How Matching Approach and Data Sources Affect Your Results

The Versium APIs use different matching approaches and data sources depending on what makes the most sense for what the API is trying to accomplish. This difference does mean you may see a difference in how many matches are found for the same set of inputs using different APIs, and this is exactly what you want.

Fuzzy matching and broad data sources expand the search

APIs that work best with the most matches, like consumerinfo, use fuzzy matching. For example, if you want to get consumer insights, you’re going to want “fuzzy matching,” where the search expands to look for similar names. These APIs also use a broader variety of data sources to maximize the chances of finding the data you need. Fuzzy matching lets you search for “Bob Smith” and get matches for “Robert Smith” and “Bob Smythe.” It can handle incorrect spellings, name variations, address formatting differences and more, and still return relevant matches.

Exact matching and reliable data sources give more precise results

APIs that work best with precise results, like consumeridentityscore, use exact matching. It gives you fewer matches, but the ones you do get are more reliable and more likely to be valid. For example, when you're looking for a Consumer Identity Score, your goals are different — you want to know your information is good. So, this API uses exact matching to match your input more precisely, and only searches in the most reliable data sources. With exact matching when you search for "Bob Smith," you will NOT get matches for "Robert Smith" or "Bob Smythe."

Advanced Matching

You can change how the API calls match using match codes. See Advanced Matching.