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Social media has come a long way since its early days. What once was a space primarily for connecting with friends has morphed into a powerful cultural and economic force, driven by personalized algorithms that shape everything from content recommendations to targeted ads. Social media platforms have evolved into highly sophisticated ecosystems where those personalized algorithms, driven by user data and AI, work together to curate experiences, amplify (and sometimes stifle) voices, and even influence public opinion.
With billions of users spending significant amounts of their time on these platforms, it’s no surprise that social media has become an essential channel for advertisers. Yet as social media—and social media advertising—has grown, so too have concerns about its impact on key issues like users’ online privacy and mental health, especially children and teens. Amidst these concerns, recent regulatory efforts in the United States have intensified, with both lawmakers and platforms taking action to safeguard younger audiences. For advertising leaders, staying ahead of these changes is key to understanding the current state of the industry, as well as how it may evolve in coming years.
In the early days of social media, the landscape was akin to a “wild west” of digital communication: Platforms were growing and changing rapidly, and both users and advertisers operated with significant freedom and minimal oversight. But as social media’s influence has grown, so too has the need for regulation—particularly given the proliferation of mis- and disinformation on social media sites and the technological advancements that make these platforms both highly personalized and addictive for users.
Many of regulators’ concerns are focused on children and teens, because while social media is used across generations, it is especially popular among young people: US teenagers spend an average of 4.8 hours per day on social media platforms, and US children averaged two hours per day on TikTok and over an hour per day on Instagram in 2023.
Social media’s impacts on youth mental health make the need for regulation especially critical: Adolescents who spend more than three hours per day on social media are twice as likely to encounter mental health problems like anxiety and depression, and half of 13-to-17-year-olds say that social media makes them feel lonely or isolated. Earlier this year, the US Surgeon General released an advisory exploring the negative impacts of social media on youth mental health, and published a piece in the New York Times calling for a warning label on social media platforms (akin to the labels found on tobacco products).
Given both social media’s popularity among young users and its potential to create negative health impacts, regulatory bodies are increasingly focusing on protective measures for younger audiences. These regulations impact how data is collected and used, restrict certain types of ad targeting and content, and attempt to safeguard young social media users’ mental health and wellbeing. For advertisers, this shift means adapting to a more structured environment, but also offers an opportunity to engage with audiences more responsibly.
Recent US regulation of social media advertising centers on protecting minors, and comes from three directions: federal enforcement (the FTC), new federal legislation (COPPA 2.0 and KOSA), and a growing wave of state laws.
In July 2024, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) took action against the social media platform NGL: ask me anything, banning its parent company and founders from offering their app to anyone under the age of 18. The FTC, along with the Los Angeles District Attorney’s Office, says the app unfairly and actively targeted children and teens to encourage sign ups, misrepresented the safeguards in place for filtering out harmful content, and used deceptive practices to lure young users into paying for subscriptions.
This represents the first time the FTC has ever banned minors from such a platform, but isn’t the first time the agency has tried to take action against a social media giant: In 2023, they proposed banning Meta from monetizing children and teens’ data. Though it is yet to be seen whether their groundbreaking decision on NGL: ask me anything will set a precedent for similar cases, it marks a significant shift in regulatory actions.
In late July 2024, the US Senate took decisive action to protect children’s safety online, overwhelmingly passing the Children and Teens’ Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA 2.0) and the Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA). COPPA 2.0 prevents companies from collecting personal data from children under the age of 17 without consent, bans targeted advertising to children and teens, and makes it easy for parents to eliminate their children’s online personal information. KOSA, on the other hand, focuses primarily on social media platforms, requiring that they protect minors’ information, “disable addictive product features,” and make it easier for minors to opt out of personalized algorithms.
Despite garnering bipartisan support in the Senate, this legislation has yet to pass the House. However, the strong momentum behind these bills indicates a growing consensus on the need for enhanced protections for young internet users.
Beyond this federal-level action, many individual states are taking social media regulation into their own hands.
