How a new Customer Data Platform is transforming the Guardian’s Martech ecosystem

The Guardian is open to all, funded by many, and beholden to no one. Our CRM team’s challenge is to encourage readers to become financial supporters so we can sustain our journalism while staying independent.

By the end of FY24/25, we delivered record results by growing our marketing base and increasing communications to known audiences. But we knew a volume alone approach would not support continuing growth in FY25/26. To keep amplifying Guardian journalism and maximise its commercial value, we needed better access to first-party data and the ability to activate personalisation at scale, unlocking CRM programmes that weren’t previously possible. We achieved this by implementing a Customer Data Platform (CDP). Working in close partnership across CRM, Product & Engineering and Data, we connected the CDP to our data warehouse and our targeting platforms (Braze and our in-house web targeting tool). This unlocked self-serve access to high-value data points for the CRM team, enabling faster programme delivery, richer cross-channel experiences for our readers, and consistent personalisation. The impact was immediate: journeys that previously required months of engineering time to enable could be activated directly by CRM in as little as two days. This unlocked new automated programmes across the reader lifecycle. Finally, we were able to activate cross-channel personalisation at key touchpoints in the reader journey to support the Guardian, driving uplifts in reader revenues through personalised pricing and messaging - from email, to on-site channels, to the checkout.