From Amazon’s predictive recommendations to UberEats’ seamless ordering process, today’s consumers are conditioned to expect every interaction to be intuitive, personalized, and fast. This retail-driven outlook now permeates every corner of life, including healthcare, financial services, and the public sector.
Yet, most organizations in these sectors are struggling to keep up. Fragmented identity data is the often overlooked root cause.
According to a new research report, nine in ten leaders across regulated industries say siloed identity data significantly hinders their ability to deliver the personalized, frictionless experiences people now demand. As a result, nearly 60% of respondents across sectors report regularly losing customers, patients, or constituents due to poor experiences.
Experience is the new currency. Identity Backs it.
Digital transformation has enabled powerful tools, from CRM platforms to AI-driven analytics. However, the research reveals that without a complete and trusted 360-degree view of identity, even the most advanced technology fails to deliver on its promise.
Less than half of customer data is unified, trusted, and accessible in many organizations. The result is incomplete insights, redundant outreach, security risks, and broken experiences that frustrate users and erode trust.
Identity is no longer just an IT challenge; it is a strategic imperative. To compete in today’s experience economy, organizations must unify and intelligently manage identity data across all systems and touchpoints.
Understanding identity intelligence
“Identity intelligence” means going beyond basic record matching. It is the ability to understand who someone truly is across every interaction, channel, and moment, and to act on that understanding with confidence. This requires:
- Accurate identity resolution across fragmented systems
- Real-time synchronization of identity data into every system that needs it
- Data enrichment with key demographic, socioeconomic, and behavioral insights
- Governed data that is secure, reliable, and ready for analytics, engagement, and AI
The findings suggest that organizations that develop these capabilities transform identity from a backend data function into a strategic asset powering personalization, fraud prevention, and trust.
The identity gap is a cross-industry crisis
Across healthcare, financial services, and government, organizations are facing mounting pressure to deliver more personalized, responsive, and seamless experiences. Yet the vast majority are held back by a critical shortcoming: the inability to confidently answer a fundamental question—Who is this person, really?
While these sectors serve very different missions, the identity challenge is strikingly consistent:
- In healthcare, the inability to unify patient, consumer, and member data across disparate systems limits care coordination, drives inefficiencies, and contributes to patient dissatisfaction.
- In financial services, fragmented identity data undermines personalization, weakens customer trust, and introduces friction in onboarding and service delivery.
- In the public sector, constituents increasingly expect government services to match the ease and speed of the private sector. Without a unified view of individuals across programs and agencies, inefficiencies, duplication, fraud risk, and eroding public trust persist.
According to the research, only 21% of leaders feel fully confident in their ability to deliver consistent, personalized experiences today. Nearly 60% admit to regularly losing people due to preventable breakdowns, and more than 90% say fragmented identity data is a significant barrier to improvement.
This is a fundamental obstacle to growth, loyalty, and trust. It affects every part of the organization, from operations and analytics to compliance and customer engagement. As digital expectations rise, the gap between what people expect and what organizations can deliver will only widen.
Closing the identity gap
Many organizations have attempted to address identity issues through isolated fixes, such as data cleanups or point integrations. The study’s results make it clear that these patchwork approaches are falling short.
A majority of respondents (57%) plan to invest in master data management (MDM) solutions, with 22% committed to doing so within the next year—signaling a shift toward scalable, unified approaches to identity.
The time to act is now
The experience economy does not wait. As loyalty becomes harder to earn and easier to lose, organizations must move quickly to close the identity gap.
Investing in identity intelligence today means:
- Delivering personalized, secure, and seamless experiences
- Unlocking trusted insights for AI and analytics
- Enabling operational efficiency across every system and team
- Building resilience, trust, and loyalty in a competitive landscape
In short, it means transforming an organization’s ability to serve, engage, and grow.
Ready to learn more?
Download the full research report to explore the findings in depth and see how peers across industries are tackling the identity challenge.