In 2023, several states passed legislation requiring age verification and parental consent for minors to access social media platforms. And in September 2024, a Texas law came into effect that creates requirements for social media platforms and other digital services providers aimed at protecting minors. Under this law, social media providers must clearly disclose how they use algorithms when sharing information and content with minors, create parental tools that allow them to supervise minors’ use of the platform, limit the collection and use of minors’ personal information, and more.
Additionally, New York recently passed two measures, The Stop Addictive Feeds Exploitation Act (SAFE Act) and the New York Child Data Protection Act, which significantly limit how social media companies can interact with minors. The SAFE Act prevents social media platforms from using algorithmic (and highly addictive) feeds on young users’ accounts, and the New York Child Data Protection Act restricts websites from collecting, using, sharing, or selling minors’ personal data, unless informed consent is given or it is crucial for the operation of the site.
Though most of these protective measures have come directly from leaders and regulators, some social media platforms are taking proactive steps to protect young audiences. TikTok, in the face of an impending ban in the US, recently announced they are restricting ad targeting for users under the age of 18. Other platforms like Facebook and Instagram already restrict certain types of targeting for teenage users, such as targeting by gender, locations smaller than cities, or interests, behaviors, and demographics.
For advertisers, social media advertising compliance now means tighter limits on targeting minors, stricter data-collection rules, and a heavier compliance burden, alongside a chance to build audience trust through more responsible practices. This burst of regulatory action around social media isn’t happening in a vacuum: It’s part of a larger trend of regulators cracking down on the digital advertising industry. In recent years, the industry has faced heightened regulatory scrutiny, with significant developments in data privacy laws, as well as antitrust lawsuits against tech giants like Google and other types of new legislation aimed at protecting consumers.
Of course, advertisers must work with their legal teams to ensure compliance with regulations that apply to them, such as COPPA 2.0. But it’s also important for advertising leaders to keep track of new regulations focused specifically on social media platforms and providers. In understanding the sentiment and goals that guide these regulations, leaders will gain a valuable outlook on how social media advertising may develop in the coming years, as well as how the industry is evolving more generally when it comes to consumer safety, choice, and privacy.
The social media advertising landscape is changing, driven by a surge in regulation aimed at enhancing the safety and privacy of young internet users. Both federal and state-level actions underscore the increasing demand that social media platforms protect the minors who use their applications. This shift is not only transforming how such platforms operate, but also reshaping social media advertising more broadly.
For advertisers, understanding the changing regulatory landscape is essential to navigating the current social media advertising environment. As the social media regulatory framework continues to develop, advertising leaders who stay informed and agile will be better equipped to maintain compliance and understand the trajectory of how the digital advertising industry will develop and change in the coming years.
How do social media regulations affect advertisers?
They restrict how advertisers can target minors, tighten data-collection and consent rules, and raise compliance requirements, while creating an opportunity to reach audiences more responsibly.
What does social media advertising compliance involve?
It means following federal and state rules on data collection, consent, and ad targeting, especially for minors, and keeping campaigns aligned with evolving privacy laws.
What are the main social media advertising regulations right now?
Key measures include the federal COPPA 2.0 and KOSA bills, plus state laws like New York’s SAFE Act and Texas’s minor-protection law, all limiting how platforms and advertisers handle minors’ data and targeting.
The story of signal loss in digital advertising has been a long and winding one, with several plot twists (we’re looking at you, Google). In the wake of the search giant’s monopolist’s latest announcement that it will not, in fact, deprecate third-party cookies in Chrome—instead planning to provide users with an “informed choice” experience—now is likely a particularly confusing time for many brands as they strive to understand the landscape of signal loss and what it means for their campaigns.
As most media agencies likely understand, signal loss will continue to increase despite Google’s U-turn, as a majority of Chrome users are expected to opt-out of a cookied browser experience. And, of course, these forthcoming changes aren’t the only source of signal loss: Digital advertisers have already lost targeting and tracking capabilities for Firefox and Safari users, faced further losses as a result of Apple’s App Tracking Transparency, and contended with a wave of privacy-minded digital advertising regulation.
