The Nosto Data Engine is a real-time data processing layer. It collects, stores, and processes multiple types of commerce data, including behavioural signals, product catalogue data, and visual content, from a wide range of sources. Using commerce-specific machine learning models, it transforms raw data into actionable intelligence that powers personalised product recommendations, search, category merchandising, email campaigns, and more across the entire customer journey.
Real-Time
Data Engine
Our data engine gathers, stores, and processes diverse data types from multiple sources in real-time. It uses commerce-specific machine learning models to process this data and turn it into the actionable intelligence needed to deliver high-performing commerce experiences via our Product Experience Cloud and Content Experience Cloud.
Enrich and action different
commerce data types
Behavorial data
We collect and process both zero-party data (information proactively shared) and first-party data (such as purchase history and website interactions) to create profiles that identify and predict affinities. These rich profiles are created for every shopper and consider both past and present interactions with your site, to illuminate unique targeting opportunities.
Product catalog data
Synchronize your product data in real time and analyze how shoppers engage with your catalog, revealing patterns and connections between items. Our engine looks at past performance of items and ranks them in terms of expected revenue. This data is then combined with behavioral data to predict how much revenue an item is likely to generate.
Content data
Visual AI uses advanced algorithms to identify, organize, and categorize objects, scenes, events, emotions, styles, colors, patterns, and more within visual content. It then turns these into machine-readable datasets with which you can enhance personalization and streamline curation.
Experience management
Our CXP is fueled by customer, product, and content data. By combining these three critical commerce data components, you have a rich and holistic pool of intelligence at your fingertips to action through end-to-end commerce experience management, driving online revenue.
Connect external data sources to
enrich commerce insights
Integrations with your
tech stack
Easily connect our CXP to your existing tech stack, including your CDP, ESP, POS and more, to further enrich your pool of customer data for greater targeting.
Open APIs and extensive
file import
Alternatively, synchronize your customer data with Nosto through our API, or conveniently upload customer lists directly from a spreadsheet if preferable.
Use rich intent data across the
entire commerce experience
Understand true
shopper Intent
Bridge the gap between human communication and machine understanding with our Semantic AI and capture the true intent behind every search query. Use this intelligence to then inform your other commerce strategies and actionability for better product discovery.
Capture anywhere,
use everywhere
Our data engine fuels every module of our CXP, including Personalized Search, Product Recommendations, Category Merchandising, UGC, Content Personalization, and more, giving you the power to deliver end-to-end personalized experiences that increase revenue.
Fuse online and offline data to create seamless customer journeys
Omnichannel
audience profiles
Your brick-and-mortar and ecommerce operations shouldn’t be operating in silos. By unifying online and offline data, you can create richer omnichannel shopper profiles. This leads to a better understanding of behaviors, preferences, and buying habits of individual shoppers or groups of shoppers to identify targeting opportunities.
Consistent online
and offline experiences
Use in-store transactional data to enhance online experiences by personalizing on-site and email campaigns with products and content related to in-store purchases. Conversely, use online behavioral data to suggest relevant items or use digital in-store screens to present content based on shopper affinities.
Aggregate your data sources and build
high-performing models for precise targeting
FAQ
What is the Nosto Data Engine?
What types of data does the Nosto Data Engine collect and process?
The Data Engine handles three primary data types:
- Behavioural data: both zero-party data (information shoppers proactively share) and first-party data such as purchase history, browsing behaviour, and on-site interactions. These signals are used to build rich shopper profiles that identify and predict individual affinities.
- Product catalogue data: real-time synchronisation and analysis of how shoppers engage with your product inventory, including ranking items by expected revenue generation.
- Content data: using Visual AI, the engine identifies and categorises objects, colours, styles, emotions, and scenes within visual content, turning UGC and product imagery into structured, machine-readable datasets.
How does Nosto’s Data Engine use first-party data?
Nosto’s Data Engine is built around first-party and zero-party data, making it inherently privacy-friendly. First-party data, collected directly from your own site through shopper interactions, purchase events, and browsing behaviour, is used to build individual shopper profiles. These profiles track both historical and real-time signals to surface targeting opportunities such as predicted buyers, lifecycle stage, and category or brand affinities. This approach avoids reliance on third-party cookies and positions brands well for a cookieless future.
Can Nosto connect to external data sources and existing tech stacks?
Yes. The Nosto Data Engine is designed to integrate with your existing technology ecosystem. It supports connections to Customer Data Platforms (CDPs), Email Service Providers (ESPs), Point-of-Sale (POS) systems, and other tools in your commerce stack. For more flexible ingestion, Nosto also offers open APIs and file import options, including direct spreadsheet uploads, so you can synchronise customer data in whichever way suits your operations.
What is shopper intent data, and how does Nosto use it?
Shopper intent data refers to the signals that reveal what a customer is actively looking for, including search queries, product views, add-to-basket events, and browsing patterns. Nosto uses Semantic AI to interpret the true meaning behind search queries, bridging the gap between natural language and machine understanding. This intent intelligence is then shared across the entire CXP, informing personalised search results, product recommendations, category page ranking, and content personalisation, so that every touchpoint responds to what the shopper actually wants.
How does the Nosto Data Engine power product recommendations?
The Data Engine underpins Nosto’s product recommendation engine by combining two key data streams: product performance data (including sales, inventory levels, and the product graph, which maps relationships and connections between items) and individual shopper behavioural data (affinities, lifecycle stage, predicted purchase probability). The result is recommendations that are personalized at an individual level while also optimized for commercial performance.
How does the Nosto Data Engine support audience segmentation and targeting?
The Data Engine feeds directly into Nosto’s Audience Builder, enabling sophisticated segmentation based on real-time and historical shopper data. Brands can build audiences based on lifecycle stage (new visitor, first-time buyer, loyal advocate), predicted purchase probability, and shopper affinities across products, categories, and brands. These segments can then be used to personalize on-site experiences, email campaigns, pop-ups, and more, ensuring that every shopper receives experiences matched to where they are in their journey.