Google’s AI Overviews (AIOs) are quickly reshaping search marketing and advertising. As AIO prevalence grows, early data reveal effects on both organic and paid media performance. And while AIOs are still fairly new and studies on their impact are preliminary, these findings provide meaningful insights for search advertisers looking to adapt their strategies.
Since Google introduced AIOs, their prevalence has varied.
When AIOs came out in May 2024, they appeared in about 10% of all Google search queries. Since then, their appearance rate has fluctuated, dropping to a low of 7% in August 2024, but has generally increased. By late February 2025, AIOs appeared in 17% of all Google search queries.
While the prevalence of AIOs is generally increasing, it varies based on the search vertical. The industries most likely to surface AIOs have fluctuated over time, but searches related to healthcare, B2B technology, and education have had some of the highest likelihoods to date. AIO prevalence also depends on the type of query, with research finding that informational queries—specifically, searches starting with the words “what,” why,” and “how”—trigger the vast majority of AIOs, as opposed to navigational, commercial, or transactional queries. Search queries made up of four or more words were also 31.6% more likely to trigger AIO results. This is likely why queries related to healthcare, B2B, and education are more likely to surface AIOs, as many of these searches are informational.
Since the rollout of AIOs, studies have observed a general decrease in organic traffic for publishers.
A 2023 study on the effects of AIOs (then known as Search Generative Experience) across 23 websites found that organic traffic declined by 18% to 64%. A September 2024 study found that organic traffic declined by about 70% when AIOs were present in search results. Interestingly, that same 2024 study also found that links included as AIO sources saw incremental increases in organic click-through rate (CTR) compared to links not cited in AIOs (1.08% vs. 0.6%, respectively). More recently, an April 2025 study found that search results featuring an AI Overview were associated with a 34.5% lower average click-through rate.
Representatives at Google and Bing have claimed that advertisers are getting higher-quality clicks on searches that surface AIOs, since those users get a sneak peek at the page content before clicking. However, as only a few websites are linked in an AIO, only that small number are receiving those higher quality clicks.
Knowing that Google’s AIOs are driving a drop in CTR—as well as allowing more relevant (but often lesser ranked) listings to drive answers—marketing teams may want to develop a separate SEO strategy for appearing in AIOs. The strategy should focus on optimizing content, not just so that it appears as a direct answer to searchers’ inquiries, but in a way that addresses potential follow-up questions while offering context, rationale, and detailed information about the products or services being promoted.
AIOs are affecting paid click-through rates (CTRs) and cost per click (CPC) in much the same way they’re impacting organic traffic: adversely. Ads within AIOs are currently limited to mobile, and placements running on Google Search or Shopping are automatically included—although there’s currently no way to tell how often a brand’s ads are showing in AIOs without a third-party tool such as ZipTie.dev.
A September 2024 study found that AI Overviews in search results led to a sharp decrease in paid ad click-through rates: When an AIO was present, the average paid CTR was 9.87% CTR, compared to 21.27% CTR when an AIO wasn’t present. And as advertisers try to maintain their impression and click volumes in reaction to this shift, CPCs on the queries and keywords that trigger AIOs will increase in turn.
In light of this, advertisers seeking lower CTRs should prioritize conversions over preserving impression share on keywords and queries likely to trigger AIOs. Some of the recent CPC increases tied to AIOs are being driven by efforts to maintain impression volume by raising bids. Focusing on conversions ensures that ad spend is tied to tangible outcomes, rather than being inflated by efforts to maintain visibility.
From a CPC perspective, advertisers can mitigate this impact by focusing bidding strategies on conversion-based goals, like ROAS and CPA, to control the potential costs. If an AIO is present, it will often make sense for advertisers not to try to bid up on that search. While the brand may lose that click, there’s a good chance it wouldn’t have been a high-value click—for example, if the user was solely looking for a definition or doing homework.
The impact of AIOs is still developing in real-time, but early indicators suggest a clear need for strategic adaptation. By developing a strategy for appearing in AIOs—if, of course, it makes sense for the specific keyword/query and brand—as well as focusing on conversion-based goals, advertisers can better navigate shifting user behavior and manage rising CPCs in an evolving search landscape.
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Looking for more insights around how AI is transforming the search landscape? Check out AI and the Future of Search Engine Marketing for a deep dive into how AI is changing search behavior, fragmenting the search market, and impacting paid advertising opportunities.
