Marketing data and identity

Conventional TV advertising campaigns have historically relied on general audience metrics like impressions and ratings to measure outcomes. These metrics can help marketers understand how many people have seen an ad, but they don’t reveal its real-world impact, which leaves a gap between ad exposure and results.  Outcome-based TV measurement bridges this gap and helps marketers tie ad spending directly to their business goals. Instead of counting eyeballs alone, TV measurement zeroes in on what viewers do after seeing an ad — whether signing up for a service, visiting your website, or purchasing a product. TV ad measurement helps marketers adjust campaigns based on clear, trackable outcomes rather than guesswork. Let’s talk about how marketers can get started with outcome-based TV measurement and start experiencing tangible results. Why outcome-based TV measurement matters Outcome-based measurement indicates a massive shift in how marketers evaluate TV advertising success. As a principal analyst at Forrester explained, the industry is about to “move into a whole different world" where multiple metrics are tailored to advertisers’ unique goals, such as sales, store traffic, or web engagement. This shift is driven by improved tools for tracking TV outcomes, which help justify spending and clarify ROI. With TV measurement, you can see how your campaigns impact aspects of your marketing like sales and engagement. Aligning TV ad spend with business goals Every business has distinct objectives. Outcome-based measurement ties your marketing efforts to business goals and enables smarter decisions, campaign optimization, and ROI improvements. Whether you're a B2C brand wanting immediate sales or a B2B organization looking to drive website traffic, this method provides the insights needed for strategic decision-making. Marketers can deliver the most value by adjusting TV ad spending to maximize desired results: Sales goals: Identify which ads and platforms directly influence purchases to ensure TV ad spend contributes to revenue growth. Customer engagement: Link actions like website visits or app downloads to TV campaigns and refine messaging to deepen audience connections. Desired outcomes: Align ad spend with goals like consumer awareness or repeat purchases to allocate resources effectively for measurable success. Reducing wasted spend on ineffective channels Outcome-based TV measurement allows you to pinpoint which networks, times, or programs drive the most engagement and conversion. When you know your underperforming channels, you can reallocate budgets to those with a higher ROI and avoid waste. Core metrics in outcome-based TV measurement The effective implementation of outcome-based measurement requires advanced TV advertising analytics and tracking metrics that shed light on TV ad performance. Incremental lift This metric measures the increase in desired actions and business results — like purchases or site visits — that can be attributed directly to a TV campaign. Incremental lift quantifies your campaign’s impact and separates organic activity from the results your ads have driven.  Let’s say a meal kit service experiences a 20% lift in subscriptions within a single week of running TV ads compared to a week without ads. They’d want to be able to isolate the impact of their ad from their organic growth so they can determine if the growth is actually a result of the TV ads or another effort.  Attribution and conversions Attribution links TV ad exposure to specific customer actions, such as newsletter sign-ups and product purchases. Conversion data helps marketers understand the whole customer journey to optimize messaging, targeting, and channel mix to improve conversion rates. A retailer that knows 50% of TV ad viewers visit its e-commerce site within 36 hours of exposure could use that information to adjust the timing of its retargeting and align with site visit spikes.  Audience segmentation for targeted measurement Outcome-based measurement breaks down performance across target demographics and allows for granular audience segmentation so TV ads resonate with the right audiences. For example, if a luxury brand saw better TV ad performance with high-earning Millennials, they’d want to refine their campaign messaging based on this group’s habits and preferences. Customer journey tracking Knowing how viewers move from awareness to conversion is critical. Outcome-based TV measurement helps you track the customer journey by pinpointing touchpoints where engagement happens and tying these to your TV campaigns. If a fitness brand found that TV campaigns drive app downloads, it could combine app analytics and TV exposure data to find out when most of their conversions happen after ad exposure and create follow-up messaging for that window of time. Integrating these insights with other marketing channels allows you to fine-tune your messaging, channel mix, and audience targeting to drive better outcomes and deliver more personalized customer experiences. Lifetime value (LTV) Beyond immediate conversions, outcome-based TV ad measurement helps brands identify which TV campaigns attract high-value customers with long-term revenue potential. If a financial institution ran a TV ad campaign centered on its new credit card, for instance, it could use LTV to track new cardholders and determine whether ads occurring during financial news airtime produced customers with higher average annual spend compared to other segments. How outcome-based TV measurement works Outcome-based measurement is a data-driven process that involves collecting, analyzing, and applying insights to improve TV ad performance. 1. Collect data When someone sees your TV ad, they might take action, like downloading your app or buying something. Outcome-based TV measurement begins by tracking these actions and gathering data from various sources, such as: TV viewership  CRM Digital engagement  Purchase behavior Cross-platform interactions And more Data integration with digital platforms Combining TV data with insights from platforms like social media or website analytics creates a more unified view of campaign performance. This integration powers easier retargeting and better alignment between digital and TV advertising strategies. Some marketers enhance this integration further using artificial intelligence (AI) to streamline data coordination and ensure campaigns are optimized for effectiveness and ROI. 2. Connect the dots Next, marketers need to find out which actions were influenced by TV ads. It’s important to ask questions like these as you work to connect the dots: Did website traffic spike right after the ad aired? Did the ad viewers match the people who signed up for the service or made a purchase? You can link TV exposure to real-world behaviors with tools and identifiers like hashed emails,  device IDs, surveys, and privacy-safe data-matching techniques. 