EMARKETER recently published, “From Guesswork to Greatness: How Marketers are Redefining Effective Creative at Scale in Digital Advertising.” The report, created in partnership with TripleLift, analyzes findings from a June 2025 survey of 164 US marketing professionals about their approaches to creative effectiveness in programmatic advertising. This FAQ explores some key questions addressed by the report.
Q: Why don't marketing teams agree on what makes good creative?
A: Marketing teams are experiencing a fundamental disconnect between recognizing creative's importance and actually defining what makes it effective. The June 2025 survey reveals that 83.5% of marketers agree that creative drives advertising performance, yet only 58.5% report that their teams share a clear definition of what constitutes great creative. Every organization operates with its own definition of “great creative,” and despite attempts at industry standards, widespread adoption remains slow. That means teams are evaluating the same creative through different lenses, potentially producing conflicting feedback and diluting the outputs.
Q: What do marketers associate with great ad creative?
A: Clear brand storytelling and visually compelling design both scored 69.5% as the most cited attributes, the survey found. Personalization and relevance to the audience followed at 66.5%, with memorable call-to-action at 58.5% and strong emotional resonance at 56.7%. Contextual alignment ranked lowest at 34.8%, revealing a disconnect between conceptual importance and practical prioritization.
Q: What are the primary reasons creative underperforms in programmatic campaigns?
A: Limited asset updates lead the list at 54.3%, the survey found. Marketers simply aren't refreshing creative frequently enough, causing audience fatigue that can erode campaign performance over time. Another 51.8% don't produce enough versions to match different audiences, contexts, or formats, meaning they're trying to reach everyone with generic creative. Additionally, 51.2% lack reliable metrics or dashboards to tie creative attributes to outcomes, while 43.9% cite insufficient funds or talent for testing, production, or tool licensing. These problems compound each other. Without measurement, teams can't identify what needs refreshing. Without multiple versions, they can't test what works. And without budget for production, they can't create the variations they need.
Q: What ad formats are advertisers using in programmatic advertising?
A: Online video ads lead at 79.9% usage, the survey found, reflecting consumer preference for video content across platforms. Display ads, long the workhorse of programmatic, closely followed at 77.4%, while 66.5% said they are using native ads. Connected TV (CTV) advertising is used by 50.0% of respondents, but as US CTV viewership rises, it is positioned to grow. Varied formats come with challenges. Video, display, and CTV deliver in different consumer contexts. Creative asset sizes vary by channel, and adapting them for quality experiences requires advanced data, creative, and rendering capabilities.
Q: Do marketers struggle to scale creative across ad channels?
A: The report found that organizations lack infrastructure for relevant cross-channel delivery. Over half cite infrequent asset updates as a failure point, and technical requirements for different formats create complexity. While advertisers own the messaging, choosing the right format for the right goal requires understanding brand objectives and matching them with technical execution.
Q: How important is it for marketers to evaluate their advertising creative?
A: The survey shows 71.3% of marketers say evaluating or improving creative effectiveness has become more important over the past year, yet only 58.5% regularly correlate creative quality with performance metrics. Just 51.2% have reliable metrics or dashboards for tracking effectiveness. The majority expect data analysis to play an increasing role in creative success.
Q: What KPIs do marketers follow to prove ad creative effectiveness?
A: Click-through rate led with 67.1% of marketers leaning on that KPI. Engagement rate followed at 59.8%, and 57.3% pointed to conversion rate, the survey found. Notably, 62.2% of marketers don't believe campaign outcomes can be attributed to creative alone, highlighting the need for multifactor attribution.
Q: Do marketers really connect creative quality with performance?
A: While marketers are indeed tying performance to the quality of their advertising creative, only 17.1% always correlate creative with performance. Another 41.5% do so often, 31.1% sometimes, 7.9% rarely, and 2.4% never. Teams that often make this connection are significantly more likely to have clear creative definitions and are over four times more likely to strongly agree that their organization understands what comprises great creative.
Q: How are marketers currently deploying AI for creative tasks?
A: Half of marketers use AI for ad copy generation, the survey found. Another 37.8% use AI to generate images or video, 29.3% to ensure contextual content alignment, and 26.2% to version or resize assets. When asked what tasks they'd offload to technology, 57.3% chose resizing and format adaptation, 54.9% selected rapid A/B testing, and 50.6% picked copy proofreading. As for the impact of AI on creative, the survey found 54.9% of marketers expect AI's biggest contribution will be workflow automation as advertisers look for operational efficiency. The results suggest AI won't replace creativity. Instead, it may enhance creativity by automating repetitive tasks, freeing marketers for high-impact thinking.
Q: What concerns exist about the use of AI in creative processes?
A: The report finds 90.9% of marketers believe human intuition in evaluating or generating AI content is very important or critical. Without human oversight, AI risks producing generic or off-brand content that breaks trust. That could result in brand dilution and loss of authentic human connection with audiences.
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