As the advertising industry moves towards a more privacy-first model, it is critical for media agencies to coach and educate their clients to set them up for success. Maintaining proactive and transparent communication, working to optimize clients’ systems for collecting and executing on first-party data, and helping them adjust to new systems for cookieless measurement should be key aspects of any media agency’s plans.
When educating clients about signal loss, agency teams should prioritize proactive, transparent communication. In maintaining as much transparency as possible around how their team plans to address signal loss, agencies can ensure that clients maintain their desired levels of understanding and control over their media buys. And by communicating proactively about changes that will impact clients’ ability to target and measure their campaigns, agencies can ensure their clients aren’t caught off guard when more signals are lost and begin to impact performance.
Lauren Johnson, Client Strategy and Effectiveness Lead at Basis Technologies, says that specificity should be a key aspect of these conversations. “The more precise we can get with how specific aspects of signal loss impact a specific client in their specific campaign,” Johnson says, “the more successful we’ll be in evolving the ways that our clients think so that they’ll be set up for success.”
Johnson recommends that agency leaders ensure their team members are prepared to come to each client and say, “These are the exact ways in which we’ve lost and are losing signals. Here’s exactly how that signal loss is impacting targeting and measurement in this specific buy. And here are the new approaches we’d like to test for targeting and measuring this campaign.’”
To provide this type of communication consistently across an agency’s clients, leaders can create a signal loss POV—a document that lays out the agency’s stance on and approach to signal loss—and share it out with their team. This helps to ensure that everyone, including more junior-level employees, can speak effectively to an agency’s signal loss plan.
Strong communication (or even overcommunication) and re-iteration of this information will be key to effectively educating clients over time. In keeping brands fully informed, agencies can build trust with clients and support client retention during a particularly tumultuous time for both agency-client relations and the advertising industry as a whole.
As advertisers know well, first-party data is currently the best replacement for third-party data: Not only is it privacy-friendly, but it also provides a high degree of precision in understanding an audience. As such, helping clients better collect, unify, organize, and execute on their first-party data must continue to be a top priority for media agencies.
“Often, the biggest struggles for brands when it comes to first-party data are (1) the ability to scale it for activation, and (2) understanding the value it brings to other aspects of campaign planning,” says Kelly Boyle, Group VP of Client Strategy and Insights at Basis Technologies.
Agencies are well positioned to help their clients address these problems—for example, by proposing a media plan with an objective of collecting first-party data. The best approaches here will vary by industry: A restaurant brand, for instance, might focus on collecting first-party data via loyalty programs and reservation systems, whereas a B2B brand might focus on collecting it by encouraging prospects to fill out a form to access a piece of relevant content, such as a report or whitepaper.
Agencies can also support their clients with the critical task of unifying their first-party data. This means taking stock of the various places where a clients’ first-party data is stored—many brands’ first-party data is spread across a variety of different platforms and third-party vendors—and educating them about how solutions like CRMs and CDPs can help to centralize, standardize, and execute on that data. For example, agencies could use a CDP storing a brand’s first-party data to gain a view of their consumers’ buying journey and better understand what tactics and touchpoints are most effective at leading to conversions. Then, in the planning stage, they can heavy-up spending on those tactics and touchpoints to increase conversions.
Boyle notes that first-party data can also help to inform campaign planning, which is growing increasingly important as advertisers lose signals. “Signal loss increases the importance of strategy, planning, and upfront research,” says Boyle. “If we’re less able to go after our audience based on cookies and other lost signals, then we must have a better understanding of the client’s core audience—what they care about, how they behave, etc.—in the planning stage, and use that to inform our campaigns.”
When unified and organized properly, first-party data can provide advertisers with valuable consumer information that they can use in the planning stage to craft more strategic campaigns.
Finally, media agencies must help their clients transition away from the current status quo of third-party cookie-based measurement and attribution solutions. A big part of this task will be resetting expectations with those proactive, transparent communications plans: Clients are used to being able to easily pull detailed, cookie-based reports, but as signal loss intensifies, the ways advertisers measure their campaigns will look significantly different.