When it comes to media plans, one of the most engaged digital ecosystems is often overlooked.
With billions of players across the globe, and particularly strong traction with younger audiences, the in-game advertising opportunity is a massive one—yet it’s still flying under the radar for many media buyers. By incorporating gaming within a holistic media mix and treating it as more than just an entertainment channel, advertising teams can both connect with audiences today and build momentum with up-and-coming generations.
Gaming offers broad reach with engaged audiences across generations. In 2025, approximately 57% of the US population is a digital gamer—with penetration being highest among Gen Zers—and average time spent with digital gaming by gamers will reach one hour and 48 minutes per day. Unlike more passive media formats, gaming usually requires players to be actively engaged, offering advertisers a chance to connect in high-attention moments that drive higher brand recall.
However, ad spend on the channel accounts for just 5% of digital advertising budgets, and ad investment still trails significantly behind other digital channels. This disconnect presents a clear opportunity for advertisers: less competition, more share of voice, and greater impact for those willing to invest.
Though gaming spans all age groups, it’s especially embedded in the lives of younger generations. Gen Z holds the highest rate of adoption, with nearly three-quarters forecasted to be digital gamers by 2027. Early indications show that Gen Alpha is also deeply invested in gaming, with 70% gaming four to five times per week. For these younger audiences, gaming is more than a pastime—it’s a social hub and a space to build community.
Reaching younger generations when and where they spend their time is critical, especially as their influence grows. Gen Z is projected to hold $12 trillion in spending power by 2030, while Gen Alpha already drives $300 billion in spending power through parental influence. For brands, building connections and fostering trust now will unlock long-term value.
Gamers aren’t just deeply engaged in gameplay—they’re highly active across the broader media landscape. In fact, weekly gamers are heavier media consumers than the global average and are more likely to engage with all major media types, especially video, streaming music, and social media.
This makes them prime audiences for omnichannel strategies. As digital natives, younger consumers move seamlessly between screens, platforms, and content types throughout the day. Since so many are also digital gamers, in-game advertising can serve as a natural and impactful touchpoint.
For instance, advertisers could reach a Gen Z gamer through in-game product placement, reinforce the message with a podcast ad, and drive conversion through a follow-up video ad on TikTok, YouTube, or another social media platform. With gaming as a core touchpoint, brands and advertisers can create cohesive, multichannel experiences that meet young audiences across multiple platforms and moments of influence.
For Gen Alpha, gaming isn’t just about entertainment. It’s where they socialize, learn, and build community. Where game enthusiasts in general still spend more time on social media than on gaming, Gen Alpha game enthusiasts spend more time on gaming than on social media. And according to the IAB, gaming is expected to become a core part of Gen Alpha’s daily life by 2030, much like social media is for Gen Z today.
For advertisers, adapting to this shift is critical. Brands looking to engage with Gen Alpha should treat gaming as a primary channel, rather than an afterthought. That means developing strategies that show up authentically in-game, aligning with the social dynamics of these platforms, and extending engagement across other digital touchpoints.
Gaming delivers scale, attention, and engagement for advertisers, but it remains underrepresented in ad budgets. Gamers, especially younger ones, aren’t just playing: They’re building community, engaging across platforms, and influencing digital culture. For advertisers, then, gaming presents a unique opportunity that bridges generations, powers omnichannel strategies, and offers a rare chance to build authentic connections in digital spaces that aren’t yet saturated.
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Looking for more insights about how to connect with Gen Alpha as they grow into the next generation of consumers? In our report, Gen Alpha: Online Habits and Media Preferences by the Numbers, we dive into their online behaviors today and what brands need to know to engage them in the future.
The TV upfronts may still be a fixture in the industry calendar, but their influence is shrinking. As streaming viewership continues to rise and more households opt for connected TV (CTV) over traditional channels, advertisers are shifting dollars away from fixed linear commitments. Even more, they’re gravitating towards the reach, efficiency, and flexibility offered by programmatic buying. The clear new winner in this evolving landscape? Programmatic connected TV.
Total CTV ad spending is projected to grow 16.8% in 2025, reaching $33.48 billion (though that growth could become stagnant this year due to tariffs set in place by the Trump Administration). And within that growth, programmatic CTV is a particularly dominant force: More than 90% of both display and video ad spending on CTV will be transacted programmatically in 2025. This shift reflects how advertisers are increasingly embracing ad-supported streaming environments and dynamic, data-driven buying models.
