At A Glance
First-party data for commerce media networks (CMNs) provides a direct connection to shopper behavior that advertisers value. But logged-in users and loyalty members only tell part of the story. Connecting fragmented identities and adding context beyond the observed behaviors can help CMNs turn more of the data they already own into consumer intelligence that works across media channels, while keeping their customer relationships at the center.Key takeaways
- First-party data can leave coverage gaps between the shoppers a CMN knows and the audiences it can consistently recognize and reach.
- Experian’s identity resolution and enrichment solutions help commerce media networks connect fragmented signals and add context beyond the direct customer relationship.
- CMNs can focus on closing their first-party data gaps and building a more complete view of their consumers. Our neutral approach helps them activate and measure campaigns across platforms without building separate integrations for every partner, while giving them the flexibility to work with their preferred technology and media partners.
Owning first-party data gives CMNs a strong foundation. The next step is connecting shopper data across customer relationship management (CRM), digital, and TV. Identity resolution helps CMNs link interactions across channels so they can recognize and reach consumers more consistently.
Media networks know what people browse and buy, loyalty programs create direct customer relationships, and transaction data gives advertisers a valuable connection between media and commerce. But logged-in and loyalty data rarely represent every shopper interaction. CMNs need to connect these signals to build a more complete view of their consumers and put that insight into action.
A shopper might research a product anonymously on mobile, buy it in-store without using a loyalty account, and then return using a different email address. By connecting these interactions, CMNs can build a more complete view of their consumers and better understand how shoppers engage across channels.
Multiply that across millions of interactions, and the challenge grows. Guest transactions can sit outside loyalty profiles, identifiers change, and shoppers move between stores, websites, apps, and devices. A CMN may have plenty of first-party data and still see only part of its audience.
The addressability gap starts inside the data
CMNs face an addressability gap when disconnected shopper data limits their ability to recognize and reach consumers beyond their own properties. Connecting loyalty profiles, transactions, and digital identifiers helps CMNs extend their reach across connected TV (CTV), social, and programmatic media.
Market concentration makes that challenge more pressing. Amazon and Walmart will capture more than 89% of incremental U.S. retail media spending in 2026. Their large logged-in audiences and extensive commerce data give them an advantage. Other CMNs can compete by making better use of the shopper data they already have.
Identity resolution helps CMNs close the addressability gap by connecting logins, devices, email addresses, and transactions to consistent consumer and household identities. This helps CMNs recognize shoppers across channels and reach more of their audience.
Our neutral infrastructure helps CMNs use that identity foundation across their preferred technology and media partners. They can build on existing investments, strengthen cross-platform addressability, and maintain flexibility without relying on a single provider.
A transaction tells you what happened, not the whole story
CMNs can build more valuable audiences for advertisers by enriching their first-party shopper data with deeper consumer insights. This helps them improve audience segmentation, strengthen their advertising offerings, and create more opportunities to generate revenue.
Purchase data reveals what shoppers buy, but it doesn’t always explain who they are or what else matters to them. A retailer may know that someone buys organic groceries every week or recently purchased paint and power tools. Two shoppers who bought the same product may represent very different audiences for advertisers.
Experian’s Enrichment capabilities help CMNs look beyond transactions by appending demographic and behavioral attributes from Experian Marketing Data to their first-party shopper data. These additional insights help CMNs refine segmentation, inform modeling, and create more relevant audiences for advertisers. With richer consumer insights, CMNs can turn transaction data into more valuable advertising offerings, helping them create new revenue opportunities while maintaining their direct shopper relationships.
Keep first-party data connected across media
CMNs can get more value from their first-party data by keeping consumer identities and audience definitions consistent across media channels. Connecting shopper signals and adding consumer context helps them build audiences they can activate, collaborate with advertisers, and measure across platforms.
Keeping audiences consistent across media channels can be challenging as CMNs move between platforms and partners. Audiences can lose scale when they reach another environment, and differences in how partners recognize consumers can create gaps in activation and measurement.
Our neutral infrastructure helps CMNs keep their first-party data connected across their preferred technology and media partners. They can maintain control over their data and identity, build on existing investments, and avoid relying on a single provider.
Experian helps CMNs strengthen their first-party data foundation for use across existing systems and media channels. With our identity resolution and offline identity append capabilities, CMNs can share first-party data with us to connect disparate records to individuals and households and add missing offline identifiers. We then return the data so CMNs can use it across their existing systems and preferred partners.
