Loading...

Identity that pays off: How to turn quality data into measurable ROI

Published: August 27, 2025 by Experian Marketing Services

Identity done right delivers stronger outcomes

Traditional audience signals are fading, and the industry is facing a new reality: identity is no longer just about connectivity, it’s about outcomes. At Cannes Lions 2025, leaders from AdRoll, LG Ad Solutions, Magnite, MiQ, OpenAP, PubMatic, Stirista, Tatari shared how innovative identity approaches are cutting through the noise, improving performance, and delivering real ROI. Their insights reveal a clear path forward for those ready to turn identity into a performance driver.

Here’s how you can apply the same principles to drive performance.

1. Make identity a performance engine

Treating identity as a performance driver leads to measurable results by creating a clear connection between marketing efforts and outcomes. Identity resolution enables the effective retargeting of audiences, accurate performance attribution across connected TV (CTV), and personalized campaigns across multiple channels. By building household-level graphs and incorporating alternative identifiers, marketers can maintain accuracy as traditional signals change. Activating first-party data across both digital and offline channels ensures that every interaction, whether on-screen or in-store, can be tied back to specific actions, helping optimize campaigns, and improve ROI.

How Experian helps

Experian’s Consumer Sync solutions create a clean foundation and persistent identity spine by resolving and expanding your first-party data across digital and offline IDs (hashed emails, mobile ad IDs, CTV IDs). This enables activation across omnichannel campaigns, from CTV to social, and connects data to outcomes.

“Identity resolution is very important to our overall strategy today. Without that identity linkage, we couldn’t speak the same language as our clients. For example, a client might want to target people who engaged with their brand’s website four days ago via CRM data. Without identity resolution, that’s not possible. But with it, we’re changing the narrative – making TV a hospitable place for deploying first-party data and driving outcomes.”

LG Ad SolutionsMike Brooks

2. Build trust through responsible data practices

Consumer trust begins with responsible data practices that prioritize transparency and privacy. Deterministic match rates ensure accuracy by connecting data points with confidence, while clear methodologies provide visibility into how data is used. These practices improve overall campaign performance and protect consumer privacy by ensuring that every interaction is respectful.

How Experian helps

Experian’s privacy-first approach ensures that all data activation occurs with compliance and consent. By maintaining high match rates and adhering to transparent methodologies, Experian helps build trust and strengthen long-term connections with audiences.

“If people don’t take any precautions and they don’t actually care about data in the public, they probably don’t care about it in private. Experian cares about data privacy and compliance, and that made it a no-brainer for us to work with them. When we combined our focus on privacy with Experian’s expertise, we knew we had to do it right – and we did.”

StiristaHenry Olawoye

3. Expand reach while maintaining high match rates

Having more data points to identify individuals leads to higher match rates and broader reach. Enriching records with additional identifiers, like hashed emails, MAIDs, and CTV IDs, makes it easier to connect data across channels and create a unified view of each person. This approach ensures that campaigns can scale effectively while maintaining the accuracy needed to deliver personalized experiences.

How Experian helps

With a database of over 5,000 attributes spanning 15 verticals and categories, Experian provides a comprehensive view of consumers through a single provider. By sourcing data from over 200 sources (including public records, consumer surveys, and purchase records), Experian enables the creation of detailed audience profiles. This enriched data focuses on identity, creating a unified view of individuals that helps pinpoint the best opportunities to engage effectively across channels and deliver measurable outcomes tailored to specific audience needs.

“We’ve been able to extend our IDs by an average of 6.5 different identifiers, with a 70% match rate. That extension is huge – it underpins a lot of the connectivity in our platform and allows us to bring 300 data feeds together to make the most of them.”

MiQGeorgiana Haig

4. Create unified campaigns with interoperability

Fragmented data often leads to fragmented results. Interoperability ensures that data from different platforms and systems can work together, creating a unified view that makes measurement and attribution more actionable.

How Experian helps

Experian simplifies interoperability by ensuring consistent data usage from activation and measurement. By connecting data from various sources, Experian enables a cohesive strategy where insights can be shared across publishers, measurement providers, and ad servers, ensuring campaigns remain aligned and effective at every stage.

“The ecosystem benefits from optimized interoperability. We’re focused on allowing advertisers to work seamlessly across IDs and identity solutions – from activation to resolution – so the same data set is used consistently across publishers, measurement providers, currencies, programmatic ecosystems, and ad servers.”

