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Marcus Johnson (00:00):

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(00:22):

Hey, gang. It's Monday, December 15th. Ross, Max, Oscar, and listeners, welcome to Behind the Numbers, and EMARKETER video podcast made possible by Viasat Ads. I'm Marcus. Join me for today's conversation. We have living just north of New York City, Senior Analyst covering digital advertising and media, Ross Benes.

Ross Benes (00:37):

Hey, Marcus.

Marcus Johnson (00:38):

Hey, fella. A little further south, in New York City itself, you can find a Senior Director of forecasting called Max Willens.

Oscar Orozco (00:45):

Hello, listeners. Hey, Marcus. Happy to be here.

Marcus Johnson (00:47):

Hey, fella. Glad to have you. Keep on going down the map. In a town called Philadelphia, there's a Principal Analyst covering social media and the creator economy known as Max Willens.

Max Willens (00:58):

Yo.

Marcus Johnson (00:58):

There he is. Today's fact, an eagle can spot rabbit sized prey from how far away do you guys think in terms of, let's do blocks. Let's do city blocks.

Ross Benes (01:18):

15 blocks.

Oscar Orozco (01:21):

I was at 60.

Max Willens (01:23):

Say five.

Marcus Johnson (01:26):

I could spot prey away from five blocks, Max. 60 actually sounds ridiculous, Oscar no offense, but it's almost spot on. 50. 50 blocks away, which is about two to three miles. Central Park for reference is about two and a half miles. So an eagle, if it was Columbus Circle, would be able to, around 59th, 60th Street, would be able to spot a rabbit sized individual from the other end of the park.

Oscar Orozco (01:57):

I don't know what's more impressive that-

Marcus Johnson (01:58):

Game over.

Oscar Orozco (01:58):

Or that I was so close. I mean, it's the forecaster in me guys but.

Marcus Johnson (02:02):

Oh, my goodness. It's definitely the fact. Okay. It wasn't you. All right, let's move on. Anyways, that's a real topic. We make some very specific, but highly unlikely predictions for 2026. Shark Tank style. Complete rip off. Complete. All right, here we go. This is how this episode works. If you watch Shark Tank, you'll be familiar. Ross is first or dragon's den if you're in England. Ross is first. He gets 60 seconds to pitch a very specific but highly unlikely prediction he thinks will come true in 2026. Then me, Oscar, Max, and everyone listening will decide if they want to invest in, in air quotes. Basically, do we believe in the prediction? If you believe in it, then you're investing in it. Oscar goes next. So on and so forth. Let's do it. Ross, what do you have for us? What's your very specific, but highly unlikely prediction for 2026?

Ross Benes (02:57):

That major brands will start to sponsor end zones and backboards.

Marcus Johnson (03:03):

Okay. So talk to us because this kind of happens now, right? There are sponsors that appear on them, but you're talking about something more longer term, I assume.

Ross Benes (03:12):

So there are some sponsorships on jerseys and equipment for these leagues, and sometimes you'll see a logo midfield or on the hash mark on a football field. But we haven't seen anything as aggressive as putting a State Farm logo on the glass backboard of an NBA game or a Honda ad throughout the whole end zone. I just feel like the leagues are getting more aggressive in where they'll put ads and they've kind of run out of space on the wall of the stadium. So they're going to insert more right into the field.

Marcus Johnson (03:45):

Will this change every quarter, every game? Is this something where are we sponsoring the end zone of the Cincinnati Bengals for the whole season?

Ross Benes (03:57):

Oh, that's a great question. I haven't thought it all the way through that far.

Marcus Johnson (04:03):

Don't be surprised that it's a good question.

Ross Benes (04:05):

If it's painted on there physically like an end zone, that would be at least the whole game. But what you're talking about is more dynamic, and I could see it going that route too, because they already do this with the pitchers mounds.

Marcus Johnson (04:18):

Yeah.

Ross Benes (04:18):

On the back of a pitchers mound, they'll even change sometimes throughout a game, the logo that's on there, because it's just holographically put on the broadcast. It doesn't really exist on the field of play. So it'd be digital out of home. You could just serve different creative in the third quarter, fourth quarter. It gets to be 30 degrees in the fourth quarter because the sun has gone down. Campbell's soup ad in the end zone. Why not?