“The biggest change to the way that brands are approaching TV buying now is the flexibility,” says Christina Fortuna, Director of Media Investment at Basis. “With the upfronts, brands used to have to commit a large part of their budget to linear placements early on. With programmatic CTV, they can pivot quickly, adjusting strategy as they go or reacting to market changes in real time.”
In today’s landscape, TV is no longer a locked-in, ‘set it and forget it’ buy. Programmatic CTV puts advertisers in control, with the flexibility to pivot, optimize, and scale on demand. By leaning into this flexibility, leveraging AI, prioritizing brand safety, and embracing new measurement solutions, teams can maximize the programmatic connected TV advertising opportunity in 2025 and beyond.
As programmatic CTV continues to evolve, artificial intelligence is pushing rapid innovation in the space. “While AI has long powered programmatic advertising, recent advancements are enhancing its impact on programmatic CTV specifically,” says Fortuna. “It’s not only driving improved efficiency in both bidding and optimization, but also in contextual targeting and relevancy.”
Historically, the metadata associated with programming on streaming TV has been very broad. Advertisers could see the genre of a TV show, but couldn’t tell if the sentiment was more serious or comedic. “Recent advances in AI are allowing teams to dig deeper into the metadata, providing richer insights around episodes, specific topics mentioned within a show, and visual scenes within the frame. AI is giving advertisers a broader range of contextual targeting within the programmatic CTV space, allowing ads to be more personalized and relevant,” says Fortuna.
For example, providers like IRIS.TV now enable the use of AI-enriched segmenting on programmatic CTV inventory based on the content’s actual context, helping advertisers serve ads that align more precisely with what viewers are watching. And this precision matters: One study found that consumers pay nearly four times more attention to ads that are hyper-relevant to the content on screen. And compared to standard demographic-based targeting, AI-powered contextual ads delivered 300% higher aided brand recall and twice the unaided brand recall.
Additionally, solutions like Peer39 now offer more granular content-level reporting that goes beyond identifying just the app where the ad appeared. “For instance, a programmatic media buyer who previously saw only a broad category like ‘Sports’ in their reports can now access deeper insights—such as the specific sport being played, the teams involved, and even the location of the game,” says Fortuna. This more specific reporting can help teams optimize their programmatic CTV placements and maximize their spending.
As programmatic CTV continues to mature, so too do the tools and strategies available to protect brand safety. This is especially critical in the programmatic space, where automated buying at scale introduces new complexities and potential risks around ad placement. Considering this, the same AI-powered contextual targeting that allows brands to reach audiences with greater precision can support brand safety by empowering greater control over where ads are placed and what types of content they appear alongside.
Focusing on premium programmatic inventory also gives advertisers more control over where their CTV ads appear, making them all the more relevant and impactful for audiences. “In 2025, we’re seeing an increase in activity in the custom PMP space for programmatic CTV buys,” says Fortuna. “Advertisers are refining their inventory sources for programmatic buys to create curated, approved inventory lists—for example, teams can work with supply-side providers (SSPs) to include or exclude certain publishers or verticals based on a client’s specific needs.”
The key? Partner with platforms that work closely with their SSPs to ensure a clean, trusted inventory pool.
Accurate measurement and attribution have long been a challenge in the programmatic CTV space, but providers and measurement partners have made some significant strides to address these gaps.
“Before, we were backed into metrics like reach or completion rate, which don’t tell the full story,” Fortuna says. “With so many brands relying on last-touch attribution models, CTV rarely got credit—it would be search or social instead. That created a feedback loop for investment. But with more sophisticated measurement solutions available, it’s easier to demonstrate the full value of programmatic CTV.”
Some partners now offer QR code integrations to track programmatic CTV impact, while others have expanded their offerings to include outcome-based metrics like incremental lift, brand lift, and brand sentiment. Ultimately, maximizing programmatic CTV measurement in 2025 comes down to choosing the right partners and evaluating which metrics align with campaign goals. With better visibility into impact, advertisers can optimize with confidence, prove the value of programmatic CTV investment, and unlock the full potential of the channel.