In addition to setting new expectations around measurement, agencies must help their clients adjust to a new, more privacy-friendly measurement stack. This means aligning all the different data sources that can help tell a client’s business story amidst signal loss, such as the client’s sales data, first-party data, brand lift studies, cookieless multi-touch attribution tools, and any other kinds of measurement tools or partners that a client or agency has access to. Of course, agencies can continue to place third-party pixels for clients where they can, but as signal loss increases, that pixel data won’t be able to tell a holistic story about what a brand’s campaign investment is doing for them. As such, advertisers should complement pixel data with other, cookieless measurement solutions, and proactively communicate to their clients about what these solutions offer.
What alternative measurement approaches might media agencies want to explore with their clients? For one, marketing mix modeling (MMM) is making a resurgence. While MMMs used to be major undertakings that could often only be done on an annual basis, there are many new players in the space offering solutions that are more turnkey. Going into 2024, more than half of US brands and agencies reported that they would be somewhat or significantly more focused on MMM this year.
Attention metrics are another KPI that forward-looking marketers are integrating into their measurement approaches. “Research shows that attention drives brand outcomes,” says Boyle. “Understanding the strengths of media placements in capturing attention and measuring that impact on short- and long-term metrics gives marketers another lever to guide marketing decisions.” Given the benefits they offer, it makes sense that just under half of US brands and agencies say they will be somewhat or significantly more focused on attention metrics in 2024.
Lastly, agencies should make ongoing testing a core competency. This means proactively building thoughtful learning agendas that help prioritize key areas where testing supports both client and agency curiosities about performance, as well as designing appropriate experiments that support those learning goals. “At Basis, we aim to group our tests around learning topics that range from audience to attention,” says Johnson. “With these foundations in place, we prioritize channel-specific tests for audience learnings, creative findings, ad quality, and so on. Testing is powerful tool for agencies to arm their clients with critical data points for how their media investment supports their business.”
It is especially important to begin testing now (if you haven’t already), as advertisers will have fewer and fewer signals to test with moving forward. Johnson recommends that advertising teams ask themselves, “How can we implement testing to understand incrementality now, so that when we lose even more signals, we can expect that incrementality is happening—because we’ve tested and proven it—even if we don't see it in our key metrics from our ad server?”
Overall, the onus is on agencies to bring those new measurement solutions to their clients and to begin testing and learning with them as soon as possible. Marketers can approach these conversations by asking their clients, “Have you thought about [X measurement solution]?” or by telling them that they have a new solution they’d like to explore on the client’s behalf. Agencies must also strengthen their own cookieless measurement stacks so that they can provide the best and most holistic approaches possible as signal loss increases.
With many signals already lost and more to come once Google makes its planned changes in Chrome, the time for agencies to set new expectations and help prepare their clients for increased signal loss is now.
As privacy regulations tighten and cookie-based data dwindles, agencies that prioritize proactive and transparent client communication and education, and coach their clients on how to optimize their first-party data and measurement stacks for a world with significantly fewer cookie-based signals, will be best prepared for what lies ahead. It is a critical time for agencies to serve as strategic advisors to their clients—and those who do it right will see the added benefit of increased client trust and retention.
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Of course, signal loss isn’t the only challenge facing media agencies: Financial pressures, media fragmentation, and inefficient processes are just a few of the other factors pushing agencies to evolve. To learn more about how marketing professionals from agencies across the US feel about the problems and opportunities shaping their present and their future, check out our 2024 Advertising Agency Report.
In the context of today’s quickly evolving advertising landscape, agencies must keep pace with the rapid growth of digital media and adtech to meet their clients' needs. Brands are demanding deeper insights and expertise around which platforms to invest in, how to leverage first-party data for greater impact, and more.
In this episode, John Lods, CEO of the agency Arm Candy, shares his thoughts on navigating these complexities. Together with host Noor Naseer, Lods explores how agencies can stay ahead of the curve, evaluate new technologies, and offer meaningful, data-driven advice that sets their clients up for success.