Oscar Orozco (04:46):

I was going to mention the holographs. I mean, we've seen those, so I could see that happening more. But did this come to mind, Ross? Because when I'm thinking about sports, I keep thinking about women's sports. So is this something that's already happening there? Is this part of what's going to drive some of this as well? But I do agree with you, that I'm seeing more opportunity. So was wondering about that part of it.

Ross Benes (05:12):

Well, I guess what spawned it is just watching NBA and NFL now and just seeing more sponsorships than I'd seen before. And especially if you ever go on YouTube and watch an old game, it's jarring how clean it looks, like how much there's just less clutter on the screen, Which makes me think there's just going to be more coming very soon because the leagues are very, very hungry for money and the advertisers are hungry to participate with the leagues and there's only so many 30-second commercials you can buy up.

Marcus Johnson (05:46):

Yeah.

Ross Benes (05:47):

Once those sell out, why not plaster your logo on the backboard or on the ball itself? Why are there any limits?

Max Willens (05:55):

Do you think that this is going to be something that the individual franchises will sell or will it be a league-wide like, and it looks like we're in Bud Light field goal range for whoever the hell it is? In either case, it sounds like my idea of hell, but I'm curious to hear how you think it will-

Ross Benes (06:14):

I think it'd be the individual teams because the reason I say that is because the individual teams have say right now over the Jersey logos in the NBA or there's helmet stuff in MLB. So given how it's already sold right now by team, I think this would just extend that precedent.

Marcus Johnson (06:39):

Yeah. I'm in because advertisers already pushing the envelope. I've thought this similar to you, Ross, I've thought this for a while. The thing that really frustrates me is the 10-second ads that pop up in between free throws during an NBA game, which is infuriating. But there's also the sponsored quick game recaps. When they come back from a break, they're like, I'm making this up, but something to the effect of the special delivery of the game brought to you by, which is the best great pass of the game, brought to you by UPS because they're talking about delivering things. Or there's Walmart 4K sky cam that they... So they're sponsoring cameras now as well.

Max Willens (07:24):

I'm also in, even though as I said, I absolutely hate this.

Oscar Orozco (07:29):

And same. I mean, agree with you completely, Max. I'm in, I buy it. As a big soccer fan, I mean, they're definitely pushing the envelope very recently. There were ads mid-game, so you're seeing two screens at once and they'll show a quick ad. So they're definitely trying different formats. And so I wouldn't be surprised if we see something like this for sure, so.

Max Willens (07:53):

Do you guys think that maybe during the world, like I think so much about soccer, and it's a sport I watch less than others, but there's so much real estate, if you like. I'm always surprised by, I think at this point, the last time I watched an NBA game, I saw three different brands superimposed on one side of court, and that's much tighter quarters relative to half of a soccer pitch. Do you think that we could start seeing little boxes or logos following the-

Oscar Orozco (08:25):

Absolutely. I agree with you. I mean, you don't see anything on the field right now, but soccer was the first to have sponsorships on the jerseys and even some of these holographs. So in some ways they're innovators, but I agree with you. I do think they could use the field a bit more.

Max Willens (08:44):

Yeah.

Marcus Johnson (08:44):

Maybe this coming World Cup-

Oscar Orozco (08:45):

This World Cup.

Marcus Johnson (08:46):

Might see some stuff.

Ross Benes (08:47):

Soccer had an interesting thing with the Dallas Cowboys with the... Didn't they make, the tournament isn't going to be AT&T Stadium. They're going to say that it's Dallas Stadium because there's FIFA rules on mentioning-

Marcus Johnson (09:00):

Oh, interesting.

Ross Benes (09:00):

A sponsor's name. So like-

Max Willens (09:01):

Wow.

Ross Benes (09:02):

The broadcast is not going to say AT&T.

Oscar Orozco (09:05):

Interesting.

Marcus Johnson (09:05):

Okay.