OpenAPChris LoRusso

5. Use AI to amplify, not replace, strategy

Artificial intelligence (AI) is transforming how campaigns are optimized, but its success depends on clean, consented identity foundations. AI can analyze vast amounts of data to refine targeting, manage frequency, and uncover new efficiencies, but only when built on a strong identity framework.

How Experian helps

Experian uses AI and machine learning to deliver highly personalized marketing solutions. Advanced clustering algorithms in Experian’s Digital Graph analyze and create household and individual device connections, improving targeting and measurement accuracy, while machine learning models improve consumer insights by inferring household composition where data is limited. These innovations enable AI tools to quickly generate tailored audience solutions, analyze contextual signals in real time, and identify opportunities that improve results while maintaining a human centered approach to decision making.

“AI is a copilot to your marketing initiatives. For it to perform, it needs insights and information to learn from. That’s why having a strong foundational data asset rooted in deterministic data is so important.”

PubMaticHoward Luks

Five moves to turn identity into profit

Here are five steps to get started:

Audit your data health icon

1. Audit your data health

Make sure your audience data is accurate, up-to-date, and complete so you’re starting from a strong foundation.

Layer in more context icon

2. Layer in more context

Enrich your records with details, like lifestyle, interests, or buying behaviors, that help you speak your audience’s language.

Unify touchpoints across channels icon

3. Unify touchpoints across channels

Link your data so you can see the same person or household whether they’re engaging on CTV, mobile, desktop, in-store, or through other touchpoints.

Activate AI for stronger campaigns icon

4. Activate AI for stronger campaigns

Use AI tools to fine-tune targeting, control ad frequency, and find hidden opportunities once your foundation is solid.

Align data across systems icon

5. Align data across systems

Ensure interoperability so data from different platforms and systems can work together, creating a unified view for actionable insights.

The common thread across these insights is connection: connecting data, teams, and outcomes. Marketers who act on these imperatives will be ready for whatever new channel, format, or privacy rule comes next.

Let’s start a conversation about how Experian can help you turn identity into ROI

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.


