The “run” phase of the identity resolution strategy is focused on accelerating and optimizing capabilities to fully support people-based marketing.

The purpose of a CDP is to collect all available customer data, first, second, and third-party, batch or streaming into one central location to serve marketing needs; all in real time. The ideal CDP is a tool for receiving both your known customers and anonymous, digital customers.

Now that you’ve established the foundation of your identity resolution strategy, it’s time to move to the next level. The walk phase of your identity resolution strategy should be focused on expanding the functionality that was established during the foundational crawl phase.

Identity has never been more critical for marketers than it is today, given the proliferation of digital and online channels and media through which consumers and brands interact. As marketers embrace the people-based marketing philosophy, having the processes in place to ascertain identity (referred to as “identity resolution”) is crucial to executing on the vision.

Customer data onboarding has become a gold standard practice for today’s marketers working to achieve people-based marketing at scale. Most companies understand what it is, and what the benefits are, but often overlooked are the intricacies and rigor involved in the partner selection process.

In nearly every one of my technology consulting engagements with enterprise clients, I’ve seen a trend: marketing technology is purchased and executed without a customer strategy to guide it. As a result, organizations find themselves in need of a marketing technology evaluation and roadmap reset project, not because their tools are outdated or broken, but because an ad hoc and accidental architecture was created due to the lack of a customer strategy.

Are you attending the MarTech West Conference, which starts today and runs from April 23-25, 2018 in San Jose, CA? This is Merkle’s first time participating as we’ve had many clients give the event enthusiastic reviews.

As technology evolves, so do consumers’ expectations — and their demands. While this may seem like common sense, or at least an inevitability of the information age, what it means for brands and retailers is that forward-leaning technology needs to be a centerpiece of your loyalty strategy.