Author: Kimeko McCoy

Search & Affiliate Marketing Strategist since 1993

Why retail media is still grappling with definition and spending uncertainties

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For an industry expected to rake in nearly $62 billion U.S. ad dollars this year, or about 18% of digital ad spend, per eMarketer’s reporting, only one thing seems to be certain when it comes to retail media networks — and that’s uncertainty.

No doubt, retail media is booming. But when it comes to defining measurement in retail media, (or even what constitutes as a retail media network in a sea of more than 250 RMNs for that matter) or who pays for retail media network campaigns, the industry is still figuring things out. Meanwhile, economic headwinds and tariffs loom, causing marketers to push for more flexibility in their retail media spend commitments, in which retailers have been asking for bigger commitments year over year.

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The rise of deep research: How agencies are using AI for strategy, content and client pitches

As client demands grow more complex and timelines shrink, agencies are turning to new AI-powered research tools to streamline workflows and supercharge insight development.

In recent months, tech giants and startups alike have released new “deep research” tools that are already helping teams within holding companies and indie shops to move faster, think deeper and deliver better work. Agencies are integrating the capabilities across strategy, media, creative, and comms teams — with some seeing benefits in helping craft pitches, shape creative briefs, and even simulate audience personas. 

Unlike basic search or dashboards, deep research tools from Perplexity and others use AI-enabled reasoning autonomously run multi-step workflows — scanning the open web, proprietary datasets, and niche databases — to generate rich, synthesized insights in minutes. As OpenAI put it, deep research equips ChatGPT to perform “at the level of a research analyst.”

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