Latest posts

Loading…
Fueling Fusion92’s marketing technology with Experian data

The partnership between Experian and Fusion92 exemplifies how collaboration can deliver real marketing impact. This article explores the ways Fusion92 relies on Experian’s data to sharpen its audience targeting, streamline engagement across channels, and achieve measurable success. A need for unified audiences When Fusion92 set out to advance how their clients connect with precise audiences, they needed a data partner that could deliver comprehensive and actionable insights. Enter Experian. By using Experian’s marketing data and digital identity graph as a core source of data, Fusion92 built a solid foundation for their tools, DIOS (Data Input Output Solution), DAX (Data Advertising Exchange), and NoMi (pronounced “Know Me”). These powerful technologies enable Fusion92’s clients to control audiences more precisely, connect with the right people across optimal channels, avoid wasted impressions, and measure results with confidence. Why Fusion92 chose Experian Quality and reliability Experian’s commitment to data accuracy has earned the #1 ranking from Truthset, ensuring Fusion92’s campaigns are built on precise, actionable, and privacy compliant data that businesses can trust. Breadth and depth By offering demographic, behavioral, and channel preference data, Experian enables Fusion92 to have greater control over precision activation, empowering better results. Expert support Experian works closely with Fusion92 to provide tailored solutions and dependable expertise, adapting to meet the unique needs of their diverse clients. “Experian never really let me down in terms of data quality, data accuracy, and data reliability.”Dave Nugent, EVP of Data Science & Strategy, Fusion92 The power of teaming up Challenge  A regional amusement park needed to increase membership renewal sales during peak season while reducing spend on households unlikely to visit.  Solution  Fusion92 combined the park’s first-party buyer file with Experian consumer data and custom geographic boundaries, built an advanced targeting model, and used Experian’s channel-preference insights to prioritize the media mix. The unified audience was then delivered omnichannel through Fusion92’s in-house proprietary DAX activation technology, with Experian’s identity graph supporting attribution.  Result  The marketing conversions beat the park’s stretch goal by 70%, confirming that accurate data and coordinated activation drive revenue lift.  “It doesn’t matter if you’re a beginner or an expert. Experian will help you make the best use out of an incredible set of data assets.”Dave Nugent, EVP of Data Science & Strategy, Fusion92 Using marketing data to power omnichannel marketing Tools built by Fusion92 that meet client needs Fusion92’s suite of tools handles every essential phase of a campaign. DIOS starts by creating audience definitions and setting a foundation for strategy. Once these insights are established, DAX takes over, activating consistent, controlled engagement with tailored messaging. Detailed performance metrics throughout help optimize strategy along the way, ensuring campaigns remain impactful and cost efficient. DIOS in action DIOS eliminates guesswork, combining Experian’s data with advanced analytics to create precise audience models. This capability enables Fusion92 to define customer segments with accuracy, providing businesses with a roadmap to success from the outset. While currently in use as a managed service by Fusion92, a public-facing SaaS version is expected to be released in 2025. Activating every channel through DAX The campaign execution phase is pivotal, and DAX ensures smooth delivery and transparent measurement across channels. By incorporating Experian’s identity graph, DAX provides a clear picture of cross-channel behaviors and preferences, and how they impact business goals. This holistic approach enhances personalization, connecting online and offline interactions to create campaigns that resonate with consumers and drive ROI. Getting to know NoMi NoMi offers next-generation audience intelligence, empowering businesses with audience profiles built from behavioral insights, like transactional activity or in-market signals. This ensures that campaigns connect with people authentically and at scale. With NoMi, Fusion92 clients streamline targeting efforts, improving efficiency while reducing wasted spend. Thinking about your own transformation? Whether you’re tackling siloed activation, enhancing attribution models, or aiming for improved targeting, Experian’s data solutions can help amplify your efforts – just ask Fusion92. Explore how we can help you target smarter, engage better, and measure success confidently. Connect with an Experian representative today About our experts Dave Nugent, EVP of Data Science & Strategy, Fusion92 Dave Nugent, EVP of Data Science & Strategy at Fusion92, has over 27 years of experience in data-driven services, helping organizations better understand and target their audiences through predictive modeling and segmentation. Before joining Fusion92, he spent 11 years at American Spirit Corporation as VP of Data Solutions and co-founded Market Reason, where he secured a patent for an identity technology known as "identity solutions." Dave’s expertise bridges traditional, digital, and social advertising, offering innovative approaches to data utilization. He also shares his knowledge as a guest lecturer at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. Crystal Jacques, VP of Enterprise Partnerships, Experian Crystal Jacques is the VP of Enterprise Partnerships, leading Experian's go-to-market team across all verticals. With over ten years of experience in the Identity space, Crystal brings a wealth of expertise to her role. She joined Experian in 2020 through the Tapad acquisition, following her successful stint as the head of Global Channel Partnerships for Adbrain, which The Trade Desk later acquired.

