Data monetization is the process of leveraging customer data to generate measurable revenue—either by improving internal business outcomes or by creating data-driven products and services that partners and advertisers will pay for.
Businesses are continuously discovering new ways to generate revenue and maximize the value of their first-party data. Data monetization has matured from an emerging concept into a core strategy for companies that want to create new revenue streams from the data they already collect.
Data Monetization: A New Way to Grow Revenue
Data monetization has seen explosive growth. Allied Market Research valued the global data monetization market at $2.1 billion in 2020, projecting a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of over 22 percent through 2030. By 2025, the market was estimated to have more than doubled.
A McKinsey Global survey found that respondents at high-performing companies “are three times more likely than others to say their monetization efforts contribute more than 20 percent to company revenues.” AI has accelerated this trend: companies with unified customer data can now use predictive analytics and AI decisioning to extract value from data that previously sat dormant in silos.
How Prioritizing First-Party Data Enables Data Monetization
Forrester defines data monetization as “the process of leveraging your data to produce insights and decisions that grow revenue and improve your business.” Fast-growing businesses are using their first-party data to improve how they run their business, understand audience behaviors, optimize business offerings and develop more personalized experiences.
With third-party cookies now deprecated and privacy regulations expanding globally, successful businesses are those that have already prioritized first-party data in order to monetize it. Customers value transparency and privacy. At the same time, customers are more likely to make a purchase from a brand with personalized experiences. You can only achieve that personalized experience by having access to data that a CDP centralizes for you and makes readily available.
By taking action on insights from first-party data, brands can differentiate from the competition as well. For example, Kaiser Permanente used its data insights about patients to improve how doctors and staff assist them. During the pandemic, usage of their telehealth system was at an all-time high of around 80 percent. With only one-in-four health systems having 25 percent of their patients using telehealth, they stood out from their competitors.
With third-party cookies fully deprecated and a growing number of global and U.S. data privacy laws and regulations, collecting and managing first-party data is more important than ever. Taking a consent-first approach to consumer data collection also builds a more secure relationship, and allows you to end a reliance on third-party data companies.
By prioritizing first-party data, businesses fill data gaps and centralize information to gain profits internally and externally. Given that data monetization depends on the ownership of first-party data, early success stories come from businesses that have improved their data collection efforts without relying on a third-party in the middle.
Data Monetization Success Story: Walmart
Walmart is another example of a data monetization success story. Their data platform, Walmart Luminate, “collects and identifies shopper patterns and then relays those patterns to the company’s merchants and suppliers.” Since using Luminate, Walmart has seen a 75 percent increase in e-commerce revenue growth and a 50 percent growth in the number of suppliers working with them.
Walmart’s data monetization is an example of how external or direct monetization – done by giving second parties or partners access to information – can benefit your business. Businesses have more reliable information because their data is directly connected to customer behavior and activities. Giving business partners access to data-based products or services allows you to partner with them to better advertise, target and engage with particular audiences.
AI-Driven Data Monetization: The 2026 Frontier
AI has opened entirely new data monetization pathways. Brands with unified customer data in a CDP can now:
- Build retail media networks: Companies like Walmart pioneered this, but AI-powered audience segmentation now enables mid-market retailers to offer advertisers precision targeting based on real purchase behavior—not inferred intent.
- Power AI personalization as a service: Brands with deep behavioral data can license anonymized insights to partners, enabling co-branded experiences without exposing PII.
- Optimize customer lifetime value: AI models trained on unified first-party data can predict which customers will generate the most long-term revenue, allowing businesses to allocate acquisition spend more efficiently.
- Enable data clean rooms: Privacy-safe data collaboration environments let brands monetize their data assets without transferring raw customer records to partners.
The common thread is that data monetization in the AI era depends on having clean, unified, consent-based data—exactly what a CDP provides.
A Centralized Data Management System is Essential for Data Monetization Success
A centralized data management system is a key element of your data monetization success. Before you can increase revenue through data monetization, you must effectively use your data to improve your business from within. In an article for Data Science Central, author Bill Schmarzo writes that data monetization is a waste of time for most companies unless their Data and Analytics functions have a seat in the C-suite.
Accessing first-party data is a challenge when distributed across different customer touch points, such as websites, apps, social media sites and more. A customer data platform (CDP) can not only consolidate information siloed across systems, it can also manage the often-complicated and murky waters of privacy regulations.
A CDP allows you to make better business decisions by bringing in missing pieces that marketing, sales, and customer success previously had to live without. By cutting out the middleman of third-party data, these teams can make improved business decisions with measurable outcomes.
A centralized data management system allows you to work with your vendors, suppliers, and partners to successfully build better marketing campaigns, personalize customer experience, and improve product offerings. By sharing data, you can generate profits, monetize owned data, and improve business relationships.