Bridging disparate data in a fragmented world
In today’s world, consumers engage with brands across multiple platforms, including social media, online marketplaces, in-store experiences, and customer service touchpoints. However, the main challenge for marketers and advertisers is the fragmentation of customer data across these different channels. Each platform generates its own set of data, which is stored in different databases and formats. Integrating these various data sources to create a unified view of the customer is a complex task involving technology and understanding customer behavior across different digital and physical channels.
Businesses must link these data fragments to avoid creating a disconnected customer experience. For example, a person may browse products on a mobile app, ask questions through a customer service chat, and eventually purchase in an online marketplace. Traditional data analysis methods often need to recognize these activities as those of a single customer, which can result in missed opportunities to deliver personalized customer experiences across the customer journey.
Identity resolution: The key to a unified customer experience
Connecting online interactions across various platforms is a challenge for brands. Identity resolution enables enterprises to overcome this challenge by stitching together disparate signals and records to orchestrate experiences and analyze outcomes more effectively. By pairing Experian’s identity capabilities with AWS Clean Rooms, enterprises can securely collaborate with their partners to derive deeper insights without exposing sensitive underlying data sets.
This partnership between AWS and Experian enables effective matching between disparate data sets, bolstering privacy-enhanced media planning, insights, data enrichment, media activation, and measurement use cases. Depending on their distinct needs and existing identifiers, customers can use two specific offerings of Experian’s identity resolution solutions paired with AWS Clean Rooms.
Experian’s identity resolution products ensure a frictionless brand experience across various channels, enhancing the customer journey from start to finish. Brands can employ our adaptable identity resolution solutions to forge connections between contextual, behavioral, lifestyle, and purchase-based data sources, assembling comprehensive customer profiles. Use dependable digital data to make informed decisions and elevate consumer engagement. Advanced deterministic and probabilistic features, combined with data science and cutting-edge technology, work hand in hand to mitigate risk and uphold data privacy.
Such recognition enables a more comprehensive understanding of your clientele, fostering trust and amplifying campaign effectiveness by utilizing securely managed, standardized customer data. With this strategic approach, businesses can achieve their objectives regulatory-compliant.
The consumer perspective: Why consistency matters
Data fragmentation can lead to inconsistent experiences for consumers, which can be frustrating and erode brand trust. For instance, imagine receiving a promotional email for a product you already purchased through an app or being targeted for a product you decided against.
Consumers are increasingly tech-savvy and demand a seamless, integrated experience regardless of how they interact with a brand. They want to feel valued and recognized at every touchpoint and don’t care about the complexities of data analytics. As a result, brands face significant pressure to get identity resolution right.
Data security and privacy: A Fort Knox for your data
AWS Clean Rooms empowers their customers to establish a secure data clean room within minutes, facilitating collaboration with any other entity within AWS. This fosters the generation of unique insights regarding advertising campaigns, investment decisions, clinical research, and more. With AWS Clean Rooms, the need to store or maintain a separate copy of data outside the AWS environment for subsequent dispatch to another party for consumer insight analysis, marketing measurement, forecasting, or risk assessment becomes obsolete.
AWS Clean Rooms provides an expansive set of privacy-enhancing controls for clean rooms. This includes query controls, query output restrictions, and query logging that allows customers to tailor restrictions on the queries executed by each clean room participant. Moreover, AWS Clean Rooms include advanced cryptographic computing tools that maintain data encryption—even during query processing—to adhere to stringent data-handling policies. This process employs a client-side encryption tool—an SDK or command line interface (CLI)—that utilizes a shared secret key with other participants in an AWS Clean Rooms collaboration.
With a wealth of expertise in data privacy management, Experian enhances campaign effectiveness and fosters trust by managing standardized customer data securely. By using the identity graph, you can preserve a unique identity for each customer. This strategy enables you to comprehensively understand your clientele and reach your business objectives in a regulatory-compliant manner.