Jun 09,2025 by Experian Marketing Services

Tuned in and turned on: How identity is powering the audio boom

Audio platforms that overcome consumer identity challenges are winning new advertisers and driving higher ROAS. In this article, you’ll hear from leading audio platforms that are solving these challenges—and seeing results. Digital audio is evolving fast. What was once a niche channel of host-read sponsorships and direct buys is now a must-have in the modern media mix. Streaming platforms, podcasts, and digital radio are drawing more ad dollars thanks to audio’s ability to capture attention and connect with listeners. But with growth comes new pressure. Advertisers expect accuracy, scale, and to see results. At the same time, listeners want more relevant content and more personalized ad experiences. That’s where identity becomes essential. With Experian’s identity and audience solutions, audio platforms can: Bolster addressable audience targeting and personalization capabilities. Gain a comprehensive view of listeners’ digital identity to reach audiences across channels. Better understand consumer preferences, enabling advertisers to reach audiences with greater accuracy. Enhance the listening experience with more relevant content. Let’s break down the key challenges in audio—and how Experian can help solve them. Challenge 1: Anonymous listening limits addressability Most listening happens in environments where people aren’t logged in—via apps, smart speakers, and mobile devices. Without logged-in data, platforms struggle to know who’s listening and advertisers are unable to reach those anonymous listeners who don’t have an addressable ID. To overcome the identity gap in unauthenticated listening environments, leading audio platforms are turning to partners that connect fragmented signals—like device type, location, and behavioral patterns—to broader household and individual profiles. By using hashed emails and other alternative identifiers, platforms can begin to make anonymous sessions more addressable. This increase in addressability ensures the platform’s entire userbase can be reached, which leads to an increase in revenue. Experian’s solution Experian's identity spine, comprised of our Digital and Offline Graphs, helps you recognize listeners even when they’re outside your ecosystem. Platforms like Audacy are already leading the way. By integrating Experian’s Digital Graph, they’re gaining a more complete view of listeners’ digital identifiers—enhancing the experience across their app and website. With a better audience understanding, Audacy can deliver personalized content while helping advertisers reach specific groups with greater accuracy. Challenge 2: IP-based targeting falls short Audio has traditionally relied on IP addresses, but that’s no longer enough. A single IP could represent an entire household—or a public setting like a coffee shop. It’s not precise. Forward-thinking platforms are moving beyond IP-based targeting by integrating identity resolution technologies that combine household-level data with device-level intelligence. These solutions help distinguish between shared devices and individual listeners, allowing advertisers to serve more relevant messages without over-reliance on a single signal like an IP address. This layered approach improves precision—especially in dynamic listening environments like vehicles or communal spaces. Experian’s solution Our identity spine links home IPs to households, then connects them to specific devices and individuals. This helps platforms move beyond basic IPs and target real people based on accurate signals—even in shared listening environments like smart speakers and cars. We also help platforms and advertisers integrate alternative IDs—like Unified I.D. 2.0 (UID2)—into their programmatic audio campaigns. That means more reach, without compromising consumer trust. Challenge 3: Audio buying is fragmented From podcasts to streaming to radio, audio lacks consistency in how inventory is packaged and bought. It’s hard for advertisers to run scaled campaigns across channels—and harder still to measure performance. Plus, advertisers don’t think in silos—they think in strategies. If audio can’t connect to their display, connected TV (CTV), and social buys, it loses ground. What they need is a way to define audiences once and activate everywhere. To reduce friction in audio ad buying, platforms are investing in infrastructure that unifies audience insights across formats. By building a centralized view of the listener—regardless of whether they're tuning in via podcast, stream, or radio—publishers can offer advertisers consistent targeting parameters, clearer reporting, and better campaign orchestration. Identity graphs and audiences are playing a growing role in streamlining this complexity and unlocking scale. Experian’s solution Experian helps simplify audio buying. Experian audiences are built on top of our identity graph and are expanded to a deep set of digital identifiers, ensuring accuracy, scale and maximum addressability across channels. Platforms can blend their first-party data with advertiser data and our audiences—then deploy those audiences onsite or activate programmatically across open web and CTV. DAX is doing just that. DAX's partnership with Experian combines Experian’s 2,400+ audiences for targeting and activation with DAX’s innovative audio advertising approach. We’re helping advertisers connect with passionate and engaged listeners nationwide. "Through our partnership with Experian Marketing Services, advertisers can unlock deeper audience insights and execute more impactful digital audio campaigns. By combining our shared market presence, knowledge, and forward-thinking approach, we’re strengthening our digital audio network offering and delivering value to all our advertising partners."  Brian Conlan, President of DAX United States In addition to integrating Experian’s Digital Graph, Audacy is also integrating Experian's syndicated audiences to unlock accurate insights like demographics, shopping behavior, and interests – providing listeners with a more personalized advertising experience and advertisers with a higher return on investment.  “Historically, audio advertising lacked precise targeting capabilities, making it challenging for advertisers to reach specific audiences. By integrating our digital identity graph and syndicated audiences with Audacy’s platform, we’re transforming how advertisers connect with listeners. This collaboration enables more effective audience targeting and delivers personalized, impactful audio experiences across all channels.”Chris Feo, Chief Business Officer, Experian Privacy is non-negotiable Everything we do is privacy-forward by design. Backed by Experian’s Global Data Principles and decades as a regulated institution, we rigorously vet every data source to ensure compliance with all federal and state laws. Build an audio strategy that performs with Experian Your advertisers want more from their audio investments. With Experian, you can give it to them. We help you: Expand digital addressability to maximize reach for marketers and drive revenue growth for your platform. Create and activate addressable audiences across all channels. Enhance the listening experience with relevant content and personalized ads. Audio has always been a powerful way to connect. Now, it’s ready to perform. Let's connect Latest posts