Programmatic CTV offers advertisers the big screen, lean-in viewing of traditional linear TV as well as the flexibility, precision, and real-time optimization inherent to programmatic technology. By leveraging advancements in AI-driven contextual targeting and reporting, implementing a strong brand safety plan, and embracing new measurement solutions, advertisers can make the most of programmatic CTV advertising.
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Looking for even more insights on the state of CTV advertising in 2025? In our recent webinar, Mastering CTV: Strategies to Maximize Impact in 2025, Comscore’s Becca Marco joins Basis’ Noor Naseer to break down the latest trends, evolutions, and strategies to help advertisers maximize the channel in 2025 and beyond.
AI is swiftly transforming the search landscape.
As generative AI reshapes the user experience on search giants like Google and Bing and AI-powered chatbots like ChatGPT and Perplexity gain traction with consumers, advertisers are preparing for a search landscape whose future looks markedly different than its past.
Although Google still dominates the market, early signs of fragmentation are emerging. Last year, Google’s market share dropped below 90% for the first time since 2015. While much of that volume went to established competitors like Bing, Yandex, and Yahoo, newer AI search agents are gaining ground as well, with Gartner predicting that traditional search engine volume will decline by 25% by 2026 due to chatbot-like applications. Gen AI pioneer ChatGPT is projected to claim 1% of search market share this year, and OpenAI’s SearchGPT—which is currently in beta—could further challenge Google’s supremacy.
Future fragmentation aside, the shift towards conversational interfaces on traditional search engines is already impacting organic traffic and advertising opportunities, leaving media teams questioning how to adapt. To succeed in today’s evolving search landscape and ready themselves for success in the future of search engine marketing, advertising leaders must understand how AI is reshaping user behavior and take proactive measures to evolve how their search teams operate.
AI is driving a fundamental change in how consumers search online. Historically, people have used keywords to search (ex. “Miami beachside hotel.”) But AI is spurring a shift from keyword searching to natural language conversations (ex. "Can you find me a beachside hotel in Miami with vacancy on May 23rd?”) This can be seen with the growing popularity of AI agents like ChatGPT and Perplexity, as well as in traditional search engines with features like Google’s AI overviews (AIOs).
The shift towards conversational interactions could also lead to a larger focus on voice search. Google appears to be embracing the possibility, with a recent update to its Gemini tool that allows users to engage with AI much like they would with another person—similar to how Iron Man talks to Jarvis in the Marvel movies. Manus, an AI agent that recently went viral, is another AI agent that offers advanced conversational voice interactivity, and OpenAI has offered an Advanced Voice Mode since Q3 2024.
As consumer adoption of generative AI increases in the coming years—and competition among companies providing AI-powered chatbots rises—the overall search market will likely grow increasingly fragmented. While we’ll eventually see a decline in the use of traditional search engines, we’ll likely also see a net positive engagement with generative AI-powered search engine-like queries.
Currently, the biggest AI-related change that marketers are seeing with their search performance is a drop in organic traffic from Google and other traditional search engines. Industry experts predict that AIOs could result in as much as a 60% decrease in organic traffic, and an April 2025 study found that search results featuring an AI Overview were associated with a 34.5% lower average clickthrough rate (CTR).
While Google could work to mitigate the drop off in organic traffic with future updates, the current outlook has advertisers and businesses concerned. Earlier this year, education technology company Chegg filed a lawsuit against Google, claiming that AIOs have negatively impacted the company’s traffic and revenue.
AIOs are also making brands feel like they have fewer avenues for effectively leveraging search advertising (at least for the time being). This change might push advertisers to invest more in programmatic, video, and other non-search channels.
In my conversations with brand and agency leaders, I’ve heard an equal amount of fear and excitement around how AI will change both the search landscape and digital advertising as a whole. Ensuring teams grow their AI expertise and increase their familiarity with these new tools is one way organizations can prepare for—and adapt to—the coming changes.
Marketing teams should use AI-powered targeting to continuously test and learn what resonates with target audiences in today’s evolving search environment. This tactic is growing even more important in the context of signal loss, offering a privacy-friendly way to reach target audiences on search platforms like Google and Bing, while simultaneously giving media teams hands-on experience with the machine learning-based systems that are increasingly shaping search. By leaning into these tools now, teams can build the agility and expertise they’ll need to stay competitive as search becomes increasingly AI-driven.
