Our team is frequently asked whether RudderStack is a customer data platform or customer data infrastructure (CDI).
This question is complex because the term customer data platform (CDP) has a strong association with marketing. Traditionally, CDPs are used by marketing teams to manage the final steps of the customer experience, such as emails, messages, and ad campaigns.
When viewed from that perspective, RudderStack functions as customer data infrastructure (CDI). Our product is not designed to send emails or execute campaigns for marketers. Instead, it is built for data teams to collect and distribute customer data throughout their organizations, including marketing and their toolset. Additionally, our product integrates with multiple marketing CDPs, and our customers use RudderStack to feed them with data.
However, referring to RudderStack solely as “infrastructure” does not fully encompass the capabilities of our platform. We enable a wide range of powerful data use cases that occur in data warehouses or downstream tools, including the CDPs used by marketing teams.
A prime example of a product feature that goes beyond the scope of “infrastructure” is identity resolution. Our SDKs track anonymous and known users and establish a transparent identity graph in your data warehouse, instead of residing in a third-party black box. This does not mean we compete with marketing CDPs that also offer identity resolution; rather, it enhances downstream identity resolution with better, more comprehensive, and transparent customer data from RudderStack.
The example of identity resolution underscores a key aspect of our vision at RudderStack: providing complete control of customer data in your warehouse and simplifying the process of distributing that data to every team and tool in your stack.