This guide explains what the LiveRamp Data Marketplace is, how a buyer works in it and where company-level signals answer a different question, so that a B2B data team can tell which of the two a given job needs. Every statement about LiveRamp comes from its own website and documentation, read on 4 October 2026 and linked below. Product names and terms change, so check them again before you buy.
What the Data Marketplace is
LiveRamp's documentation describes the Data Marketplace as a place where buyers and sellers of marketing data connect and transact across channels at a person level. As in any data marketplace, sellers list data and buyers request it. The documentation lists three things a user can do: manage the permissions on how data is used, view usage aggregated across the platforms where it is used, and manage aggregated billing. It gives first-party data owners, third-party data owners and digital platforms as examples of marketplace users. Access is through the Data Marketplace tab in LiveRamp Connect, and a LiveRamp representative is the contact for anyone who does not see the tab.
What is traded is the segment. The marketplace page lists behavioural, geographic, transaction-level and connected-television audience data. A standard segment is prebuilt and open to every buyer. A custom segment is built for the request of one buyer and can go only to approved platforms. LiveRamp's overview of the company adds that the marketplace also brings together AI models and partner agents.
How a buyer works in it
The buying guide sets out the sequence. A buyer does the following:
- Searches for standard segments in the marketplace and requests them.
- Activates a destination account for each platform that is to receive segments.
- Distributes the segments to those destination accounts.
- Activates the segments at the platform.
- Receives a monthly invoice from LiveRamp for the segments that were activated.
Two details matter to a data team. First, charges arise when a segment is activated at a destination, not when it is requested or distributed, and the pricing model depends on the platform: the guide names models based on cost per thousand impressions or per click, and on a percentage of media spend. On advertiser-direct platforms the buyer reports usage and the charge follows it. On the others the destination charges LiveRamp the usage fee and LiveRamp invoices the buyer.
Second, not every destination accepts marketplace data, and some require the seller to send the segments to the buyer's account. The marketplace page lists the places audiences can be activated as programmatic campaigns, streaming and connected television, retail media networks and commerce platforms.
Identity beside the marketplace
LiveRamp's identity products sit beside the marketplace. Its RampID documentation says identity resolution takes known and pseudonymous identifiers and resolves them into individuals or households, producing a person-based, pseudonymised view of customers that carries the identifier RampID. The unit is a person or a household, and the marketplace documentation describes its own trade as person level.
For business buyers, LiveRamp's B2B page describes the same machinery pointed at accounts. It says unified identity gives account-level precision for reaching decision-makers across channels, that a B2B identity graph resolves buyer signals into a view of those decision-makers, and that a clean room can match campaign exposure against a company's own CRM data. It also says the marketplace can enrich first-party data with firmographic, technographic and intent signals from B2B providers. Those signals are the providers' products, so the unit, the fields and the refresh of each set are for that provider to state.
Where company-level signals differ
Fokals is a company-level feed, firmographic, technographic, hiring and intent data on public and private companies worldwide, and the differences follow from that. Its unit is the company: each company has one stable company ID, and a listed company also carries its ticker, MIC, ISIN, LEI and share-class FIGI. A record is a dated fact about a company: a technology added, a role opened, a funding raise, an announcement. Each record carries the time it was observed, and daily and weekly tables are written once after the period closes and are never revised, so the data is point-in-time by construction. A leadership change in Company News is recorded with the role concerned.
Fokals is delivered direct, by REST API and as bulk files in JSON, JSON Lines or CSV, which you load into the warehouse or CRM where your team works, where it joins on the company ID or on the market identifiers. The guide to company-level data and identity platforms sets out the split between account level and person level in more detail.
One term needs care. In LiveRamp's documentation, first-party data is data a company has collected itself, as against second-party data from a partner and third-party data purchased in LiveRamp. Fokals applies the word to its sourcing: first-party company sources and public records, processed in-house. The senses differ, so when a vendor says first-party, ask whose first party it means.
| Question | Audience data in a marketplace, as LiveRamp describes it | Company signals from Fokals |
|---|---|---|
| What is the unit? | A person, at a person level | A company, with one stable company ID |
| What is traded or held? | Segments: behavioural, geographic, transaction-level and connected-television audiences | Dated facts about a company: a tool added, a role opened, a filing, an announcement |
| Where is it used? | Activated at destination platforms | Loaded into your warehouse or CRM and joined on identifiers |
| How is it charged? | On activation at a destination, by that platform's pricing model | Licensed by written agreement, with no public price list |
A worked example shows where each belongs. Acme Robotics, an illustrative company, sells software to manufacturers and wants a campaign aimed at accounts that are likely to be buying now. The first decision is which companies, and that is a company-level question. The query below, run on the loaded Intent Scores and Technology Stack tables from the intent and marketing data, lists the companies whose score for one topic surged in the latest closed week, with the website to match on. The data dictionary names every table and column used.