Nearly all (97.7%) advertising agencies are using generative AI today, with 38.6% of agency professionals using it daily and over 90% using it at least weekly. To make the most of the technology, marketing teams should actively experiment with various generative AI tools to better understand how and where they can make the campaign process more efficient and data driven.
At the same time, AI comes with risks such as inaccuracies and bias, and leaders must make sure to put the proper guardrails in place to minimize risk—particularly when it comes to generating creative content and analyzing consumer data.
Google’s Performance Max (PMax) is one of the most prominent examples of how AI is shaping the future of advertising, particularly when it comes to using generative AI to create ads. For instance, within PMax, an advertiser can upload a picture of their product and tell PMax to generate an image of that product on a beach at sunset. PMax will then spit out four variations of that basic image for use in an ensuing campaign. There are some enormous time- and cost-efficiency benefits to this: Advertisers can cut thousands of dollars that would typically be spent on production and go to market much more quickly. They can even download that asset and use it on other channels for greater creative continuity.
While advertisers may not love the levels of control and transparency offered by PMax, using it to test and learn will help marketing teams gain expertise with AI-driven systems and better understand their benefits and drawbacks.
The shift to AI overviews and resulting decline in organic traffic doesn’t mean that brands should deprioritize their SEO efforts. Brands that continue to invest in SEO will be better positioned to have their content featured as a source in Google’s AI overviews, which often include clickable links that drive traffic back to a brand’s site.
However, knowing that Google’s AIOs are driving a drop in clickthrough rate, as well as allowing more relevant—but often lesser ranked—listings to drive answers, marketing teams should also develop a separate strategy for appearing in AIOs. This strategy should focus on optimizing content not just to appear as a direct answer, but also to address potential follow-up questions and offer context, rationale, and detailed information about the products or services being promoted.
One of the greatest benefits that AI offers advertisers is its ability to quickly process and analyze huge amounts of data. As the technology develops, data-related insights will become more widely available, and businesses will need the infrastructure and the know-how to use those insights effectively.
Data-driven cultures prioritize using data to guide decision-making—and invest time, energy, and money into the people, processes, and tools that make it possible. For leaders, this might mean improving data quality and consolidation workflows, conducting audits of all existing data sources (e.g., social media, website analytics, customer surveys, etc.), or investing in a CDP to better capitalize on first-party data.
By investing in AI-powered tools, data-facing teams will be able to generate new insights, improve accuracy, and automate tasks. And because they’ll be using AI for data-related tasks, teams will likely grow increasingly comfortable with these kinds of tools, which will make it easier for organizations to leverage additional AI-powered solutions as they emerge.
With 67% of marketing and business professionals reporting that a lack of education and training is the top barrier to AI adoption, it’s clear that empowering teams with continuing AI education should be a priority for leaders. This is especially true given how rapidly AI is evolving, and how quickly new tools are coming to market. By partnering with vendors or consultants for tailored workshops, creating AI-focused knowledge-sharing forums, and investing in training and education platforms, advertising leaders can grow teams whose AI expertise gives them an edge over their competitors. Advertising leaders should also work to upskill their teams by prioritizing AI-related skills when hiring new employees.
Lastly, leaders should aim to stay on top of news related to how search engines are changing, monitor what new AI-driven advertising opportunities are available, and pay attention to what successes and failures their peers are having with artificial intelligence tools.
In particular, leaders must stay attuned to the potential challenges and pitfalls posed by artificial intelligence. 100% of marketers agree that generative AI presents a brand safety and misinformation risk. A hallucinating AI chatbot, for example, can make up fake “facts” and generate misinformation that can be difficult for content moderation tools to spot, and the resulting content can represent a threat to brand safety.
There are also many unanswered questions related to AI-generated content and copyright infringement—from the legality of chatbots being trained on unlicensed content, to questions around who owns AI-generated media. In the short term, be sure to keep an eye on how the regulatory landscape develops. While we don’t know exactly how governments will legislate the use of these technologies, it’s all but certain that they will eventually take regulatory action, and staying updated on those developments will be critical.
The quickly evolving search landscape asks a lot of marketing and advertising leaders. Advertisers will need to get comfortable with being uncomfortable in the coming years as artificial intelligence moves the industry towards an uncertain future. Teams that use AI to test and learn, grow data driven cultures, and stay learning will have a leg up on those who are less proactive about adapting to how AI is changing search.
