The Marketing Insider | A Claritas Podcast: Mapping Lifestyles to Growth

The Marketing Insider: A Claritas Podcast, Episode 58 with Joel Nadelman

In this episode of The Marketing Insider: A Claritas Podcast, host Monique Ruiz, Marketing Director at Claritas, speaks with Joel Nadelman, Chief Growth Officer at PolicyMap, about how lifestyle segmentation and mapping tools empower organizations to drive growth. Below are a few highlights from their discussion:

Monique: What made PolicyMap decide to partner with Claritas to integrate Prism Premier segmentation into your platform? What do you see as the benefits for your customers?

JOEL: The initial push came from our public library customers. We’ve worked with librarians for years, giving them tools for community analysis, outreach, and planning. But we hadn’t built a holistic solution that included library patrons as well. When a competitor exited the library space, we developed something in 2024 that allowed us to support both librarians and patrons. Market research showed there was a gap in psychographic data on our platform, and Claritas emerged as the leader in this space

Monique: How do you see PolicyMap users getting the most value out of Prism Premier within analytics?

JOEL: Public libraries benefit, but let me give another example. Academic users in marketing courses and classes can use PolicyMap with Prism Premier for real-world case studies. Students can build realistic strategies for reaching different audiences at a granular level. Pairing Prism with PolicyMap’s tools provides a holistic, visually compelling picture that can easily be included in reports and presentations. This prepares students for their careers by giving them practical, hands-on experience with real data.

Monique: I know a lot of companies want to be able to use their own data along with third-party insights. Is that possible with PolicyMap? And how does that help marketers refine targeting or messaging?

JOEL: Yes, that’s one of the most powerful elements of our platform. Customers can bring their own data and overlay it with PolicyMap data and third-party data like Claritas. For example, a small business owner can map their customer list to see which lifestyle segments they are or aren’t reaching. Libraries can compare their cardholder data with Prism segments to see who is or isn’t using the library. Combining these perspectives gives a richer understanding than any one data source could provide. This allows for downstream activation. Once you know about the lifestyles in your geography,you can tailor outbound messaging across different channels based on the segmentation insights.

Monique: What are your biggest tips for a successful data partnership, and how does that translate into what you make available for your clients?

JOEL: Partnerships work best when they’re open, transparent, and collaborative. It’s not just about what we need but also about making it mutually beneficial. I always look for one-plus-one-equals-three solutions, where combining data sources—public, customer, and third-party—creates more value than any could alone. That’s what makes this partnership model powerful.