The European regulatory framework has shifted more in 2024 than the features of advertising platforms themselves. The European AI Regulation, which came into effect on August 1, 2024, prohibits subliminal or manipulative techniques and requires explicit transparency whenever a user interacts with AI-generated content.
The DMA, on its part, limits the combination of personal data between services of major platforms without specific consent. Any digital marketing strategy built without integrating these constraints rests on fragile foundations.
Regulatory compliance and editorial governance in digital marketing
We observe that most articles on digital strategies in 2024 treat AI as a productivity lever, rarely as a regulated object. The European AI Act changes the game on three operational axes.
First, any content produced or modified by generative AI must be flagged as such when it is disseminated to the public. A landing page written by an LLM, an image edited by a diffusion model, a customer service chatbot: each of these cases requires a user information mechanism. Ignoring this obligation exposes one to sanctions, but more importantly, to a measurable reputational risk.
Next, manipulative interfaces (dark patterns) are subject to enhanced regulation. Conversion funnels that exploit cognitive biases, fake reviews, and fictitious urgency counters now fall under misleading commercial practices in the strict sense. Resources on digital marketing on Business Club detail these developments for companies structuring their compliance.
Finally, the DMA restricts cross-targeting between services within the same ecosystem (Google Ads + YouTube + Gmail, for example) without granular consent. In practical terms, multi-service combined audiences lose volume and precision. Advertisers who heavily relied on these complementarities must reassess their targeting architecture.
First-party data and measurement without third-party cookies: concrete trade-offs
Google announced in July 2024 that it would not proceed with the removal of third-party cookies from Chrome according to the originally planned schedule. This turnaround does not mean that third-party data remains reliable. Safari and Firefox have already been blocking these cookies for several years, which affects a significant portion of web traffic.
We recommend structuring data collection around zero-party data (voluntary declarative data) and first-party data (behavioral data on your own properties). Common mistakes regarding zero-party data remain the same:
- Asking too many questions at the wrong moment in the journey, which degrades the completion rate of forms and quizzes without improving segment quality
- Storing declarative data in a silo disconnected from the CRM or email platform, making personalization practically impossible
- Not updating collected preferences, as interests evolve within a few months, leading to campaigns disconnected from customer reality
On the measurement side, the transition to Google Analytics 4 imposes an event-based logic that breaks with the session-based model of Universal Analytics. Historical KPIs are no longer comparable without reprocessing. Many companies continue to manage their investments based on metrics whose definitions have changed.
Cookieless tracking: what actually works
Server-side tagging reduces reliance on browser cookies by shifting data collection to a proprietary server. Infrastructure costs increase, but tracking reliability improves significantly on restrictive browsers.
The conversion modeling solutions offered by Google and Meta partially compensate for missing data through statistical inference. These models remain estimates. Treating them as observed data skews budgetary trade-offs between channels.
SEO and content in the face of Google’s generative results
The Search Generative Experience (SGE), renamed AI Overviews, alters organic visibility on informational queries. Google now displays an AI-generated summary above traditional results, which reduces the click-through rate on organic links for some queries.
Purely informational and generic content loses SEO value. Pages that provide an editorial viewpoint, proprietary data, or identifiable technical expertise maintain their position, or even gain visibility in AI block citations.
For an adapted content strategy, three operational principles must be followed:
- Favor long formats with original data (internal studies, field feedback, industry benchmarks) that language models cannot synthesize from public sources
- Structure semantic markup (schema.org, structured FAQ) to facilitate extraction by generative systems and maintain visibility in answer blocks
- Invest in building a recognized author entity (E-E-A-T profiles) so that Google associates the content with a reliable source rather than interchangeable text
Social networks and social commerce: where to concentrate resources
The temptation to multiply platforms remains the most costly trap. TikTok, Instagram, LinkedIn, Pinterest: each network has its own audience mechanics. It is better to master two channels than to feed five mediocre accounts.
Social commerce (in-app native purchasing) is progressing, but its profitability heavily depends on the sector. Low average basket products and impulse buys convert. B2B offers or long-cycle products have not yet found measurable ROI.
Micro-influencers and qualified audience
Partnerships with micro-influencers (niche communities) generate engagement rates higher than campaigns with profiles that have a very broad audience. The cost per acquisition decreases, provided that creators whose audience truly matches the targeted customer segment are selected, and not just those with a related theme.
Budgetary trade-offs between paid advertising and organic partnerships should be based on actual acquisition costs, not on gross visibility volume. Too many companies continue to confuse impressions with business results.
Digital marketing in 2024 is driven less by new tools and more by a better understanding of legal constraints, reliable proprietary data, and deliberate channel choices. The companies that progress are those that reduce the number of tactics to deepen those they master.