Oscar Orozco (09:06):

Yeah. I mean, that makes sense. I hadn't heard of it, but it makes a lot of sense.

Marcus Johnson (09:09):

Well, the last point I wanted to make before we move on was I think it might make more sense for advertisers to only sponsor the thing for a short while because personally, I'm a Lakers fan, and so I've always known that it's been the Staples Center before it changed its name to Crypto.com Arena. But I never thought of Staples the company when I thought of... It was just the Staples Center. And then similar with Citi Field, I don't think, oh, Citi Field, Citibank. So I wonder if after a while you just become so used to what the name is that you stop thinking about the company in association with...

Ross Benes (09:43):

I mean, when I watch the Houston Astros, I still call it Enron Field.

Marcus Johnson (09:47):

Yeah.

Oscar Orozco (09:48):

Oh my goodness. Dating ourselves here. But I see what you're saying.

Ross Benes (09:54):

Wait for Keg Bizio to get up to the plate and get a double.

Marcus Johnson (09:58):

I think we're all in. Great start, Ross, with three investments off the back. So you basically have to bat perfect 1000, gents, if you want to win. Oscar, what do you have for us?

Oscar Orozco (10:10):

Tough one. So here shifting from sponsorships and marketing to e-commerce and social media, my prediction is TikTok Shop is on track to crash the US e-commerce top 10 when we look at it from top e-commerce platforms and retailers. That's in 2026, and I believe it might be able to break into the top five within the next two or three years after that. So massive growth from TikTok Shop, and a lot of things are driving it there, but more and more people are shopping on the platform.

Marcus Johnson (10:46):

So well give folks some context because we do have numbers for TikTok Shop right now. Where does it sit in terms of the rankings at the moment, roughly?

Oscar Orozco (10:55):

At the moment, it's roughly, I think we're on 12th, I believe, 12 to 13. So it's-

Marcus Johnson (11:00):

Okay.

Oscar Orozco (11:01):

Slightly under.

Marcus Johnson (11:02):

Just outside.

Oscar Orozco (11:03):

Yeah, just outside the top 10.

Marcus Johnson (11:03):

Okay.

Oscar Orozco (11:04):

But there are some massive retailers. I mean, we're comparing marketplaces to social commerce platforms. Sometimes it's hard to envision that, but ultimately it boils down to where people are shopping, where they're finding the items that they need on a daily or weekly basis. And yeah, the way TikTok Shop is growing, it should be able to easily crack that top 10 next year. And just a bit more context. I mean, it's only launched a little over two years ago in the US, so we have seen just massive triple digit growth in sales numbers since then.

Marcus Johnson (11:44):

So for a little bit more context as well, outside of Amazon, about half a trillion dollars this year in retail context.

Oscar Orozco (11:54):

Nowhere close to that.

Marcus Johnson (11:55):

Walmart, second place, a long way behind that with about 120 billion. Then Apple, quite far behind that with 45. And then it's a pretty-

Oscar Orozco (12:07):

It gets close.

Marcus Johnson (12:08):

Close. Yeah. Long tail. It's right after. So it definitely has the ability to leapfrog some, but you don't have to make 10, 30, 40, 100, $200 billion to leapfrog someone. You only need to make an extra 500 million, billion to be able to get over some of these guys in front of it. So I can see it happening.

Oscar Orozco (12:27):

Yeah. Yeah. There are players like Temu, which TikTok Shop is really competing against as well. So I think very, very feasible. We're just seeing so much interest from Gen Z. Gen Z's purchasing power continues to grow. And just the gamification of shopping, there's more shoppable media, interesting ads, which are leading to one click purchases. The livestream story, livestream shopping is becoming much more popular, nowhere close to where it is in China, but we're seeing a lot more interest and growth in that here in the US. So lots of reasons to see this happening next year.

Max Willens (13:07):

Yeah. It's interesting to think about the ways that they're trying to sort of broaden the use of TikTok Shop. They announced, I guess, maybe a couple of weeks ago that Kim Kardashian was going to do a live stream shopping event on their platform. And because to your point, Oscar, it does seem like this is a phenomenon that's driven largely by Gen Z and to a lesser extent, millennials, but-

Oscar Orozco (13:33):

Yep.