-- Illustrative: companies to hand to an audience or advertising tool
select
i.company_id,
i.company,
i.score,
w.domain
from company_intent_weekly i
join (select distinct company_id, domain from company_technologies) w
on w.company_id = i.company_id
where i.topic = :topic_id
and i.surge = true
and i.week_start = (select max(week_start) from company_intent_weekly)
order by i.score desc;The second decision is how to reach people at those companies. That is the part LiveRamp's pages describe: identity, audiences and activation. Which account identifiers a platform accepts, and how it matches them to people, are questions for LiveRamp's documentation or its representative. In the other direction, every Intent Scores row carries its five strongest signals as evidence, so the list you hand over can say why each company is on it.
Questions to put to any provider of company-level data
Whether a company-level set is bought through a marketplace or licensed directly, the same questions separate sets that can be used from sets that cannot. They apply to Fokals as much as to any provider. How a marketplace compares with a direct licence is the subject of data marketplace vs direct licensing.
- Unit and key. Is a row a company or a person, and which identifier is it keyed on?
- Dates. Does each fact carry the time it was observed, or only a refresh date for the file?
- Revisions. Are past periods ever rewritten? A back-test or a trend needs rows that stay as published.
- Sourcing. Does the provider say where each field comes from, and is the source public?
- Coverage. What share of your own account list does the set match? Test it on a sample of the companies you track before any licence.
- Delivery and use. Does the data reach your systems as a file or an API, and what does the licence allow: internal use, embedding in a product or redistribution?
What each is built for
LiveRamp's documentation describes work at the person level: reaching people in advertising channels, buying audiences and matching campaign exposure against CRM records. Fokals is built for the company-level decisions that come first: which companies to pursue, when and why, with the answer kept in your own systems. Intent Scores carry the evidence behind each score, Technology Stack and Hiring Activity show what a company runs and builds, and every observation is dated. The two work together: the account list from one is an input to the other. The methodology sets out how each dataset is produced.
Frequently asked questions
What is the LiveRamp Data Marketplace?
According to LiveRamp's documentation, it is the part of LiveRamp where buyers and sellers of marketing data connect and transact across channels at a person level. Sellers list audience segments, buyers request them, and the segments are distributed to and activated at destination platforms, where the buyer is charged under that platform's pricing model. LiveRamp's own overview also lists AI models and partner agents in the marketplace.
Does LiveRamp sell company-level data for B2B teams?
LiveRamp's B2B page says the Data Marketplace can enrich first-party data with firmographic, technographic and intent signals from B2B providers. Those signals are the providers' products, so the unit, fields and refresh of each set are described by the provider. Before you buy, ask for the columns, the identifier each row is keyed on and the date each fact was observed.
How is company-level data different from audience data?
Audience data describes groups of people, at a person level, and is used by activating segments in channels. Company-level data describes organisations: one row per company, keyed on a company identifier, holding dated facts such as a technology added or a role opened. Audience data answers whom to reach. Company-level data answers which companies to pursue, when and why.
How is Fokals data delivered to a team that activates audiences elsewhere?
Fokals is delivered direct, by REST API and as bulk files in JSON, JSON Lines or CSV. You pull the data with a key and load it into the warehouse or CRM where your team works, then join it to your account list on the company ID or on identifiers such as ticker, ISIN or LEI. Licences are by written agreement for internal use, embedding in a product or redistribution.
What company-level evidence can an account list carry?
Each row of Intent Scores carries a 0 to 100 score for a company and topic, a surge flag when a score at least doubles against the company's own twelve-week average, and the five strongest dated signals behind it. A list built from it can say why each company is on it, which lets a marketer or a model reviewer open the source of every score.
The queries and code on this page are examples to adapt. Test them in your own environment before you rely on them.
What this page says about the products it names was checked against their public documentation on 4 October 2026. Product and company names are trademarks of their owners. Fokals is not affiliated with them or endorsed by them.