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Want to learn more about how your peers are leveraging AI? We surveyed marketing professionals across brands, agencies, and publishers to find out what tasks marketing teams are using AI for, how AI tools are impacting efficiency, how they predict AI will transform the future of marketing, and more. Check out AI and the Future of Marketing for all the findings.
Advertising agencies are experiencing a period of extraordinary transformation, caught between rising client expectations, mounting operational pressures, and revolutionary technological opportunities. To better understand the industry’s greatest obstacles and opportunities, Basis conducted a comprehensive survey of 100s of professionals at leading advertising agencies. The findings offer a window into the brewing challenges, strategic priorities, and future outlook shaping the agency landscape.
Our 2025 Advertising Agency Report explores those findings while providing agency leaders with actionable, data-driven insights to navigate this changing environment and position themselves for sustainable growth in the years ahead.
Here are some of the key findings from the report:
To get more insights into the state of advertising agencies, as well as an in-depth look at key takeaways and strategic opportunities based on the findings, download the full report today.
Advertising agencies are facing mounting pressure from all directions.
Economic volatility and decreased consumer spending are pushing marketers to make their budgets go further. Signal loss and privacy regulations are complicating the task of effectively reaching and engaging audiences. And, brand safety concerns are skyrocketing, driven by content moderation rollbacks on social media platforms, the proliferation of AI-generated mis- and disinformation, and low-quality content like made-for-advertising sites (MFAs) increasing across the open web. Clients are demanding greater transparency in everything from reporting to fees, putting additional strain on agency-client relationships. On top of it all, the digital media landscape is increasingly fragmented, and tech stack sprawl and siloed systems are making it harder to work in a connected, streamlined way.
In this context, it’s no wonder a growing majority of agency professionals agree that digital advertising has gotten harder over the last two years.
Though the challenges facing agencies are varied, inefficiency is a common thread either driving or aggravating many of them—indeed, agency leaders rank inefficient processes as the most pressing issue facing their businesses today. As such, by working to improve efficiency, agency leaders can make significant progress towards alleviating some of their biggest problems. Specifically, unifying data and embracing automation will allow agencies to work faster, drive better performance, and strengthen their relationships with clients.
Tech sprawl is at the heart of agencies’ efficiency problem. More than half of agency professionals say they now rely on eight or more tools to manage client campaigns, and 40% are juggling 10 or more. Teams are increasingly weighed down by fragmented systems and inefficient workflows, forcing marketers to operate in silos or waste valuable hours reconciling data manually.
The issue is further compounded by the fact that media fragmentation is at an all-time high. In fact, agency leaders rank siloed and disconnected systems as the second-most pressing challenge facing their organizations today. Without a unified view of performance, real-time optimization becomes inefficient and difficult, limiting agencies’ abilities to drive meaningful results.
Adding to the challenge, half of marketers agree that martech is complicated and difficult to use, and 63% of martech leaders say marketing teams lack the technical skills to successfully implement and use their tech stacks. These inefficiencies create operational bottlenecks that ultimately impact both agency performance and client satisfaction.
Finally, AI in advertising adds a new and often complicated layer to agency operations. While AI presents powerful opportunities to drive revenue, adding new AI tools to a tech stack can also increase the complexity of workflows. Without thoughtful implementation, proper training, and quality data, AI can contribute to inefficiencies rather than resolve them.
Unifying data and having a single source of truth should be a key priority for agency leaders in 2025. Centralizing data enables teams to deliver strategic recommendations that drive performance and craft compelling performance narratives for clients, rather than spending time pulling data from many different sources and attempting to unify it manually, which inevitably leads to errors.
Unifying data doesn’t necessarily mean overhauling entire tech stacks or tossing existing tools out the window, but rather finding solutions that bring existing systems together to ensure visibility, efficiency, and smarter decision making. With such solutions, teams can access real-time insights in a centralized dashboard—rather than spending hours pulling reports and reconciling data—allowing them to make faster, data-driven decisions. Unified reporting also empowers agencies to tell powerful performance stories with greater confidence, reinforcing their value and strengthening client relationships in an increasingly competitive landscape.
Additionally, a strong data foundation can help agencies to better harness AI. Right now, 58% of ad industry professionals say data quality or accessibility issues are a challenge for adopting AI in their media campaigns. Agency leaders that prioritize unifying their company’s data now will be better positioned to integrate AI-driven efficiencies and maintain a competitive edge in the evolving media landscape.