Max Willens (13:34):

Do you think that that's going to be sort of most of the engine behind it is just young-ish consumers whose shopping behaviors are still kind of crystallizing, just leaning more into something that they've gotten comfortable doing already or will-

Oscar Orozco (13:47):

I think so. I think so. And I think there's a lot more potential there for growth because we have a number. I mean, it's not exactly apples to apples, but when we look at TikTok buyers, not necessarily all of those are buying on TikTok Shop, but they're only spending a little bit under $300 a year. Right. So let's say the frequency goes up and we see more purchases of expensive products. Right. It could be luxury items or tech products. You'll see that dollar amount go up. So I think a lot of that will come primarily for more frequency of purchasing higher order value and just mainly Gen Z, and like you said, millennials. Down the line, we'll see if other generations also come on board. But for now, I would say it's mainly from that generation. Yeah.

Max Willens (14:36):

Makes a lot of sense.

Marcus Johnson (14:38):

The TikTok buyers numbers, just circle back to that for a second, that's what gave me pause because we have 53, and again, this is TikTok's social buyers. We have 53 million US this year. We expect 58, call it 58 million next year, and then going up by basically a couple of million each of the following. So what we're really hoping for Oscar, to drive this trend is, and we do, of the TikTok Shop, retail e-commerce sale numbers, we said, what it's about 15, 16, call it 16 billion this year, we're expecting to go up to 23 billion the year after that, 2026, which is significant growth, and then maybe five billion each of the following years. What we're saying there to what you were just, to your earlier point, it's a somewhat slightly higher number of people spending a relatively significant more amount of money to grow this.

Oscar Orozco (15:32):

Exactly.

Marcus Johnson (15:33):

Okay.

Oscar Orozco (15:33):

I mean, yeah, that's really what it is, but we're seeing that shift in social. Right. This is just a microcosm and just of the social commerce story and how it's not the only platform, but it's shifting from being kind of a discovery inspiration avenue to be more of conversion. And TikTok themselves recently mentioned how almost all of the users on their platform are expected to use the app for advice and inspiration, and ultimately a lot of them will actually purchase a gift through there. So that's just part of that momentum we're seeing with social commerce in general.

Max Willens (16:14):

I have no questions-

Oscar Orozco (16:14):

Come on, guys-

Max Willens (16:18):

Because I was jealous of this prediction to begin with. I'm pretty much-

Oscar Orozco (16:20):

Easy buy. Easy buy.

Max Willens (16:21):

Yeah.

Oscar Orozco (16:22):

That's what I want to hear.

Max Willens (16:22):

You've got my money.

Ross Benes (16:24):

Yeah, I'm going to buy because last few years I was a little skeptical TikTok would get as big as people predicted and then it got even bigger. So I've learned my lesson, I believe you, I'd buy it.

Oscar Orozco (16:39):

There you go. Let's make it three out of three. Come on...

Marcus Johnson (16:43):

Let me check our numbers quick. Let me do some more research. I think-

Max Willens (16:47):

Oh, go ahead.

Marcus Johnson (16:47):

Live research. I just need to check Home Depot's numbers. I think I'm in.

Oscar Orozco (16:53):

You're in?

Marcus Johnson (16:54):

Yeah.

Max Willens (16:56):

Should be.

Oscar Orozco (16:56):

Three out of three.

Marcus Johnson (16:57):

Yeah. I think top 10 for sure. And actually, I think your 2027, eight, nine, whatever prediction is also going to be spot on.

Oscar Orozco (17:05):

Top five.

Marcus Johnson (17:05):

Top five. Oh, yeah. Yeah, I think you're spot on-

Oscar Orozco (17:07):

I think that's going to happen, guys. I mean, it's pushing up on Temu and you're stuck with the marketplaces and then we're seeing the shift to social. So I definitely-

Marcus Johnson (17:17):

Nice.

Oscar Orozco (17:17):

See it happening.