The future of data-driven marketing starts here
AWS customers can use AWS Clean Rooms to establish their own clean rooms in mere minutes, initiating the analysis of their collective data sets without sharing their underlying data with each other. Customers can use the AWS Management Console to choose their collaboration partners, select data sets, and configure participant restrictions. With AWS Clean Rooms, customers can effortlessly collaborate with hundreds of thousands of companies already using AWS without needing to move data out of AWS or upload it to a different platform. When running queries, AWS Clean Rooms accesses data in its original location and applies built-in, adaptable analysis rules to assist customers in maintaining control over their data.
Coupled with Experian’s trusted data privacy management and unique Experian ID, businesses can effectively manage customer data, secure partners’ communication, and achieve regulatory-compliance objectives. This combination allows companies to use data-backed insights to supercharge their marketing initiatives, resulting in more meaningful customer interactions, improved match rates, and business success.
About the authors
Kalyani Koppisetti, Principal Partner Solution Architect, AWS
Kalyani Koppisetti is a technology leader with over 25 years of experience in the Financial Services Industry. In her current role at AWS, Kalyani advises financial services partners on best-practice cloud architecture. Kalyani works closely with internal and external stakeholders to identify industry technical trends, develop strategies, and execute them to help Financial Services Industry partners build innovative solutions and services on AWS. Technical and Solution interests include Cloud Computing, Software-as-a-Service, Artificial Intelligence, Big Data, Storage Virtualization and Data Protection.
Matt Miller, Business Development Principal, AWS
In his role as Business Development Principal at AWS, Matt drives customer and partner adoption for the AWS Clean Rooms service specializing in advertising and marketing industry use cases. Matt believes in the primacy of privacy-enhanced data collaboration and interoperability underpinning data-driven marketing imperatives from customer experience to addressable advertising. Prior to AWS, Matt led strategy and go-to-market efforts for ad technologies, large agencies, and consumer data products purpose-built to inform smarter marketing and deliver better customer experiences.
Tyler Middleton, Sr. Partner Marketing Manager, Experian Marketing Services
Tyler Middleton is the Partner Marketing Lead at Experian. With almost 20 years of strategic marketing experience, Tyler’s focus is on creating marketing strategies that effectively promote the unique value propositions of each of our partners’ brands. Tyler helps our strategic partners communicate their mutual value proposition and find opportunities to stand out in the AdTech industry. Tyler is an alumnus of the Seattle University MBA program and enjoys finding new marketing pathways for our growing partner portfolio.
Latest posts
Experian Marketing Services and Data Quality President Genevieve Juillard recently sat down with Zach Rodgers, host of the AdExchanger Talks podcast to discuss the future of identity, the importance of data transparency and privacy, and our recent acquisition of Tapad. Genevieve focused on the opportunity for our industry to reimagine an advertising ecosystem that is resilient and adaptable; one that takes advantage of emerging data and prioritizes data transparency and consumer privacy. She also discussed the importance of advertising strategies that put consumers at the heart of every decision and give them more control over their data. Genevieve shared with AdExchanger that Experian’s acquisition of Tapad, a global leader in digital identity resolution, was a natural fit for our company. Tapad’s approach and role in the ecosystem is very much aligned with Experian’s, which is to develop solutions that are resilient to industry and consumer changes. The combination of our capabilities supports interoperability across all types of identifiers, both online and offline, and will position us to help our clients navigate the post-third-party cookie world. To learn more about Experian’s plans to support an effective advertising ecosystem that will evolve with our dynamic industry, listen to the full podcast Embracing ‘Healthy Fragmentation’ In Ad Tech, With Genevieve Juillard. Get in touch