It’s nearly impossible for marketers to get through a day without encountering a conversation, article, or social post about AI—how it can help businesses drive revenue, how governments may regulate its use, how it might transform the search landscape, its environmental impact, and more. Most advertisers feel the technology will revolutionize our industry, with a 2024 Basis survey finding that 87.9% of marketers believe AI will radically transform digital advertising in the next three to five years. However, the newness of generative AI, the risks associated with it, and the influx of AI-driven applications and tools flooding the market can make crafting an adoption strategy a daunting task.
Indeed, the prominence of AI in today’s marketing conversations is in part due to advertising leaders' thirst for guidance on how to effectively adopt the technology, particularly when it comes to paid solutions. Most brands and agencies recognize the significant potential for cost and time efficiencies offered by AI, and that early adoption may provide a competitive edge and drive success for their businesses as the industry transforms. However, they’re also wary of the risks associated with AI—particularly generative AI—as well as the trend of AI-washing, and know they must select paid solutions with care.
The tension between this desire to adopt and uncertainty around how to adopt is evident in the current rates of industry use and investment. While an overwhelming 92% of US advertising agencies are currently using generative AI, exceeding the general business population, only 44% of marketers and advertisers say their employers currently pay for generative AI tools.
These statistics demonstrate that the industry is in a transition period, with many marketing teams using free solutions like ChatGPT as well as older AI-driven technologies that have already been integrated into their work (such as programmatic advertising), but still figuring out how to navigate the adoption of newer paid AI solutions. To make informed investment decisions about these types of solutions, marketing leaders must understand AI’s risks as well as how their peers are approaching paid AI tools.
Marketing teams who have yet to invest in paid AI solutions seem to have some common concerns about the technology, mostly stemming from its risks.
A 2023 Gartner survey found that concerns around inaccuracies and bias in AI-driven software and AI-generated content were the top reasons marketing leaders were hesitant to onboard new AI solutions, along with concerns around relying too heavily on the emerging technology. Marketers are also concerned with how AI-generated content will land with consumers: 60.3% of industry professionals feel that consumers will find a brand less authentic if its marketing and advertising efforts include AI-generated content.
Many of these concerns intensified over the past year as advertisers witnessed controversies related to AI-generated content making headlines. Early in 2024, advertisers saw the risks of bias and inaccuracies in AI-generated content play out when Google had to take its Gemini AI tool offline after it portrayed white historical figures, such as the US Founding Fathers and German soldiers from the Nazi era, as people of color. Ironically, the tool generated the content because of safeguards Google developers put in place to reduce bias, which inadvertently resulted in offensive inaccuracies. And in June, advertisers saw how Toys“R”Us’ AI-generated commercial was met with both backlash from creatives and a drop in consumer sentiment. These well-publicized controversies have likely made many advertisers a bit more wary of genAI’s content creation abilities.
Considering the very real risks associated with AI, it’s critical for marketing leaders to understand what safeguards they can implement to mitigate liabilities associated with any AI tools they consider adopting. For example: Human staff should always review all AI-generated content for bias and inaccuracies before it goes live, legal teams should review any AI solutions under consideration for possible data privacy and security threats before they’re onboarded, and some brands may even choose to forego releasing fully AI-generated advertisements given developments like the consumer response to the Toys“R”Us commercial.
To a majority of marketing teams, AI’s risks still appear to be outweighed by its alluring potential benefits, and budgets are increasingly making room for new paid AI solutions. But with so many new tools and applications on the market, how are advertising leaders prioritizing those tools in which they feel confident enough in to invest?
One August 2023 survey found that data analysis was most commonly listed as a focus for the next 12 months for US and Canadian CMOs, followed by strategy, creative, and content development for media use and audience targeting and segmentation. Digital marketing teams have already benefited from AI’s data analysis capabilities for many years, as it drives programmatic advertising and programmatic optimization tactics like bid shading and machine learning optimization. And AI tools that can assist in the organization and synthesis of first-party data for audience targeting and segmentation are helping advertisers grapple with signal loss and the shift towards a privacy-first advertising model.
