What is a customer data platform (CDP)?

A CDP unifies customer data from every touchpoint — website, CRM, email, ads, support, mobile app — into a single customer profile. Unlike a CRM (which stores sales interactions) or a DMP (which stores anonymous audience segments), a CDP creates persistent, identified profiles that update in real-time. Use a CDP when: you have data siloed across 5+ tools, your marketing team needs unified audience segments, you want to personalize experiences across channels, or regulatory compliance requires a single source of truth for customer data. Major CDPs: Segment (developer-first, best API), Rudderstack (open-source alternative to Segment), mParticle (enterprise mobile-first), and Tealium (enterprise, tag management integration). Cost: -,000/month for SMB, ,000-,000/year for enterprise. The DIY alternative: a data warehouse (BigQuery, Snowflake) with reverse ETL (Census, Hightouch) can replicate 70% of CDP functionality at lower cost if you have engineering resources.