It’s been over a year since Google announced they’d be deprecating the third-party cookie and in that time there’s been a major focus on two types of cookieless identity solutions. Identity vendors and marketers are strategizing which of these two future solutions best fits their needs so they can achieve privacy-safe scale once third-party cookies are no longer available for use on Chrome. Let’s break down these solutions and the considerations marketers need to take into account when deciding what partners to move forward with in the future of identity resolution. Authenticated Traffic Solutions Authenticated traffic solutions (ATS) are a type of digital identification that asks the end-user to identify themselves via personal information, most commonly email address. Often, you’ll see self-authentication at the point of entry to a website that asks you to create an account or login immediately to access the content you are seeking. E-commerce sites use authentication to keep track of consumer purchases and inform advertising decisions for that customer; and publishers use it to tailor featured content, or, more importantly for this discussion, leverage it within the ad ecosystem for targeting. While authentication can provide very valuable user data for audience segmenting and targeting, it can be limited in scale for a single publisher to leverage and monetize on their own. That’s why some identity vendors have worked to integrate themselves within as many publisher authentication modules as possible, so that they can create an aggregate of scale for the ad ecosystem to tap into. But, even this isn’t going to deliver the reach marketers truly thirst for. Alternatively, Facebook has the scale for authenticated traffic, but they keep their data inside a walled garden, so the utility of those authenticated users is only valuable within the Facebook ecosystem. So how can authenticated traffic solutions increase scale to broaden the scope of identifiers they can collect and leverage? Hint: a few of the biggest players have already figured it out. It’s the single sign-on. Google is probably the largest purveyor of a single-sign on solution that can directly impact advertising capabilities. Can you think of a site you visit that doesn’t offer a sign-in with your existing Google account? It’s a short list. Google has integrated themselves into so many applications and publishers that “Login with Gmail” is just second nature (you pictured the Gmail logo when you read that, didn’t you?). Now, if you’re about to purchase something you found off an Instagram ad, or perhaps a retailer you buy from regularly, you’ve probably noticed options to proceed with your checkout via “Amazon pay” or “Apple pay”. These are also single-sign ons. You’re authenticating yourself through Amazon or Apple to that retailer in exchange for A- the safety and security that Amazon or Apple provide for your financial information and B- skipping the annoying process of manually entering personal information over and over again at point of sale. It’s starting to sound like there’s a lot of authenticated data out there isn’t it? Well, that’s true, but again, Amazon and Apple are walled gardens. Amazon is working diligently to build out their own ecosystem to leverage their content and retail channel data for a holistic offering. And Apple keeps user data very close to the chest, constantly limiting its utility for themselves and advertisers. So what is identity resolution doing about it? The Trade Desk announced their solution; Unified ID 2.0, which promises to leverage email authenticated identity for a truly scaled solution for publishers via Javascript through Prebid. By handing over UID2.0 to an independent unbiased organization like Prebid, The Trade Desk is creating instant scale and trust in their solution. Unauthenticated Traffic Solutions Unlike ATS, unauthenticated traffic solutions do not rely on a log-in to identify a user, but they also don’t rely on third-party cookies. Instead, unauthenticated solutions (UATS) leverage their existing streams of real-time data through Javascript on publisher sites or an SDK (software development kit used by apps). The type of information UATS solutions can collect via Javascript or SDK vary, but it can include IP address, user agent and device level info. But being able to read this information at the point of entry to a website does not make a quality identifier. The best unauthenticated solutions will have the ability to set or ingest this information into a unique ID through an infrastructure with incredibly fast speed that can process trillions of anonymous data signals across multiple channels and devices. And even more so, be able to interpret those signals into a profile using machine learning– all at the moment a user enters a domain. It sounds complicated because it is, but it also has a lot of potential. The identity space cannot rest solely on authenticated traffic solutions, because, as you can see, it could limit ownership and operability to just a few power players/walled gardens. This doesn’t help the larger ecosystem monetize and personalize ad inventory. The right unauthenticated solution, however, can unify cross-device individuals and households at scale, because they’re integrated on the broadest number of publishers/SDKs across platforms, have the best algorithms to build confident connections between identifiers, and are universally transactable across the most common sell and demand side platforms. Think of it as the perfect partner- speaking a common language that everyone in