Marcus Johnson (17:19):

Three out of three. Hat trick for Oscar.

Oscar Orozco (17:22):

There we go.

Marcus Johnson (17:23):

Hopefully none of those from Lamine Yamal, the [inaudible 00:17:25].

Oscar Orozco (17:26):

You know it's coming, Marcus.

Marcus Johnson (17:28):

Unfortunately, yes.

Oscar Orozco (17:30):

No pressure there, Max.

Max Willens (17:32):

You guys can just buy now, but just do it blind so we can have some harmony. All right. So my prediction is that 2026 will be the year that creators and retail media networks begin to work together more visibly. So this has sort of been a question that a lot of people in the media and retail chattering classes have been wondering about for a while, which is when kind of the creator economy and the retail media industrial complex will start to intertwine or intersect a little bit. And it has begun happening in kind of small ways, usually kind of oriented around affiliate marketing. So Walmart's had a creator program for a while. Amazon obviously is kind of the grandaddy of it with affiliate marketing. But in starting over the second half of 2025, you've started to see examples of these two worlds kind of intermingling a little bit more. So for example, you've had Best Buy ads and Dude Perfect have announced that they're going to have this big partnership that's going to last, I think all of 2026.

(18:44):

Sephora and Conde Nast launched a creator storefront, which will allow creators to essentially set up personalized storefronts that exist on their website. And you've also seen little examples too of this as well that have gone really well. So like Dick's Sporting Goods has something called, I think it's called the Varsity Team, which is essentially a brand ambassador program that taps into creators mostly in the form of professional and semi-professional athletes. And so I just think that as retail media networks look to find ways to kind of broaden their appeal to brands and find ways to deliver on not just bottom funnel KPIs, but really full funnel objectives, you're going to see more of this. And frankly too, I mean, creators, especially the folks that are not in that kind of 0.01% who are all looking for ways to make more money and monetize their followings more effectively, this kind of thing is going to wind up being very attractive to them. So those are all the reasons that I could see this becoming more prominent in 2026.

Marcus Johnson (19:55):

Is there a current example or a future hypothetical that you think exists that would really just hit extremely well?

Max Willens (20:06):

So I think a lot about, I mean, the Dude Perfect and Best Buy ads to me signaled the potential for a lot of stuff like this in the future with more specialized retail media networks. So when you think about retail media, most of the money goes to Amazon and Walmart because they are marketplaces, because they operate on this plane that's sort of separate from everybody else. But if you are a Home Depot or a Lowe's, for example, I think it would absolutely be possible to forge partnerships with really visible creators that are really synonymous with home improvement, whether it's people like Chip and Joanna Gaines or someone like Mike Rowe or someone much younger and kind of more on the come up who is able to really create this kind of like-

Marcus Johnson (21:03):

Marcus Johnson.

Max Willens (21:04):

There you go. Yeah. You can finally get your power saw creations out there and do it for some extra money. Yeah. So basically essentially thinking as more retail media networks sort of lean into their kind of vertical advantages and benefits of their data, I think you could see them start to forge more partnerships with sort of specialty creators that have real credibility to a certain target demographic that that retail media has a good story to tell around to advertisers already.

Marcus Johnson (21:34):

Yeah. Gents, what do we think?

Oscar Orozco (21:38):

Yeah, for me, thinking of it from the consumer standpoint, I mean, how are we... I'm trying to visualize this a little bit. I mean, are we creating a new digital storefront that actively is promoting these partnerships as a way to sort of engage the consumer or is this really just backend, kind of using first party data to help target the consumer and so they're kind of unaware of this? I guess I'm trying to understand more of how it would function to understand if I could see this working. Ultimately, it's up to the consumer and then that dictates whether it's beneficial to both parties here.

Max Willens (22:16):

So I think the answer, I'll give you a short answer and the long answer. The short answer is yes. It's going to be sort of all of those things folded together, but I think that the sort of idealized version of it is a little something like this where creator X creates a branded storefront on, let's say that it's someone who's a real popular pastry chef, for example, on YouTube and they spin up a branded storefront on an Instacart, for example. And all of a sudden as the sort of affiliate conversion data starts flowing in from people watching videos of this person make cakes or pies and people start buying the ingredients through their page, Instacart starts noticing it and goes, "Man, this woman really converts. People really seem to be about her."

(23:10):

And then looks at the stuff that is selling over and over again and then goes to the flour maker or the butter brand that she seems to use every time and says, "Just so you know, this woman absolutely has the ear of her audience and is doing this. So I think why don't I connect you two so that you guys can do more to promote your wares using our platform, using our pipes?" And then all of a sudden in the interim or rather in the early stages, this is I think going to be kind of a managed service very, a little bit bespoke, but as this starts to really hum and work more at scale, I could absolutely see a form of this being automated.

(23:52):

Walmart, for example, at the back half of this year introduced a kind of, I forget the term of it. It's maybe something like Walmart Creator Collab, which is basically like a marketplace that allows Walmart.com sellers and creators to get synced up with one another. And so I think that a version of that could absolutely exist on multiple RMNs across the United States once everybody kind of gets acclimated to the process that powers it.

Marcus Johnson (24:25):

I was listening, but at the back of my mind, I was thinking, what kind of pies are we talking here? Chicken pot, probably. Ross?

Ross Benes (24:34):

You asking me about the pies?

Marcus Johnson (24:36):

What kind of pies? No, I wish. Are you in?

Ross Benes (24:41):

Yeah, I think so. The only thing that would stop me from being in is if this was already happening a lot already and not something that we're looking forward to happening, but is already in the process of, but it all makes sense to me for why this convergence would happen.

Max Willens (25:02):

I would say this is happening in the same way that TikTok Shop is already rolling. In the same way that TikTok Shop, I think you said Oscar's ranked 12th and we think it'll crack 10. I think this is already happening in a couple of places, but the snowball is going to pick up speed as it rolls down the hill, if that makes sense.

Marcus Johnson (25:22):

Yeah.

Oscar Orozco (25:22):

Yeah.

Ross Benes (25:22):

Gotcha.

Marcus Johnson (25:24):

All right. I think Ross, that's a yes. He's in. Oscar?

Oscar Orozco (25:27):

Yeah. For me, now that I understand logistically how it would work, I'm in. I'm in as well. It makes-

Marcus Johnson (25:33):

Okay.

Oscar Orozco (25:33):

A lot of sense.

Marcus Johnson (25:34):

All right. God, me too, I guess. God, this has been the worst. It's not competitive at all.

Ross Benes (25:42):

Yeah. Did we do this wrong here where we're all too friendly? We should have just-

Oscar Orozco (25:46):

well-

Marcus Johnson (25:46):

Yes.

Oscar Orozco (25:47):

I've been on an episode before. There were a lot of nos, so I think just good ideas.

Marcus Johnson (25:52):

They're three great predictions though. And we do have another episode on Friday, and so let's see if they can get a clean sweep. Nine out of nine for investments, three for Ross's, major brands will start to sponsor sports end zones backboards and pitchers mounds, three for Oscars TikTok Shop, breaking the top 10, US e-commerce platforms by sales and market share, knocking on the door of top five soon. And Max's creators and retail review networks beginning to work together more visibly. Three investments there as well. I wonder what folks listening in thought, probably none for everyone, but nice job. I guess everyone won. That's what we have time for for today's episode. Gents, thank you so much for hanging out with me today. Thank you first to Ross.

Ross Benes (26:35):

Thanks, Marcus.

Marcus Johnson (26:36):

And Oscar.

Oscar Orozco (26:38):

Thanks, man.

Marcus Johnson (26:39):

Finally, to Max.

Max Willens (26:40):

Always a pleasure, Marcus. Thank you.

Marcus Johnson (26:41):

Thanks to the whole production crew and to everyone listening in to Behind the Numbers, an EMARKETER video podcast made possible by Viasat Ads. Tune in Wednesday to hang out with Suzy Davidkhanian from the Reimagining Retail Show. I hope to see everyone Friday as I mentioned, for more, very specific, but highly unlikely predictions in another what if episode.