By keeping first-party data connected across media, CMNs can extend the value of their shopper relationships, support advertiser campaigns, and make better use of their existing technology investments.
More addressable data creates more places to grow
Connecting shopper data across media helps CMNs expand their addressable audiences and create more advertising opportunities.
A more complete, addressable audience can give advertisers more ways to use first-party data that makes a CMN distinct. It can help networks extend those audiences beyond owned-and-operated properties into CTV, social, programmatic, and other environments where shoppers spend their time.
CMNs can build on their existing technology investments by improving the quality and consistency of their first-party data. With a stronger identity foundation, they can better understand their customers, activate audiences across channels, and measure campaign outcomes.
CMNs can strengthen their advertising offerings by turning more of their existing shopper data into audiences advertisers can reach across channels. By recognizing more consumers across channels and building more relevant audiences, they can create additional media opportunities for advertisers while keeping their first-party data at the center of their business.
Our neutral infrastructure helps CMNs extend the value of their first-party data across media environments while maintaining control over their customer relationships, technology investments, and partner choices.
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About the author
Colleen Dawe
VP, Advertiser Partnerships
Colleen Dawe is VP, Advertiser Partnerships at Experian Marketing Services, where she oversees revenue growth and client success, helping advertisers harness data and identity to fuel marketing strategies. With over 15 years of experience spanning TV and digital media, she brings deep expertise in data, identity, activation, and measurement to help her clients connect innovation with business outcomes.
FAQs
The first-party data gap for CMNs is the difference between the shopper data a CMN owns and the first-party data it can consistently connect and use. Anonymous interactions, disconnected identifiers, and incomplete customer records can leave part of the shopper relationship outside a CMN’s addressable audience.
CMNs can use identity resolution to connect fragmented shopper signals and enrichment to add relevant context beyond the direct customer relationship. Neutral infrastructure helps them put that consumer intelligence to work across activation and measurement, using their existing technology and preferred partners to extend reach and improve outcomes.
Neutral infrastructure gives CMNs greater control over how they use their customer data and identity across platforms, partners, and channels. Neutral infrastructure that integrates with existing workflows can help a network expand addressability, preserve choice, and adapt its media strategy without rebuilding its customer data foundation whenever its needs change.
Latest posts
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
Adapt with Tapad, a part of Experian Leading browsers have made public announcements and technical deployments to reduce the digital advertising accessibility of third-party cookies for data collection, storage, and sharing due to growing privacy concerns. As a result, there has been growing momentum to find an alternative via cookieless IDs, with the intent to create a replacement that helps ensure continuity across the ecosystem. At Tapad we’ve chosen to approach the market with a solution that provides agnostic interoperability for these cookieless identifiers, so that marketers can continue to work with the identity providers of their choice while maintaining the most holistic view of consumers across digital touchpoints. Introducing switchboard Switchboard is a module within The Tapad Graph that leverages our core capabilities across machine learning and identity management to provide a connection between traditional digital identifiers and the new wave of cookieless IDs that will be utilized in the future. Customers of Tapad can take advantage of its broad ecosystem of identifiers to drive targeting and frequency capping strategies and enable detailed measurement and attribution post-deprecation of the third-party cookie. Our goal is to accelerate the adoption, scale, and utility of cookieless IDs with the release of the Switchboard module within The Tapad Graph, while maintaining an agnostic approach to the market. Switchboard for identity solutions In the evolving landscape agencies and marketers will need to invest, test, and analyze the best combination of cookieless ID partners to meet their objectives. The Switchboard module will increase the utility and value of the cookieless ID space in conjunction with other addressable IDs, by providing a layer of connectivity that will be natively missing with the deprecation of third-party cookies. Identity solutions at launch: Switchboard for graph customers For existing Tapad customers who leverage the Switchboard module in The Tapad Graph, it will provide a seamless way to facilitate interoperability while resolving identity back to a Household or Individual. By providing this translation layer, Tapad will take on the responsibility of encryption and decryption protocols where applicable, which will deliver added functionality to our customers. Tapad + Experian partners at launch: Use cases Resolve existing first-party data with new cookieless solutions through The Tapad Graph to minimize data loss Frequency cap at the Individual and Household level via Cookieless and traditional ID Reach consumers at scale across all touchpoints and IDs Build a more inclusive and holistic view of the consumer journey Run accurate and scalable measurement before and after the formal deprecation of third-party cookies in Chrome Map online data into offline activities Hear why industry leaders are adapting with Tapad + Experian As advertisers continue to contemplate the future of identity, Amobee is proud to partner with Tapad, a part of Experian, on this next-generation solution to provide a comprehensive view of consumers. 