the ecosystem understands and acts on. Today more than twenty cookieless identifiers are available in market for the ad ecosystem, and Google hasn’t even announced a date of deprecation. It’s important to be on the lookout for differentiators like scale and precision. Most importantly, choosing a truly cross-device partner will be key, especially as more digital devices and IDs grow in adoption, like CTV has this past year. Taking advantage of both What we will come to find, once the third-party cookie is obsolete, is that choosing just one of these solution types, or partners, will be a disadvantage. The more the industry comes together to collaborate on solutions, the more apparent it is that both of them have value, and thus employing both solutions will give marketers the best opportunities. Tapad, now part of Experian, recently announced the launch of Switchboard; a module within our identity solution; The Tapad Graph, to create this agnostic interoperability for identifiers of all types, and choice and control for the ad tech vendors and marketers who want them. By instantly creating the ability to partner with multiple solutions, Tapad + Experian is ensuring that all use cases for the third-party cookie live on in our cookieless future. Get in touch
Tapad launches global privacy-safe solution to provide continuity in the absence of third-party cookies Switchboard, a module within The Tapad Graph, will connect emerging cookieless identifiers to traditional IDs, creating a more holistic view of the consumer and driving value exchange within the advertising ecosystem Tapad, part of Experian, a global leader in cross-device digital identity resolution, and a part of Experian, announced today the launch of Switchboard, a first-of-its-kind solution to help navigate the evolving cookieless landscape. Switchboard, a module within The Tapad Graph, will operate as a global, privacy-safe solution to provide continuity in the absence of third-party cookies by connecting new cookieless identifiers to traditional digital IDs for a comprehensive view of consumers and their digital touchpoints. Switchboard will enable interoperability across the growing number of these digital identifiers and the value exchange between publishers, content creators and consumers. Leading digital identity solutions partnering with Tapad, part of Experian at the launch of Switchboard include Unified ID 2.0, ID5, Lotame Panorama ID, BritePool, Retargetly IDx and Audigent Halo ID. Tapad, part of Experian plans to expand support to additional identity solutions on an ongoing basis. In addition to these identity solutions, early partners across the ecosystem include The Trade Desk, Amobee, Martin, ShareThis, Eyeota and Catalina. “This diverse group of launch partners and testing customers will prove that Switchboard is an important tenet for the future of identity resolution. We’re excited to be proactive in our approach to give marketers time to adapt new solutions and test their function in tandem with the third-party cookie, while continuing to give our customers flexibility and control,” said Mark Connon, General Manager of Tapad, part of Experian. “Facilitating access and usage of 1st party identifiers is crucial to help marketers prepare for the cookieless future. Thanks to Switchboard, ID5's cookieless IDs will be available to a wider audience of brands and agencies and enable them to run effective, data-driven campaigns beyond the third-party cookie,” said Mathieu Roche Co-founder & CEO of ID5. Switchboard provides value across the marketing and advertising ecosystem as the need for the ability to support multiple cookieless ID’s across ad tech increases throughout 2021. With a decade of expertise creating digital identity resolution products, Tapad, part of Experian is poised to solve this challenge through innovation and quality, privacy-safe data-driven solutions. “Interoperability is paramount for brand marketers, agencies, publishers and platforms if we want to support an open and free Internet and break free of the stranglehold of walled gardens,” said Pierre Diennet, Global Partnerships at Lotame. ”Lotame Panorama ID’s participation in Switchboard reflects our steadfast commitment to collaborating across and within the industry and providing value to all of its players.” “As advertisers continue to contemplate the future of identity, Amobee is proud to partner with Tapad, part of Experian on this next-generation solution to provide a comprehensive view of consumers,” says Bryan Everett, Senior Vice President of Global Business Development at Amobee. “With the imminent loss of cookies, advertisers must think creatively in order to respectfully engage consumers in a privacy-compliant way and Switchboard can play an important role in addressing their respective identity needs.” Tapad, part of Experian is welcoming identity solutions and Tapad Graph customer participation in Switchboard throughout 2021. Stayed tuned for more updates and information on Switchboard in the coming months. Get in touch