Jun 04,2025 by Chris Meredith, Head of Sell-Side

Driving performance and scale: The rise of Experian’s data marketplace

When we launched our data marketplace earlier this year, we set out to transform how the industry discovers and activates privacy-safe audiences and maintains addressability across display, mobile, and connected TV (CTV). Yieldmo was one of the first adopters and their story speaks volumes about what’s possible when flexible tech meets premium data. Large retail brand boosts in-store traffic with Yieldmo and Experian Yieldmo, an advertising platform known for its inventive, AI-powered creative formats and privacy-first inventory, partnered with Experian to support a leading athletic retailer’s campaign focused on driving in-store traffic. The goal? Attract in-store shoppers likely to purchase from competitors, particularly during key sales windows. Using Experian’s Audience Engine platform, which includes our proprietary and third-party data marketplace, Yieldmo built a high-performing, self-serve targeting strategy that included both conquesting and in-store shopper segments. With the ability to easily combine Experian Audiences and Partner Audiences, like those from Alliant, Circana, Webbula, and Sports Innovation Lab, Yieldmo quickly built precise apparel and footwear audiences. Using Experian’s identity graphs in Audience Engine, Yieldmo increased cross-channel addressability to maximize campaign scale and impact. “Experian’s data marketplace in Audience Engine fills a critical gap, letting us quickly search by brand, build smarter conquest segments, and activate custom audiences fast. The platform is flexible and the support is hands-on and reliable.”Abby Littlejohn, Director of Sales Planning at Yieldmo With self-serve setup that cut down manual work, the ability to build highly tailored audiences, and expected lift in store visits, Experian helped the team achieve standout results. "We selected Experian as our primary third-party data partner based on contract ease, audience quality, and speed. Through Experian, we can find high-performing audiences from multiple providers that meet our client’s targeting objectives. We include Experian audience segments in 80% of formal RFP proposals and are in active discussions on how to optimize for future campaigns—making Experian a go-to partner for third-party targeting.”Nelson Montouchet, AVP, Strategic Partnerships, Yieldmo More data, more reach: Experian’s data marketplace fuels smarter targeting across ad platforms Today, just months after launch, Experian’s data marketplace is gaining traction across the ecosystem. Over 10 platforms, including leading supply-side platforms (SSPs) and TV platforms such as Madhive, OpenAP, and Optimum, are now actively utilizing our data marketplace to enhance their activation capabilities. As privacy rules tighten and many identity signals start to fade, a lot of activation platforms are finding it tougher to reach their audiences. This is where our data marketplace shines, with one of the most comprehensive identity graphs out there, 126 million households, 250 million individuals, and over four billion active digital IDs, we make it easy to activate audiences while keeping addressability high across channels. We preserve accuracy when scaling to digital IDs via our identity graphs since Experian is rooted in offline data, which provides better connections and smarter targeting. “Our long-standing partnership with Experian and breadth of Experian's data marketplace, combined with the interoperable, direct matching methodology of our Open Identity solution, make it possible for OpenAP to enable advertisers and agencies to use best-in-class data partners to build audiences with the highest fidelity and consistently reach audiences at scale wherever they are consuming content across premium video.”Chris LoRusso, Chief Business Officer at OpenAP Experian’s data marketplace has grown to include over 20 premium data providers, such as: “We’re thrilled to bring PlaceIQ’s privacy-first, visit-based audiences to Experian’s marketplace, giving brands quick and easy access to high-intent shoppers. From recent big-box customers to yoga-studio regulars, advertisers can add real-world relevance to campaigns across every channel.”Brian Bradtke, Head of Partner Development, Precisely PlaceIQ These partnerships bring unique value to platforms looking to understand and engage audiences more effectively, whether through physical location intelligence, sports and fandom insights, or behavioral intent signals. What’s next We're focused on expanding our data ecosystem and helping platforms and marketers turn fragmented data strategies into a unified competitive advantage. If Yieldmo’s story is any indication, this is just the beginning. Let’s connect and explore how Experian’s data marketplace can help you drive more revenue, scale your audience reach, and stay ahead of privacy shifts. Connect with us Latest posts

May 29,2025 by Experian Marketing Services

Subscribe to our newsletter

Enter your name and email for the latest updates

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

About Experian Marketing Services

At Experian Marketing Services, we use data and insights to help brands have more meaningful interactions with people. As leaders in the evolution of the advertising landscape, Experian Marketing Services can help you identify your customers and the right potential customers, uncover the most appropriate communication channels, develop messages that resonate, and measure the effectiveness of marketing activities and campaigns.

Visit our website

Subscribe to our newsletter

Stay up to date on the latest industry news and receive expert tips from our marketing experts.
Subscribe now!