Even with a strong data foundation, agencies can lose valuable time to inefficient processes. Many teams still rely on manual reporting, campaign management, and optimization—practices that not only waste time but also increase the risk of errors. Media fragmentation compounds the issue, forcing teams to toggle between multiple platforms to pull performance insights, manually adjust bids across different channels, and use spreadsheets to reconcile data from various sources to create client reports.
Automation software addresses such inefficiencies by streamlining workflows and eliminating redundant tasks across the campaign life cycle. In reducing operational inefficiencies, automation frees up agency teams to focus on higher-value strategic work, which in turn drives stronger performance and strengthens client relationships. It makes sense, then, that 77.8% of agency professionals say their organization has plans to invest in tech to automate or streamline processes, and over a third of marketing decision-makers say the type of martech they plan to invest in the most over the next 12 months is marketing automation technology.
In an increasingly fragmented and complex digital landscape, agency leaders that focus on reducing inefficiencies by unifying their data and streamlining their operations will maintain a competitive edge. By embracing these strategies, agencies can ensure ad dollars are maximized and operations run smoothly. In turn, this will allow agencies to deliver stronger results, strengthen client relationships, and drive revenue in today’s ever-evolving digital advertising ecosystem.
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Want to learn more about how advertising agencies are navigating today’s complex digital media landscape? We surveyed professionals from agencies across the US to gather their insights on agency performance, industry trends, key challenges and opportunities, the impact of AI, and the future of agencies. Dive into the full findings in our 2025 Advertising Agency Report.
2025 is shaping up to be a critical year for advertising agencies.
Agencies are experiencing a period of extraordinary transformation, caught between rising client expectations, mounting operational pressures, and revolutionary technological opportunities. To better understand the industry’s greatest obstacles and opportunities, we conducted a comprehensive survey of 100s of professionals at leading advertising agencies. The findings offer a window into the brewing challenges, strategic priorities, and future outlook shaping the agency landscape. This report explores those findings while providing agency leaders with actionable, data-driven insights to navigate this changing landscape and position themselves for sustainable growth in the years ahead.
Select findings include:
Download the full report today to get more insights into the state of advertising agencies, as well as key takeaways and strategic opportunities based on the findings.
In the fast-evolving world of programmatic media and adtech, staying informed is key to advertising success. In this episode, U of Digital Founder Shiv Gupta joins host Noor Naseer to discuss how advertisers need sources of credible information to build sound adtech perspective.
Gupta explores how education can help advertisers adapt to rapid industry evolutions, from AI-driven programmatic advertising to evolving privacy regulations. This episode equips advertisers with the mindset shift needed to stay competitive as changes like these redefine the advertising ecosystem.
How a premium tourism board leveraged expert strategy and advanced automation to maximize reach, engagement, and visitor growth.
THE CHALLENGE
A premier tourism board aimed to position its destination as a top choice for year-round travelers, driving high-value website traffic while maintaining cost-efficient media spend and engagement. However, a competitive travel landscape required a more sophisticated strategy to:
Without a strategic and data-driven approach, the organization risked missing valuable travelers and overspending on inefficient ad placements. To succeed, the organization required media operations and tourism marketing experts to guide strategy, activate campaigns, and deliver measurable results.
THE SOLUTION
Basis’ media experts designed and activated a high-impact media strategy, ensuring every media dollar drove measurable results.
Multi-Channel Media Activation
A tailored programmatic strategy used display retargeting, contextual targeting, high-impact HTML5 creatives, and premium video placements (CTV, OLV, PMP) to maximize reach and engagement.
AI-Powered Optimization & Automation
Automated bidding strategies and real-time performance monitoring ensured cost-efficient conversions and maximized campaign effectiveness.
Strategic Audience Targeting
By focusing on priority markets and excluding local audiences within a 100-mile radius, the campaign engaged adventure seekers, outdoor enthusiasts, and family travelers most likely to visit.
Seamless Media Operations & Performance Tracking
A dedicated team managed campaign activation, analysis, and refinements, enabling faster insights and better decision-making.
LASTING RESULTS
With over two years of partnership and $1M in annual media spend, Basis has fueled tourism growth through expert strategy and programmatic activation—driving stronger engagement, economic impact, and visitor activity:
