What is Customer Data Platform (CDP)?
A software system that creates a persistent, unified customer database accessible to other systems, consolidating data from multiple sources to build comprehensive customer profiles.
Understanding the Details
CDPs solve the fragmented customer data problem. Your customers exist in your CRM, marketing automation, product database, support system, and billing platform, but no single system has the complete picture. CDPs collect data from all sources, resolve identity across systems (matching the same person across different identifiers), and create unified profiles that other tools can access. This enables true personalisation, accurate segmentation, and consistent customer experiences across channels.
How It Works in Practice
Identity resolution
A CDP matches the email address from signup, the phone number from support, and the cookie from website visits to create one unified profile.
Real-time activation
When a high-value customer visits the pricing page, the CDP triggers a Slack alert to their account manager within seconds.
Personalisation engine
Website experiences personalise based on CDP data: showing enterprise content to enterprise visitors based on firmographic data.
Why It Matters
Personalisation at scale requires unified customer data. Without a CDP or equivalent infrastructure, you're sending generic messages and missing context that would improve customer experiences.
What People Often Get Wrong
CDPs are just data warehouses. Actually, CDPs focus on identity resolution and real-time activation, not just storage.
CRMs already solve this. Actually, CRMs typically don't include product usage data or real-time behavioural streams.
CDPs are only for enterprise. Actually, composable CDP approaches make unified customer data accessible at smaller scale.
How We Handle Customer Data Platform (CDP)
We implement CDP infrastructure using modern data stack approaches, connecting sources to unified profiles that power personalisation across marketing, sales, and product.
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Common Questions
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