3. Analyze the data Then, the data needs to be analyzed for patterns like these: Which TV ads or time slots drove the most engagement? Did certain customer groups respond better than others? Was there a noticeable lift in sales or signups after the ad campaign? This step can help you uncover what’s working and what’s not. Role of advanced analytics and machine learning The data analysis required in this process can be overwhelming, time-consuming, and risky without the right tools. Fortunately, advanced analytics and fast, effective artificial intelligence tools can process large amounts of data from digital platforms, TV viewership, and customer interactions in less time to reveal accurate, actionable insights and patterns. They can also predict which audiences, messages, and channels will be most profitable so campaigns can adapt in real time, whether by reallocating spend to higher-performing channels or refining audience targeting. 4. Turn insights into action Once you have your data-derived insights, you can tweak your campaign in a number of ways, whether you decide to: Adjust your ads: If one message works better than another, lean into it. Refine your targeting: Focus on the audience segments most likely to act. Optimize your spend: Invest in channels or times that deliver the best return. For example, if you see that ads during prime time lead to more purchases than morning slots, you can shift your budget accordingly. This type of knowledge can be used to continuously improve your campaigns. Each time you run a new ad, you measure again, building on past insights to make your outcome-based TV advertising even smarter. Applications of outcome-based TV measurement Outcome-based TV measurement has wide-ranging applications across industries. Here’s how it’s helping businesses link TV ad exposure to real-world actions and optimize campaigns for better results. E-commerce and retail: Retailers can track how TV ads influence purchases and use those insights to refine their assets and target specific customer groups. A clothing retailer may track how well a TV ad boosts online traffic and in-store purchases. For instance, if a seasonal sale commercial correlates with a spike in website visits or mobile app downloads, the brand can refine its ad placement to focus on the most responsive demographics. Automotive: Automakers use outcome-based TV measurement insights to determine how ads drive dealership visits, test drives, or inquiries. A car manufacturer could analyze whether TV spots featuring a new vehicle increase traffic to its dealership locator or car configuration tool online. Healthcare: Pharmaceutical companies could assess whether TV spots lead to increased prescription fills, or a health provider could test how ads promoting flu shots result in appointment bookings through its website or app. If any messages resonate more with families, the provider can create similar campaigns for the future. How Experian enhances outcome-based TV measurement Experian has recently partnered with EDO, an outcomes-based measurement provider, to offer more granular TV measurement across platforms. Our identity resolution and matching capabilities enhance EDO’s IdentitySpine™ solution with rich consumer data, including age, gender, and household income, all in a privacy-centric way. Integrating these demographic attributes is helping advertisers achieve more precise audience insights and connect their first-party data to actionable outcomes. As a result of this collaboration, brands, agencies, and networks can optimize their TV campaigns by identifying which ads drive the most decisive engagement among specific audience segments. We’re improving accuracy, targeting, and more so advertisers can maximize the performance of their CTV strategies. Get in touch with Experian’s TV experts If you’re ready to take your data-driven TV advertising strategies to the next level, connect with our team. We combine advanced data and identity solutions as well as strong industry collaborations to help brands optimize their TV campaigns. Whether you're navigating traditional or advanced TV formats, our expertise ensures your efforts deliver maximum impact. Connect with us today to drive engagement, connect with audiences, and achieve better ROI. Let’s transform the way you measure success on TV. Reach out to our TV experts Contact us Latest posts

Originally appeared in AdExchanger Navigating the world of data and identity partners feels like scrolling through a dating app: a sea of options, but only a select few worth swiping right. To find your perfect match, look for a partner who ticks all the right boxes. Here’s your guide to finding your perfect match. 1. Identity resolution: It all starts with a strong foundation Great identity resolution depends on a rock-solid foundation. The best partners rely on offline data—like names, addresses, and emails—that rarely change, ensuring a consistent view of households, individuals, and their devices over time. You want someone who gives you the same understanding of your audience across every stage of a campaign. 2. In search of: A well-rounded, reliable identity partner When evaluating identity graphs, it’s essential to distinguish between digital-only graphs, offline graphs, and those rare gems who combine both. Digital graphs rely on digital identifiers, while offline graphs are grounded in persistent identifiers like name, address, and phone number. A partner who offers both creates a more complete and reliable view of consumers across channels, resulting in more effective targeting and measurement. 3. Match rates are like dating profiles—don’t be fooled by the numbers Match rates can look impressive, but they’re often misleading. They can also vary widely depending on the methodology and the IDs being tested. Some providers inflate match rates by limiting the scope of comparison or tweaking their standards. The real indicators of quality are the depth of the data, the quality of matches, and how often the graph is refreshed. Ideally, your partner updates their graph weekly or monthly. The inclusion of inactive IDs may inflate the perceived scale without reflecting the true addressable audience. It's like having a profile photo from ten years ago–a major no-no. 4. Authentic origins: Is their data genuine or just a catfish? Look into your partner’s data sources and place a premium on those with public records or direct to consumer relationships. Ask if they have the experience and expertise when it comes to all aspects of data processing from accuracy to privacy and security. Look for some clear third-party indicators for accuracy, like ratings from Truthset, but there is also a basic reality: either your partner is focused on privacy and accuracy, or they are just playing the scale game. Swipe left on those playing games. 5. The breadth to impress Depth matters as much as quality. Seek a partner with wide-ranging attributes that span key audience categories like demographics, interests, and purchase behavior. They should offer the flexibility to deliver both granular data scores and broad audience segments, empowering you to reach the right consumers across channels effectively. 6. The total package: Does your partner really have it all? A true, lifelong partner connects the dots seamlessly, offering a blend of data and identity that link households to devices while layering in rich marketing insights. This approach helps advertisers better understand their customers, reach the right audiences across channels, and measure the impact of their campaigns. The right partner is well-connected and ensures that all the pieces—identity, data, and activation—work in harmony. 