Marketing teams are also investing in AI to increase efficiency and streamline workflows. Sixty-one percent of industry professionals say their organization has invested in technology to automate or streamline processes in the past year, and 66% say their organization plans to invest in the technology in the coming year. While not all these tools are AI-driven, AI is opening many new opportunities for workflow automation and streamlining. For example, marketing teams are leveraging AI copilots that work alongside their tech stacks to streamline operations, as well as advertising platforms equipped with digital advertising automation features that simplify various aspects of the campaign process.
Because the technology is so new, most marketing teams are still in the process of optimizing their generative AI usage and investments. And they’re not alone: Only 11% of global companies across industries are using generative AI at scale.
More than 90% of marketers and advertisers say they use generative AI as part of their digital marketing efforts, primarily leveraging the technology to ideate/brainstorm and to draft content/creative, as well as for research and optimization purposes. While AI-led ideation and brainstorming are relatively risk-free, using genAI to draft content and creative comes with distinct risks, and marketers should ensure they are setting up fact checking and quality control systems to avoid AI-generated bias and inaccuracies in their marketing content.
Additionally, though unpaid tools are the most popular, many marketers are recognizing that premium tools offer can more than their free counterpoints. As marketers continue to explore and expand their use of generative AI, balancing its potential benefits with careful management of risks will be crucial for maximizing effectiveness and achieving strategic goals.
Ultimately, while most marketing teams are still working through their approach to newer, paid AI tools, they are readily embracing free tools like ChatGPT. Due to the risks associated with AI, marketing teams will want to invest meaningful time and effort in evaluating which paid solutions will drive the most success for their teams, and what protections they must put in place to use them safely. This will require a significant time and energy investment up-front—but doing so may well help organizations to get ahead of their competitors in the long run.
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Want to learn more about how advertisers are approaching AI, as well as how they’re thinking and feeling about an AI-driven future? Get all the latest insights in our report, AI and the Future of Marketing.
As AI revolutionizes how advertisers work, media agencies are adopting the technology to drive revenue amidst slashed client budgets and shrinking margins.
Agency leaders overwhelmingly feel that AI will have a significant and positive impact on the advertising industry, with 82.4% believing that AI will be the most influential trend to shape digital advertising in the next ten years. At the same time, media agencies have a bit of a leg up when it comes to familiarity with AI, given that they’ve relied on the technology for longer than many other players in the industry via programmatic advertising (and programmatic optimization tactics like bid shading and machine learning optimization.)
As AI develops at a rapid pace, there are an ever-expanding number of ways agencies can employ the technology to save time and increase efficiency. To make the most of AI for driving revenue and staying competitive, media agencies may want to pay particular attention to AI-powered opportunities supporting campaign planning and optimization.
One of AI’s most meaningful impacts on marketing is its ability to organize and analyze huge amounts of data in a fraction of the time it would take for a human to do so. This AI-powered capability has already revolutionized the media buying space, most notably through the advent of programmatic advertising. Today, AI is growing increasingly effective at pulling insights from audience and historical campaign data to help marketing teams craft more impactful campaign strategies. And generative AI is opening new possibilities for supporting and accelerating the campaign planning process, with 6.4% of marketers reporting that they use generative AI for tasks related to media buying strategy, and a flurry of new tools emerging that look to expand that number significantly.
AI-driven social listening, for example, is becoming table stakes for marketers. Manually sifting through social media to gain insights on the top concerns of consumers looking for a certain type of product takes hours—but AI-powered social listening tools can get it done in a matter of minutes. Using these tools, advertisers can easily track their competitors online as well as quickly generate clear insights into consumer sentiments, preferences, and trends. They can then use those insights in the planning process to ensure their campaigns are attuned to both competitor activity and consumer sentiment and behavior. For example, Fulham Football Club uses social listening to gain a more segmented and nuanced understanding of their fanbase according to their online activity, which opens up opportunities to target those segments with personalized messaging. This heightened attunement to their audience helps Fulham spend more efficiently, which in turn drives revenue.
