Sam’s Club and BJ’s aim to show that samples and screens drive sales.

Super Bowl campaigns aren’t one-size-fits-all; brands are now splitting between full-scale TV buys and multi-channel activations that extend beyond the broadcast.

Retail media is entering an execution era; advertisers are now judging networks on speed, flexibility, and clarity, not just closed-loop performance or topline growth.

28% of retail commerce media decision-makers in North America and Europe say they review and approve creatives manually but lack automation or dynamic capabilities, according to November 2025 data from Koddi and Forrester Consulting.

PayPal rolled out Transaction Graph Insights & Measurement at CES to gives advertisers and merchants a clearer, cross-merchant view of how people actually shop and purchase—and early results suggest meaningful impact.

At CES, Amazon is repositioning Amazon Ads as a full advertising ecosystem rather than a commerce-adjacent channel, emphasizing unified reach across TV, streaming, live sports, audio, and programmatic partners.

In a year marked by platform volatility, AI acceleration, tariff shocks, and shifting consumer behavior, marketers searched for clarity across EMARKETER’s most-read topics. The top 10 themes reflect where advertiser attention truly moved in 2025. These trends captured the forces reshaping performance, discovery, and measurement: AI-driven optimization, creator-centric social ecosystems, commerce-led advertising, and CTV’s rise as the new premium video default. Together, they tell the story of a market recalibrating around efficiency, accountability, and cultural relevance as marketers prepared their 2026 strategies.

Amazon is recalibrating its relationship with the agencies and adtech firms that helped build its retail-media dominance. While Amazon insists agencies remain central, many intermediaries say rising data costs and tool duplication echo earlier platform playbooks from Google and Meta—centralize strengths, limit external dependencies, and scale in-house automation. The result is a more controlled, AI-driven ecosystem that may reduce tooling diversity while boosting Amazon’s own ad stack. For marketers, the challenge will be balancing Amazon’s convenience and scale with the flexibility, transparency, and customization offered by independent partners.

On today’s EMARKETER Miniseries—A Blueprint to Better Measurement—we explore Amazon's plans for moving out of Beta and offering Omnichannel Metrics (OCM) more widely to advertisers, the top two challenges they face heading into the new year, and what is next for Amazon Ads in 2026, as it pertains to durables. EMARKETER Principal Analyst Sky Canaves speaks with Kolby Capelouto, Head of Sales for Durables at Amazon Ads. Listen everywhere you find podcasts, and watch on YouTube and Spotify.

Meta’s global ad marketplace is splitting into two distinct cost curves. According to new Emplifi data, retail CPCs nearly doubled from $0.16 to $0.32 over the past year, while ecommerce CPCs fell from $0.23 to $0.19 as Meta’s AI optimization drove sharper efficiencies. The overall median CPC declined from $0.19 to $0.15, indicating advertisers aren’t cutting spend—they’re reallocating as automation improves returns. Retail’s mixed online–offline goals make optimization harder, while ecommerce benefits from clearer conversion signals. With Q4 competition intensifying and holiday ecommerce projected to grow 7%, marketers should expect sharper CPC swings and plan for agile bidding, creative iteration, and real-time budget shifts.

Retailers experimenting with agentic AI are doing so with commercial urgency, not curiosity. In an EMARKETER interview, Criteo’s Michael Greene said retailers now see onsite AI as “mission critical” for owning the shopping journey—especially as consumers increasingly use chat-based tools for early discovery. Generic LLMs lack real retail signals like inventory, regional availability, and nuanced category expertise, making proprietary data the retailer’s strongest edge. With Gen Z already leaning heavily on AI for purchase research, retailers must build systems that deliver more relevant, trustworthy guidance than general chat interfaces. The mandate is clear: build AI that improves baskets, conversion, and shopper retention.

Dentsu forecasts the global advertising market will surpass $1 trillion for the first time in 2026, growing 5.1% and powered by digital channels that will capture nearly 69% of total spend. Retail media leads with projected 14%–16% growth, while online video and social also expand double digits. Major global events—including the Winter Olympics, FIFA World Cup, and a packed political calendar—will drive attention and pricing pressure across markets. APAC remains the fastest-growing region, led by India and China, while the US will represent about 40% of worldwide spend. For marketers, algorithm-first planning, advanced measurement, and early tentpole buying will be critical.

Publicis Groupe’s 100th-anniversary film, “A Lion Never Gives Up,” blends live action with 4,500 AI-generated images to retell the company’s evolution and project its future. With more than half its workforce now in data, engineering, and AI, leadership says the next era will reward companies that fuse creativity with machine-driven operational scale. The film lands as Omnicom’s acquisition of IPG reshapes the competitive field, and Publicis argues its AI maturity gives it an edge in a more concentrated market.

Baidu posted its sharpest revenue decline on record, with ad revenues falling 18% as AI-generated answers replace traditional search clicks. Ernie Bot now powers responses on most Baidu queries, improving user experience but suppressing monetizable activity—a trend management says will weigh on results into Q4. Competitors like Tencent, ByteDance, and PDD are still growing 20% to 30% YoY, suggesting Baidu’s weakness is structural. While the US market is more diversified, Baidu offers a stress test: AI can reshape search faster than monetization evolves. For advertisers, it’s a reminder that even Google and Microsoft must balance innovation with economic stability.

This is the second installment of our “UK Ad Spending Benchmarks” series, which helps ad buyers and sellers calibrate their spending and revenue mix against the market.​

This is the second installment of our “UK Ad Spending Benchmarks” series, which helps ad buyers and sellers calibrate their spending and revenue mix against the market.​

On today’s podcast episode, we discuss what makes Dollar General Media Network unique, how it's approaching measurement, and what it’s focusing on for next year. Join Senior Director of Podcasts and host Marcus Johnson, Principal Analyst Sarah Marzano, and Vice President and General Manager of DG Media Network, Austin Leonard. Listen everywhere, and watch on YouTube and Spotify.

As CTV investment accelerates, so does scrutiny. Marketers face pressure to validate every ad dollar, yet measurement across connected TV (CTV) remains fractured and disconnected from the outcomes that matter: Sales.

Q3 was a record-breaking quarter for the three largest ad platforms, but heavy spending on AI is compressing margins and raising questions about how the technology will impact the future of digital advertising.