7. Future-proof charm: Will they ghost you when cookies crumble? With the Identifier for Advertisers (IDFAs) gone, cookies on the wane, and IP addresses under scrutiny, a partner’s ability to adapt is critical. The most future-proofed solutions are based on offline identifiers like names and addresses, which are user provided and consented data points–making them more resistant to privacy changes. Additionally, look for partners who have made the necessary investments and are prepared to support the new wave of addressable IDs emerging as alternatives to traditional signals. 8. Privacy savvy: Do they respect boundaries? As privacy laws evolve, you need a partner with a strong history in privacy compliance and proactive leadership in navigating new regulations. Strong and transparent privacy policies and participation in privacy organizations are a good indicator of trustworthiness, especially as new rules emerge across different states. Look for a partner who takes data privacy as seriously as you do and gives you peace of mind when handling sensitive information. 9. Seamless connectivity: Do they play well with others? Data is only as useful as it is actionable. Connectivity across platforms is essential, so choose a partner with seamless integrations into the major platforms you rely on for advertising. This ensures your data quality and identity resolution remain intact throughout your campaigns, avoiding loss from multiple handoffs. 10. Killer customer service: Are they in it for the long haul? A great partner collaborates to solve challenges, not just to sell or upsell. Long-standing partnerships and testimonials about strong customer service are key indicators of reliability. Choose a partner who educates and guides you through technical and strategic challenges, fostering an environment where problem-solving and innovation thrive. Keep your standards high Only a handful of companies can meet these rigorous criteria, and you should refuse to settle for a partner that lacks any of these key dimensions. Successfully navigating signal loss, privacy compliance, and seamless omnichannel integration requires extensive resources, robust infrastructure, and years of expertise. Download our full matchmaking guide So, swipe right on a partner who can handle the complexities of modern marketing and deliver consistent, scalable successful marketing outcomes. Could we be your perfect match? Find out if it's a match today Latest posts

Delivering personalized customer experiences is essential, with 81% of customers preferring a personalized approach to their relationships with brands. However, 80% of consumers are concerned about how their data is used, presenting businesses with the challenge of balancing data collection and privacy with personalization. Despite consumer appetite for personalization, many organizations lack the data to make data-driven decisions: 68% of businesses don't understand how their customers think, and 82% don't confidently know their customers' pain points.  Without this critical data, businesses cannot effectively create personalized consumer connections. Experian offers businesses robust and unique data through our Marketing Attributes to empower businesses with the insights required to derive accurate insights into consumers and drive personalized experiences.  How Experian can help businesses with their data acquisition needs through Marketing Attributes Experian's Marketing Attributes allow businesses to license Experian's data attributes in part or full to provide reliable and accurate data solutions. These solutions assist companies in finding, reaching, and influencing their customers. They are supported by rigorous quality and privacy controls which has earned Experian a #1 data accuracy ranking by Truthset helping our clients reach people based on who they are, where they live, and what they do. Download our Marketing Attributes one sheet Experian has built a strong foundation of consumer behavioral and demographic data with over 5,000 attributes available across over 15 categories and verticals, helping our clients gain deep insights into their consumers. Below we go through five common use cases we have seen using Experian’s data to power various business initiatives. Exploring everyday use cases for Experian's Marketing Attributes 1. Understand areas of the country where your products or services are underserved For instance, a brand offers a diverse range of products that cater to various market segments and audience personas. They seek to gain a deeper understanding of geographic distribution to refine their marketing strategies. Specifically, they aim to identify which market areas are currently underserved, presenting a valuable opportunity for targeted marketing campaigns to boost product adoption in regions that have not fully embraced their offerings.  Utilizing Marketing Attributes from Experian, the brand can access detailed data aggregated at the geographic level. This data provides crucial insights into markets where their products have seen limited adoption yet show a strong potential for success based on the preferences of their target audiences. This approach will help the brand strategically direct its marketing efforts to areas with high growth potential. Learn how Swiss Sense drove market-specific growth strategies with Experian 2. Better understand consumers who purchase within a category Brands frequently operate based on assumptions regarding their customers' preferences and interests, yet they may lack the comprehensive data necessary to substantiate these beliefs.  Experian's Marketing Attributes provides brands with access to extensive data across 15 diverse verticals and categories. This wealth of information allows businesses to develop a holistic understanding of their customer base, enabling them to validate their assumptions and uncover valuable insights into customer behaviors. By utilizing this data, brands can significantly enhance their marketing strategies, refine their product offerings, and implement personalized tactics that resonate with their audiences on a deeper level.  3. Reach a new segment of the market for a new product offering Introducing a new product to a new segment of the market presents unique brand challenges. Without any historical customer data to draw upon, companies lack vital insights that could help them identify and reach their target audience. This absence of foundational knowledge makes it challenging to understand consumer preferences, craft suitable messaging, or determine the most effective channels for connecting with potential customers. To navigate these hurdles, brands frequently turn to Marketing Attributes for consumer research within the new segment. Analyzing demographics, common behaviors within a geographic region, or previous purchase behaviors can uncover patterns and preferences among potential customers. This deeper understanding enables them to create tailored audience models, allowing brands to develop and activate customized messaging based on common interests, identify channels consumers are most likely to engage by using TrueTouch data from Experian. 4. Create custom lookalike models based on your current customers We have found brands trying to launch an acquisition campaign to look at consumers whose behaviors and interests closely mirror those of their highest-converting customers. However, they often lack the necessary data to find new customers that look like their most loyal base.   To address this gap, they turn to Marketing Attributes in combination with Experian’s Offline Graph or Digital Graph, which allow them to pinpoint and analyze the key characteristics and behaviors that define their top customers and reach these consumers on digital or offline channels. Marketing Attributes power the insights into their client’s behaviors and Experian’s Offline or Digital Graph create the linkage to their customer base. Using these insights, the brand can develop a distinct audience model tailored to reflect their most successful customers' unique traits and preferences. This customized approach will help them reach potential new customers who will likely engage and convert. 5. Develop unique audience products We have seen clients use their own first-party data alongside Experian Marketing Attributes and other data sets they own or lease. With Experian's Offline Graph or Digital Graph, they can connect the different data sources together to create a tailored audience solution that meets the specific needs of the brand's clients and the requirements of their market segment. Exploring joint solutions Combining Experian’s Offline Graph with Marketing Attributes Many customers use Experian’s Offline Graph with Marketing Attributes to connect Experian’s data to the brand’s offline marketing strategy. Experian’s Offline Graph offers companies a license of stable offline data points, like name, address, phone number, email, geographic, date of birth, and more that provide a complete view of household and individual identities. Powering use cases like: Regional consumer insights for marketing strategy, media activation, product and location planning Offline media activation, including direct mail, telemarketing, out-of-home, and more Client-driven enrichment The combination of Offline Graph and Marketing Attributes provides unmatched consumer connectivity, enabling clients to generate custom insights, inform product strategy, and activate marketing campaigns. Offline Graph acts as the link between consumers insights and activation. Download our Offline Graph + Marketing Attributes one sheet Combining Experian's Digital Graph with Marketing Attributes The uncertainty around third-party cookies in Chrome and the overall decline in signal complicates the industry’s ability to reach the right consumer. Omnichannel media consumption results in scattered data, making it harder for marketers and platforms to understand consumer behavior and reach them across channels. These challenges call for a comprehensive solution. Our Digital Graph and Marketing Attributes solution addresses these challenges by providing identifiers for seamless cross-channel engagement. By adding Marketing Attributes, like demographic and behavioral data, marketers and platforms also gain a better understanding of their customers. This solution uses Experian’s Living Unit ID (LUID) to combine offline and digital data, giving customers deeper insights into consumer behavior, greater audience reach, and improved cross-channel visibility. Transform insights into loyalty with Experian’s Marketing Attributes Experian's Marketing Attributes enable businesses to gain valuable insight into their prospects and customers. Through this deeper understanding, they can deliver personalized experiences while successfully navigating the complexities of data acquisition and privacy. This helpful information allows brands to make strategic, informed decisions that enhance their marketing efforts. Ultimately, these insights foster more substantial, meaningful connections between businesses and their customers, leading to enhanced customer satisfaction. Get started today Latest posts

Setting sail For hospitality and travel marketers, understanding which marketing efforts lead to actual bookings can be a tidal shift. Windstar Cruises—renowned for its intimate yachts and off-the-beaten-path itineraries—wanted data-driven visibility into how digital media placements translated into confirmed reservations. Windstar turned to the strategic media expertise of MMGY, a leading integrated marketing company dedicated to the travel, tourism, and hospitality industries and Experian's marketing data and identity solutions to bridge this gap. Together, they developed a closed-loop attribution system that directly tied digital campaigns to offline passenger bookings. The challenge: Blind spots in the booking journey Windstar Cruises had plenty of top-of-funnel metrics—impressions, clicks, website sessions, cruise quote requests—but struggled to connect these indicators to confirmed reservations. Without that link, it wasn't easy to pinpoint which audience segments were most valuable in their marketing campaigns or accurately measure return on ad spend (ROAS). Traditional attribution methods and limited booking system data painted an incomplete picture, leaving Windstar to wonder which media channels and audience strategies were truly driving revenue.  MMGY and Experian: Bridging data gaps to power attribution   Comprehensive pixel tag MMGY designed an online-offline measurement strategy and coordinated with Experian to deploy pixels across Windstar's digital media placements. These pixels captured valuable event-level data—ad exposures, clicks, site visits, and more—so that every interaction could be matched back to a future booking if it occurred. Identity resolution and data enrichment Using the Experian identity graph, Experian matched Windstar’s reservation data with its extensive consumer database. This approach provided a precise, individual-level view of how digital interactions translated into real-world sales. By combining pixel data (which identifies who viewed specific ads) with reservation data (which shows who ultimately made a booking), the solution delivered a comprehensive, end-to-end, multi-touch perspective on the customer journey.  Advanced audience segmentation Utilizing MMGY’s powerful Terminal audience modeling platform—which integrates MMGY Travel Intelligence performance and intent data, Experian’s consumer intent data, and the client’s first-party data— MMGY in conjunction with Experian’s marketing analytics team developed custom audiences designed to drive incremental traveler growth. These audience segments identified travelers most likely to engage in the unique travel experiences Windstar offers. The insights revealed not only who these travelers are, but also where they consume media, how they make travel decisions, and what influences their purchasing behavior. This data guided the development of hyper-targeted media buys, ensuring Windstar’s messaging reached the right people on the right platforms at the right time—maximizing engagement and driving qualified leads. The results: Mapping spend to bookings By utilizing data connectivity and measurement, Windstar gained the insights needed to optimize every aspect of its marketing—audiences, media placements, channels, and more. This data-driven approach revealed which tactics were most effective and enabled Windstar to refine campaigns in real-time for maximum impact. 6,500+ bookings attributed to digital efforts: Over 6,500 bookings—valued at over $20 million—were tied to specific MMGY-managed placements, demonstrating which data-driven tactics led passengers to book. This level of attribution was only possible because we helped Windstar measure and connect the right data points. 13:1 ROAS: By investing $1.48 million in highly trackable, data-informed media, Windstar achieved an impressive 13:1 return on ad spend. Data connectivity gave Windstar the clarity needed to target the right audiences and channels—turning every $1 of spend into $13 of bookings. Actionable cost per booking benchmark: Armed with the ability to map ad spend to individual bookings, Windstar’s average cost per booking settled at $236. With insight into which audiences and placements performed best, Windstar adjusted its strategy in real-time, lowering acquisition costs across the board. High-value reservations: Attributed bookings were, on average, $500 higher in value than non-attributed bookings. By focusing on the right customer segments and messages—determined through precise measurement and segmentation—Windstar secured more bookings and maximized revenue per guest. Terminal Audiences outperformed: For Terminal-targeted segments, the ROAS soared to 28:1 with nearly half the cost per booking compared to non-Terminal audiences. This outcome illustrates how advanced data segmentation and connectivity deliver more profitable guests at lower acquisition costs—further proof that continuous optimization grounded in real data pays off. What this means for travel and hospitality Windstar's success story illuminates a bigger truth for the travel and hospitality industry: closing the attribution loop is no longer optional. In a fiercely competitive marketplace, brands need concrete proof that their marketing investments drive awareness and translates into real revenue. By marrying MMGY's travel-specific marketing acumen with Experian's marketing data and identity solutions, travel brands can: Invest with confidence: Marketing investment flows to the most effective channels and placements based on actual bookings, not superficial metrics. Refine strategies: Real-time attribution data creates a feedback loop marketers can use to iterate on messaging, creativity, and targeting for even stronger results. Capture higher-value guests: Pinpointing and appealing to likely travelers allows marketers to increase booking volume and total revenue per booking. Charting a course for data-driven success By seamlessly linking digital exposure to confirmed reservations, Experian and MMGY gave Windstar Cruises the compass they needed to navigate the complexities of digital marketing confidently. This new level of insight is empowering Windstar to double down on the campaigns, creatives, and segments that move the needle the most. For travel and hospitality brands worldwide, data-driven attribution goes beyond simply understanding what happened—it’s about shaping what comes next. When marketing decisions are guided by real customer journeys and precise ROI metrics, brands can make more innovative investments, foster stronger guest relationships, and chart a course toward sustainable growth. Ready to embark on your own data-driven journey? Contact us to learn how Experian and MMGY can help you create impactful, measurable marketing strategies. Contact us About MMGY MMGY is a leading integrated marketing company dedicated to the travel, tourism, and hospitality industries. With deep expertise spanning research, brand strategy, media planning, and creative execution, MMGY helps global travel brands forge meaningful connections with consumers. By utilizing data-driven insights, cutting-edge technology, and decades of experience, MMGY delivers strategic programs that capture attention and drive measurable results for its clients—ensuring that every marketing investment is tied to clear business outcomes.   Latest posts

Originally appeared in Streaming Media Magazine Navigating today’s fragmented, privacy-conscious media landscape is a bit like stepping into a dense jungle. The buy-side—marketers, agencies, and demand-side platforms (DSPs)—must find their way through signal loss, measurement challenges, and evolving consumer expectations. But this isn’t just a challenge; it’s a strategic opportunity. Let’s dive into how buy-side players can use Experian’s advanced data and identity solutions to be their guide through the jungle and emerge as winners. Marketers: Maintaining personalization and measurement across channels Marketers are navigating an increasingly fragmented media jungle, where the deprecation of signals like cookies, mobile ad IDs (MAIDs), and IP addresses makes finding and understanding audiences feel like guesswork. To chart a clear path, marketers need a reliable compass—and identity resolution provides exactly that. A strong identity provider, grounded in offline data like names, addresses, phone numbers, and emails, acts as a guide through the chaos. By connecting offline signals with digital identifiers in a privacy-first manner, marketers can uncover the relationships between households and devices, then enrich those profiles with valuable marketing data. With a complete view of your customers, you gain deeper insights and can seamlessly reach the right audience across channels—even as signals evolve. It’s a marketer’s North Star—constant, dependable, and always pointing you in the right direction. How Experian can help Imagine a financial services brand aiming to connect with high-net-worth individuals across today’s fragmented media world. They’ve excelled on social and search but now want to dive into connected TV (CTV) and other emerging channels. Enter Experian’s Digital Graph. By seamlessly connecting digital identifiers like MAIDs, CTV IDs and hashed emails (HEMs), our graph becomes the bridge that unifies their audience across every channel. Suddenly, the same audience that saw their ad on social during lunch is now watching a personalized spot on CTV that evening, all thanks to Experian. The result? A cohesive campaign that delivers hyper-relevant messages, stronger engagement, and measurable success. With Experian, fragmentation becomes connection, and personalization stays powerful across the entire media landscape. Agencies: Strategic partners in a fragmented world Agencies are the architects of the identity jungle, building bridges that guide brands through fragmentation and deliver campaign success. Thriving in this terrain requires data solutions that create actionable insights, enable personalization, and drive measurable outcomes. To meet marketers’ demands, many agencies have invested heavily—acquiring data companies or forging strategic partnerships to strengthen their foundations in data and identity solutions. These investments help them connect fragmented audience data and unlock new opportunities for their clients. But even with in-house capabilities, agencies often need more—more attributes, more integrations, and greater connectivity. In the jungle of identity, success isn’t just about building better data assets; it’s about ensuring those assets can be utilized across platforms. How Experian can help Picture a large independent agency ready to step up its game—expanding beyond its middle-market niche to attract enterprise-level clients. But to play in the big leagues, they need more than a solid strategy; they need data and identity solutions that deliver a competitive edge. Enter Experian. With our rich identity graph and deep customer insights, the agency can unlock new opportunities for its clients. Imagine offering enterprises the ability to connect fragmented audience data, create hyper-targeted campaigns, and measure success across every channel. The payoff? The agency doesn’t just win over new enterprise clients; it strengthens relationships with existing customers by proving it can navigate today’s fragmented media landscape with precision and measurable impact. With Experian, the agency becomes an indispensable strategic partner in the data-driven advertising world. DSPs: Navigating signal loss with a multi-ID strategy For DSPs, navigating the identity jungle means forging a path through the winding trails of cookieless strategies. With third-party cookies fading and no single identity solution—like Unified ID 2.0 (UID2)—able to cover all media engagement, DSPs must adapt to a multi-ID world. The challenge is twofold: finding flexible solutions to manage a multitude of identifiers while staying compliant with a growing number of state-level privacy laws. It’s not just a technical problem; it’s a call for strategic vision. And the way to thrive in this ever-changing terrain is to invest in identity solutions that connect digital and offline identifiers to a single customer profile. How Experian can help Imagine a DSP navigating a complex web of identifiers—UID2, HEMs, proprietary IDs—while juggling compliance with evolving privacy laws. Experian steps in as the ultimate connector. Our identity solutions, powered by stable offline data, are signal-agnostic and integrated across the advertising ecosystem. This ensures that DSPs can confidently manage multiple identity frameworks, keeping campaigns targeted, measurable, and compliant. With Experian, DSPs gain more than a stopgap solution; they get a future-proof identity strategy. The result? Better targeting, smoother omnichannel execution, and the strategic edge needed to thrive in a fragmented, multi-ID world. Turning identity challenges into a strategic advantage The identity jungle is a thriving ecosystem for those with the right guide. Experian helps marketers, agencies, and DSPs chart the course by unifying multiple identifiers into a single, complete customer profile. With the right tools (and a good map), buy-side stakeholders can learn more about their customer, reach audiences across channels, and deliver personalized marketing. Read our companion article to learn how the sell-side is approaching data and identity challenges. Read now Get started today Latest posts

Swiss Sense’s mission is to provide exceptional sleep comfort for all. The European retailer analyzed their customer data in one market to better understand their ideal customer profile and scale these learnings to other markets. To achieve this, Swiss Sense used Experian’s Mosaic® data, a profiling tool that segments households into categories based on their lifestyle, interests, and demographics. Using Mosaic data, Swiss Sense identified key customer personas and tailored their communications to match. Partnering with Experian, they created personalized product recommendations and delivered targeted messaging through direct mail, out-of-home (OOH) advertising, and leafleting campaigns. What is Mosiac? Experian’s Mosaic data helps businesses understand their customers better by grouping households into segments based on their lifestyles, interests, and financial situations. It gives marketers a clear picture of who their customers are, so they can create more targeted campaigns. Challenge: Utilize data-driven insights to drive market-specific growth strategies Swiss Sense wanted to expand its presence across all of its markets. To achieve this, they analyzed customer data in the Netherlands to identify their ideal customer profiles and replicate their success in other regions. Their objectives included: Develop regional strategies Integrate data-driven insights into their local and international marketing strategy The solution to achieve data-driven marketing Swiss Sense saw that Experian could provide a data-driven view of customers in other countries using both Global and local Mosaic profiles. They chose Experian as their partner to ensure a persona-based segmentation across multiple countries. This partnership allowed Swiss Sense to: Gain consistent customer insights across all operational markets.  Equip marketing and operational teams with precise data for targeting and personalization. Drive adoption of the segmentation strategy by giving end users access to a bespoke dashboard with the data. Results: Driving targeted marketing and personalized experiences with Mosiac By partnering with Experian, Swiss Sense was able to seamlessly implement a solution tailored to their unique needs. Swiss Sense gained an overview of its customer base while using the more granular Mosaic data in each country to gain the optimal understanding of each region’s customers.  These insights helped Swiss Sense’s marketing team, allowing them to craft targeted customer content, suggest relevant imagery, and adopt the right tone of voice. Identifying key Mosaic growth segments further enabled Swiss Sense to focus marketing efforts on regions and cities over-indexing for their ideal customer types. This led to the execution of highly targeted offline campaigns, including: Direct mail flyers delivered to target audiences’ homes OOH advertising in cities where key segments over-index Distributing leaflets in public places such as target town centers Download our case study for the full details of Swiss Sense’s journey to international growth.  Download the full case study now Contact us About Swiss Sense Founded by the Diks family in 2006, Swiss Sense is a Dutch family-owned retailer specializing in high-quality beds, mattresses, and bedroom accessories. With over 2,000 employees and stores across multiple European countries, Swiss Sense is dedicated to providing exceptional sleep comfort for all. To learn more, please visit www.SwissSense.nl. Latest posts

Suppose you're watching your favorite TV show, and an ad suddenly catches your attention. It urges you to take immediate action, whether to call a number, visit a website, or text a keyword like ‘DETAILS’ to a specific number for more information. This is direct response television (DRTV), a powerful form of advertising available on all TV types — including live, cable, and streaming — that directly connects brands with consumers to drive immediate engagement and measurable results.

Originally appeared on MarTech Series Marketing’s understanding of identity has evolved rapidly over the past decade, much like the shifting media landscape itself. From the early days of basic direct mail targeting to today's complex omnichannel environment, identity has become both more powerful and more fragmented. Each era has brought new tools, challenges, and opportunities, shaping how brands interact with their customers. We’ve moved from traditional media like mail, newspapers, and linear/network TV, to cable TV, the internet, mobile devices, and apps. Now, multiple streaming platforms dominate, creating a far more complex media landscape. As a result, understanding the customer journey and reaching consumers across these various touchpoints has become increasingly difficult. Managing frequency and ensuring effective communication across channels is now more challenging than ever. This development has led to a fragmented view of the consumer, making it harder for marketers to ensure that they are reaching the right audience at the right time while also avoiding oversaturation. Marketers must now navigate a fragmented customer journey across multiple channels, each with its own identity signals, to stitch together a cohesive view of the customer. Let’s break down this evolution, era by era, to understand how identity has progressed—and where it’s headed. 2010-2015: The rise of digital identity – Cookies and MAIDs Between 2010 and 2015, the digital era fundamentally changed how marketers approached identity. Mobile usage surged during this time, and programmatic advertising emerged as the dominant method for reaching consumers across the internet. The introduction of cookies and mobile advertising IDs (MAIDs) became the foundation for tracking users across the web and mobile apps. With these identifiers, marketers gained new capabilities to deliver targeted, personalized messages and drive efficiency through programmatic advertising. This era gave birth to powerful tools for targeting. Marketers could now follow users’ digital footprints, regardless of whether they were browsing on desktop or mobile. This leap in precision allowed brands to optimize spend and performance at scale, but it came with its limitations. Identity was still tied to specific browsers or devices, leaving gaps when users switched platforms. The fragmentation across different devices and the reliance on cookies and MAIDs meant that a seamless, unified view of the customer was still out of reach. 2015-2020: The age of walled gardens From 2015 to 2020, the identity landscape grew more complex with the rise of walled gardens. Platforms like Facebook, Google, and Amazon created closed ecosystems of first-party data, offering rich, self-declared insights about consumers. These platforms built massive advertising businesses on the strength of their user data, giving marketers unprecedented targeting precision within their environments. However, the rise of walled gardens also marked the start of new challenges. While these platforms provided detailed identity solutions within their walls, they didn’t communicate with one another. Marketers could target users with pinpoint accuracy inside Facebook or Google, but they couldn’t connect those identities across different ecosystems. This siloed approach to identity left marketers with an incomplete picture of the customer journey, and brands struggled to piece together a cohesive understanding of their audience across platforms. The promise of detailed targeting was tempered by the fragmentation of the landscape. Marketers were dealing with disparate identity solutions, making it difficult to track users as they moved between these closed environments and the open web. 2020-2025: The multi-ID landscape – CTV, retail media, signal loss, and privacy By 2020, the identity landscape had splintered further, with the rise of connected TV (CTV) and retail media adding even more complexity to the mix. Consumers now engaged with brands across an increasing number of channels—CTV, mobile, desktop, and even in-store—and each of these channels had its own identifiers and systems for tracking. Simultaneously, privacy regulations are tightening the rules around data collection and usage. This, coupled with the planned deprecation of third-party cookies and MAIDs has thrown marketers into a state of flux. The tools they had relied on for years were disappearing, and new solutions had yet to fully emerge. The multi-ID landscape was born, where brands had to navigate multiple identity systems across different platforms, devices, and environments. Retail media networks became another significant player in the identity game. As large retailers like Amazon and Walmart built their own advertising ecosystems, they added yet another layer of first-party data to the mix. While these platforms offer robust insights into consumer behavior, they also operate within their own walled gardens, further fragmenting the identity landscape. With cookies and MAIDs being phased out, the industry began to experiment with alternatives like first-party data, contextual targeting, and new universal identity solutions. The challenge and opportunity for marketers lies in unifying these fragmented identity signals to create a consistent and actionable view of the customer. 2025: The omnichannel imperative Looking ahead to 2025 and beyond, the identity landscape will continue to evolve, but the focus remains the same: activating and measuring across an increasingly fragmented and complex media environment. Consumers now expect seamless, personalized experiences across every channel—from CTV to digital to mobile—and marketers need to keep up. The future of identity lies in interoperability, scale, and availability. Marketers need solutions that can connect the dots across different platforms and devices, allowing them to follow their customers through every stage of the journey. Identity must be actionable in real-time, allowing for personalization and relevance across every touchpoint, so that media can be measurable and attributable. Brands that succeed in 2025 and beyond will be those that invest in scalable, omnichannel identity solutions. They’ll need to embrace privacy-friendly approaches like first-party data, while also ensuring their systems can adapt to an ever-changing landscape. Adapting to the future of identity The evolution of identity has been marked by increasing complexity, but also by growing opportunity. As marketers adapt to a world without third-party cookies and MAIDs, the need for unified identity solutions has never been more urgent. Brands that can navigate the multi-ID landscape will unlock new levels of efficiency and personalization, while those that fail to adapt risk falling behind. The path forward is clear: invest in identity solutions that bridge the gaps between devices, platforms, and channels, providing a full view of the customer. The future of marketing belongs to those who can manage identity in a fragmented world—and those who can’t will struggle to stay relevant. 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Originally appeared on Total Retail Retail media networks (RMNs) continue to demonstrate how they can be a powerful monetization driver for retailers, creating a win-win-win for everyone involved. Retailers can monetize their valuable first-party data as well as their online and in-store inventory, while customers benefit from timely, relevant content that enhances their shopping experience. At the same time, advertisers can reach highly targeted audiences at critical moments near the point of purchase Achieving this type of success requires overcoming challenges around fragmented and incomplete first-party data, which can limit a retailer's ability to organize and use their data effectively. Additionally, many RMNs lack the analytical capacity to generate customer insights, build addressable audiences, and accurately measure success. To realize the full potential of their platforms, RMNs need partners that provide complementary data, strong identity solutions, and the expertise to transform insights into actionable strategies. This allows RMNs to drive winning outcomes for themselves, marketers, and their customers. Here are the five steps an RMN should consider when selecting the right partner. 1. Build an identity foundation First, the right partner needs to be able to organize and clean customer data. Given the millions of customer records and data points that a retailer has, RMNs need to make sure their data is highly usable. Whether it is a known customer record or an unknown customer with incomplete data, partners should fill in missing information and connect fragmented customer records to a single profile. For example, RMNs need to know that a purchase made in-store is by the same customer who bought online. The best partners will then organize those profiles into households since targeting (and purchasing) is often done at the household level. Without a strong identity foundation future steps of segmentation, insights, audience creation, and activation will not be successful. Experian identity Experian's identity solutions provide RMNs with a comprehensive and accurate view of their customers across both offline and digital environments. We clean an RMN's first-party data and organize their customer records into households since targeting is often done at the household level and purchases are made at the household level. Using Experian's Offline and Digital Graphs we work with the RMN to fill in the missing information they have on their customers (e.g. name, address, phone number or digital IDs like hashed emails, mobile ad IDs, CTV IDs, Universal IDs like UID2 or ID5 IDs). This ensures that the retailers' entire customer base can be reached - and measured - across devices and channels. 2. Segment your customers An RMN’s ability to segment its customer base and derive insights depends on the availability and usability of their data assets – not to mention some serious analytical chops. Some RMNs will split their customers into different product segments based on what’s relevant to an advertiser. For example, a home improvement retailer may segment customers by who is buying DIY supplies versus improvement services.  Other RMNs may develop custom segments from their customer data and third-party data sources, so that advertisers can personalize their marketing based on life stage, age, income level, geography, and other factors. Either approach is effective but requires working with a partner who has high quality data and deep analytical expertise to develop those segments. Segment with Experian Experian Marketing Data helps an RMN learn about their customer beyond their first-party data. With access to 5,000 marketing attributes, RMNs can fill in the holes in their understanding of a customer. We provide them with demographic, geographic, finance, home purchase, interests and behaviors, lifestyle, auto data and more. RMNs can use this enriched data set to create addressable audience segments. 3. Generate actionable insights about these segments Once the RMN determines how they will segment their customers, they can utilize demographic, attitudinal, interest, and behavioral data from a trusted partner to develop a customer profile that compares its customers against a relevant sample of consumers. Here, the RMN will gain insight that will help them answer questions about its customers. Examples include:  What age and income groups are more likely to purchase my product? What is the current life stage of my customers – do they have children, are they married, are they empty-nesters? Is price or quality more important to customers in their decision-making process? What sort of activities do my customers enjoy? How frequently do my customers shop for similar merchandise? What media channels do my customers use to get their information? Expanded insights with Experian With Experian’s advanced customer profiling, RMNs can go beyond basic customer segmentation. We build detailed customer profiles by utilizing accurate, attribute-rich consumer data, so RMNs can gain a more comprehensive understanding of their customer’s preferences, life stages, and purchasing behaviors.  Having this insight enables the RMN to: Design a targeted email campaign promoting home essentials to recently married new homeowners. Develop a social media post announcing the opening of a new hardware store to users within a specific location interested in do-it-yourself products. Create brochures and flyers at a local community event tailored towards parents with small children that promote equipment for youth sports leagues. 4. Create high quality lookalike audiences The RMN now knows what distinguishes their customers from other consumers and can create audiences that enable advertisers to run personalized marketing campaigns at scale. RMNs can do this in several different ways: Work with a data provider who can create custom audiences for the RMN (e.g., Ages 40-49 and Leisure Travelers and past purchase of travel item) These custom audiences are created by joining multiple first- and third-party data attributes found to be significant in the customer profile or using machine learning techniques to develop a custom audience unique to the advertiser.   Custom audiences with Experian With an enriched understanding of their customers, RMNs can create addressable custom audience segments, including lookalike audiences, for advertisers. 5. Expand addressability of audiences and activate on multiple destinations Once audiences are created, RMNs will want to increase a marketer’s reach across on-site and off-site channels. With the right identity graph partner, an RMN can add digital identifiers to customer records that enable activation across media channels, including programmatic display, connected television (CTV), or social. RMNs should work with identity providers that are not reliant on third-party cookies. They should select partners that offer more stable digital IDs in their graph like mobile ad IDs (MAIDs), hashed emails (HEMs), CTV IDs, and universal IDs like Unified I.D. 2.0 (UID2). Experian powers data-driven advertising through connectivity Using Experian's Digital Graph, RMNs expand the addressability of their audiences by assigning digital identifiers to customer records. Marketers will be able to reach an RMNs customers onsite as well as offsite since Experian provides several addressable IDs. Audiences can be activated across an RMNs owned and operated platform as well as extended programmatically to TV and the open web through Experian's integrations across the ecosystem. Maximize your RMN’s revenue potential with Experian Organizing customer data, segmenting customers, generating insights, creating addressable audiences, and activating campaigns are all critical steps for an RMN to realize that revenue potential. RMNs should select a partner that provides the data, identity, and analytical resources to create the winning formula for marketers, customers, and retailers.  Experian’s data and identity solutions are designed to help RMNs maximize their revenue potential. Reach out to our team to discover how we can support your path to RMN success. Connect with us Latest posts