Moreover, these types of tools aren’t exclusive to social—AI listening tools can pull data from search touchpoints and synthesize data from consumer reviews as well.
Beyond customer listening, media agencies and their technology partners are finding more and more ways to refine campaign planning processes using AI’s data synthesis capabilities. For example, some advertising platforms can employ AI to synthesize data from all the campaigns that run within them, and provide advertisers with insights into performance benchmarks and budget distribution trends amongst marketing teams working in the same vertical. AI can also accelerate the forecasting process, enabling advertisers to predict available inventory based on specific criteria and implement new strategies using the precise targeting parameters from their forecasts.
Media agencies are also mitigating signal loss by using technologies like CDPs equipped with AI to quickly gather, standardize, and leverage consumer data to pull audience insights and track the customer journey to plan their campaigns more strategically as well.
Overall, leveraging AI to implement audience and competitor insights in the planning process can help media agencies save time and craft data-driven strategies that are finely attuned to their target audiences’ needs and preferences as well as market trends, helping them better drive ROAS and deliver revenue for their clients.
AI-powered campaign optimization has been around for a while, but new innovations in this area offer media agencies a variety of ways to allocate campaign assets and budgets more effectively. In fact, AI is moving the advertising industry closer to a world where teams will spend very little time on manual campaign optimization, freeing them up for more strategic and fulfilling tasks.
Tools like bid shading and group budget optimization, which automatically make campaign adjustments to improve win rates and drive increased ROAS, have begun this process and are growing more widely adopted. As AI continues to progress, more tools such as these are expected to emerge and help advertisers drive revenue by allocating their dollars towards the tactics, channels, and properties where they’re most impactful.
Major adtech partners are also rolling out offerings that include AI-driven campaign optimization features, such as Google’s Performance Max and Meta’s Advantage+. However, these walled-garden offerings don’t come without trade-offs—the most significant one being the transparency media buyers are used to. While it’s important for advertisers to test and learn on these tools, media teams must assess whether they are actually accomplishing their goals, rather than setting and forgetting their campaigns.
Dynamic creative optimization (DCO) is another developing area that’s helping media teams save time and spend more effectively, allowing media teams to serve high volumes of diverse creative that’s personalized to specific audience segments, which makes it more likely for ads to resonate with more consumers. One Jack in the Box campaign, for example, used DCO to generate 135 different ad variations and saw a whopping 85% increase in CTR compared to the campaign’s benchmark.
DCO not only reduces time spent on manual creative optimizations, but also provides media teams with extensive insights on how all those creative variations perform, allowing them to tweak their strategies based on those learnings. The speed and efficiency with which AI can process and analyze data, and generate new content based on its findings, will doubtless enhance creative optimization technologies moving forward: Creative optimization was marketers’ third-most popular response when asked what part of the digital marketing process they expect to be most impacted by AI.
These are just a few of the many ways in which AI is helping advertisers to automate and speed up the campaign optimization process, and there are plenty more coming down the line as the technology advances. When used effectively (and carefully monitored by human teams), these tools hold tremendous promise for increasing efficiency and personalization—and thus for driving revenue for media agencies and their clients.
With over half of marketing leaders believing that AI will make marketers significantly more efficient at their jobs within the next three-to-five years, AI-driven workflow automation is another major area of opportunity for media agencies.
Indeed, all the AI-driven campaign planning and optimization functionality detailed above can help contribute to overall workflow automation, in that they automate parts of the campaign process and reduce manual workloads for marketing teams. But there are other applications as well: For example, some agencies are turning to AI copilots to automate their workflows. AI-driven copilots are LLMs that are integrated into existing tools and platforms and collaborate with the marketers using them. They improve efficiency and accelerate specific workflows, such as by detecting inconsistencies across different media formats.
By adopting AI-driven tools throughout the campaign life cycle that automate manual tasks, advertising leaders can streamline their workflows and save time. This is an application that’s been of interest to marketing organizations for some time already, with 61% of marketers reporting that their organization has invested in technology to automate or streamline processes in the past year. And adoption is set to increase, with 66% of marketers saying their organizations have plans to invest in this kind of technology within the next year.