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. — Bryan Everett | Senior Vice President of Global Business Development | Amobee Connecting offline and online shopper activity in a privacy-compliant way is fundamental to marketing effectiveness and determining return on ad-spend. That’s why we’re excited to be a launch partner for Tapad + Experian’s Switchboard offering; it provides a unified solution for supporting the variety of proprietary and anonymous user ID standards required by advertising demand-side platforms today. — Brian Dunphy | SVP Digital Business and Strategic Partnerships | Catalina As the industry evolves, Tapad + Experian’s Switchboard presents a privacy-safe solution that allows for the continued activation of data and an alternative to advertising within walled garden environments. We look forward to collaborating with Tapad and the industry as we collectively transition to support cookieless identity. — Don Lee |SVP of Global Platform Partnerships | Eyeota We are excited to participate in this proactive solution to the sunset of third-party cookies. Switchboard’s agnostic interoperability, with BritePool and other ID providers, will create high-value for marketers as they transition to the era of cookieless web advertising. — David J. Moore | CEO | BritePool 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. 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. — Pierre Diennet | Global Partnerships | Lotame At this pivotal moment in the industry, we are excited to be partnering with Tapad, a part of Experian on their cookieless initiative and making Retargetly IDx available into the Switchboard solution, providing global brands, platforms and publishers with a compliant, cookieless ID solution for the Latin American market; enabling them to target, reach and measure users at scale through the region. — Daniel Czaplinski | CEO and Co-Founder | Retargetly With Audigent’s Halo ID, we’re architecting a cookieless future where clients and partners have confidence in the actionability and interoperability of exclusive 1st party audiences, originated from some of the world’s leading publishers and creators. We see collaboration as being critical to a collective understanding of identity and Tapad, a part of Experian as a trusted partner with solutions such as Switchboard to support continuity for marketers’ addressability. — Drew Stein | CEO and Founder | Audigent Facilitating access and usage of 1st party identifiers is crucial to help marketers prepare for the cookieless future. Thanks to Switchboard, ID5’s cookie-less 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. — Mathieu Roche | CEO and Co-Founder | ID5 Addressing the current identity challenge requires transparency and collaboration. We are pleased to align ShareThis data with Tapad + Experian’s growing ecosystem. ShareThis data helps marketers evolve beyond the cookie to complete the picture. Tapad + Experian’s Switchboard offering will support ShareThis’s deep connections to clients and technology platforms, preserving and growing the accessibility of our data. — Michael Gorman | SVP Product and Business Development | ShareThis Get in touch
With the emergence of email addresses as a currency for brands to communicate with their consumers offline; attaching email data to in-store purchases lays the groundwork for future advertising strategies. However, this advantage in having an additional digital touchpoint also creates a new challenge for marketers. How do they connect what they know about their customers via offline data and PII, or personally identifiable information, with what they want to know about their online behaviors and interactions? Taken a step further, how can they create actionable strategies that connect these two streams of consumer insights in order to drive them to make more future purchases; and even become loyalists? At a time when the shift from traditional to online shopping feels more like a landslide; connecting online and offline data has never been more valuable or more urgent. The solution for these marketers lies in the framework of identity resolution; and a key capability called hashed email onboarding. Hashed email onboarding is a privacy-safe way to connect consumer email addresses to their related digital devices and other digital identifiers. The methodology prevents the consumers actual email address from being readable; while still providing marketers a connection between those emails and other touchpoints for an individual. Instead of understanding the customer journey in two distinct parts; how they interact with a brand or company offline and separately how they interact with a brand online; hashed email onboarding allows for the two parts to be woven together in a holistic view of that consumer. The power of connecting these data sets can be seen when combining offline and online attribution and measurement to improve frequency capping and look-alike modeling. It’s important to note that not all identity resolution vendors that onboard hashed emails function in the same way or provide the same level of data. Some connect only to desktop or only to mobile devices; while others don’t actually make direct linkages at all- they simply provide the hashed emails as a targetable digital audience for upload. While hashed email onboarding and the connection between offline and online data is a powerful strategy; it needs to be as structured as possible across the most data available to reveal truly efficient targeting and measurement strategies. Tapad, a part of Experian has built a hashed email product feature that works with the existing flexibility of The Tapad Graph to deliver the most holistic consumer view in the structure that works best for your business objectives. Get in touch