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:
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.
2. Layer in more context
Enrich your records with details, like lifestyle, interests, or buying behaviors, that help you speak your audience’s language.
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.
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.
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
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In our Ask the Expert Series, we interview leaders from our partner organizations who are helping to lead their brands to new heights in ad tech. Today’s interview is with Jordan Feivelson, VP, Digital Audiences at Webbula. Jordan is a 22-year advertising industry veteran who has worked for media properties such as WebMD and Disney. Over the past ten years, he has transitioned to the data and programmatic space, including growing the data business for Kantar Shopcom and Adstra. What types of advertisers might benefit from utilizing Webbula audiences across various verticals? Can you provide examples of how different industries successfully leverage your data to achieve specific campaign goals? Most advertisers can leverage Webbula’s award-winning attributes for their activation initiatives. Webbula offers approximately 3,000 syndicated segments covering categories such as Demographics, Automotive, Political, Mortgage, B2B, Hobby/Interest/Lifestyle, and Interests & Brand Preferences (brand name targeting). Audience insights and marketing strategies What specific types of audience segments does Webbula provide? How can advertisers leverage these segments to craft more effective, personalized marketing strategies? Webbula has incredible depth and breadth within its verticals, giving marketers the tools to deliver targeted messaging effectively. Our Demographic, B2B, Mortgage, Automotive, and Interest and Brand Preferences segments each contain 500-1,000 segments, all built on deterministic, self-reported, and individually linked data. We ensure the best accuracy with multiple deterministic data points tied to the real world (ex., first name, last name, postal address, and email address). Some examples of our unique syndicated audience types: B2B: A view of the latest industry trends with detailed cuts of the professional world, such as companies with and not within the Fortune 500 companies and job positions that are directors and below. This also includes custom capabilities, including ABM (list of target companies in an activation campaign or by industry code (ex. NAICS, SIC). Interest and Brand Preferences: Consumers who have shown interest and affinity to hundreds of brands (ex., Nike), genres (ex., comedy, hip hop), sports teams, and more. Mortgage: A detailed view of homebuyers’ purchase range, loan type (ex. jumbo loan, standard loan), mortgage amount, interest rate, and more. With Webbula’s audience data, brands can create a comprehensive picture of their audiences down to the individual level and reach them accurately. Data quality, sourcing, and differentiation How is consumer data sourced and curated at Webbula? Are there data quality standards that Webbula establishes for consumer data, and how do you ensure your sources and methods meet these standards consistently? Webbula’s data is aggregated from over 110 trusted and authenticated sources, including publishers, data partners, social media, and more. The data collected comes directly from consumers who self-report information through surveys and other methods. We apply our hygiene filters to mitigate fraud and accurately score the data. Data Collection: The data collected comes directly from consumers who self-report information through surveys, questionnaires, transactions, and sign-ups. This ensures that brands display ads to audiences based on self-identified, cross-channel behaviors, not modeled assumptions. Hygiene Solutions: Webbula applies multi-method hygiene solutions to mitigate fraud and accurately score the data before onboarding, ensuring that all data meets the highest quality standards. Examples of Data Sources: Questionnaires: Self-reported data through surveys, offer submissions, and telemarketing. Transactions: Deterministic data from aftermarket parts, online purchases or services, and more. Sign-ups: Individually linked data from information entered through sweepstakes, infomercials, newsletters, and forms. What differentiates Webbula's data from other data providers in the market? Can you explain the unique value proposition that Webbula offers in terms of data depth and breadth? Due to our extensive experience in data cleansing, we provide the most accurate data within the programmatic ecosystem. TruthSet, the leading programmatic accuracy measurement company, has ranked Webbula as having the highest number of top attributes compared to other data providers with 150M+ HEMs. Additionally, Publicis Groupe and Neutronian further validate Webbula's data quality, underscoring its position as a leader in the industry. Webbula's data stands out in the market due to its unmatched accuracy and quality, achieved through years of expertise in data cleansing. Unlike other providers, Webbula’s foundation lies in its robust email hygiene process, ensuring that all data entering the programmatic ecosystem is thoroughly cleansed. Privacy, compliance, and future-proofing What measures does Webbula take to maintain data privacy and compliance? How do these efforts benefit advertisers in an evolving regulatory landscape and ensure ethical standards? Webbula was created over a decade ago with a future-proof, privacy-compliant foundation. We understand the industry’s rapid changes, including government and state legislation and cookie depreciation. Our goal has always been to build long-term partnerships and ensure we are prepared for industry changes. We rely on validated offline data sources, making us resilient to external influences. Success stories Can you share success stories where advertisers saw significant campaign improvements using Webbula’s data? What were the key factors that contributed to these successes? Our success is measured by client feedback and increased client spend. Webbula has helped several key advertisers achieve six-figure monthly thresholds by providing the most accurate data to meet campaign KPIs. Clients consistently return to use our data, validating our belief that “the proof is in the pudding.” Thanks for the interview. Any recommendations for our readers if they want to learn more? For those interested in learning more about Webbula, reach out for a personalized consultation. Contact us Latest posts