In an era where media fragmentation, signal loss, high turnover rates, and many other factors are making agency work more difficult for marketing professionals, AI’s ability to automate manual tasks and streamline workflows is one of its major benefits for media agencies looking to save time, drive efficiency, and increase revenue.
Media agencies have a unique opportunity to leverage AI to drive revenue and enhance efficiency, at a time when such results are critically needed across the agency landscape. AI-powered planning and optimization tools are two areas that offer particularly strong benefits.
Additionally, the AI-driven campaign planning and optimization functionality detailed above can pair with workflow automation technology to help drive wider agency efficiency, reducing manual workloads for teams across the organization.
In exploring and integrating these types of AI into their operations, media agencies can open new avenues for growth and innovation, and position themselves at the forefront of an increasingly AI-driven industry.
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Curious to learn more about how advertisers are navigating AI adoption? Get all the latest insights in our report, AI and the Future of Marketing.
It’s been less than two years since OpenAI introduced the public to ChatGPT and officially ushered in the generative AI era, and the technology has quickly become the hottest topic in all of marketing.
Agencies and in-house teams have rushed to begin using new AI solutions in pursuit of greater efficiency, deeper insights, and creative inspiration, while adtech and martech companies have eagerly promoted their own AI capabilities in the hopes of cashing in on the buzz.
Amidst this flurry of excitement and activity around AI’s potential, marketers and advertisers have begun facing a steady increase in pressure to demonstrate the impact of these new tools. Is AI, in fact, driving new levels of efficiency and facilitating stronger work? Are industry professionals still as excited about this still-emerging tech as they were a year ago, during its relative infancy? Do its many much-touted upsides outweigh a laundry list of potential risk factors? And how much of this AI hype cycle is just that: hype?
For this report, we surveyed marketing and advertising professionals from top agencies, brands, and publishers to see how marketers are using and feel about AI today, and to explore how the technology is poised to shape the industry going forward.
Findings include:
Whether it’s making headlines for its commanding role in the political advertising sphere, its record-setting viewership levels, or its popularity among younger generations, it’s no secret that connected TV (CTV) is one of the most talked about—and fastest-growing—advertising channels.
However, rapid channel growth is often accompanied by increased risks, and CTV is no exception. Factors like its fragmented nature and lack of standardization make it vulnerable to fraud, from inflated ad impressions to wasted spending on inactive devices. At the same time, advertisers face the possibility of their ads being placed next to low-quality content or content that conflicts with their brand values, which can erode audience trust. Fortunately, there are solutions to address these risks, which allow teams to harness the full potential of this booming channel in a way that protects against ad fraud and brand safety threats.
The TV landscape has undergone a dramatic transformation in recent years, as connected TV and over-the-top (OTT) have exploded in popularity and traditional linear TV viewership has declined. Over the past five years, time spent with CTV has increased by more than 137%, and time spent with traditional/linear TV has decreased by nearly 17%. Even more, in June 2024, streaming amassed the highest share of TV usage—a whopping 40.3%—surpassing the previous record set by cable in June 2021.
However, the fast-paced influx of CTV ad dollars has attracted attention from fraudsters and other bad actors, making ad fraud a growing threat on the channel. This is of particular concern when it comes to programmatic CTV: In Q3 2023, 15% of programmatic CTV advertising traffic was found to be invalid.
At the same time, more than 80% of CTV ad buyers feel significantly concerned about securing brand suitable ad placements. Because the landscape is so fragmented—with viewers watching across a variety of apps and platforms on their connected devices—it’s more difficult for advertisers to control precisely what content and/or programming their ads run alongside. As a result, teams that overlook a brand safety plan when investing in the channel could very well end up with fraudulent placements and/or ads served next to content that is unsuitable for their brand or client.
Part of the reason ad fraud in the CTV landscape is increasing is because advertisers are spending more programmatic dollars on the channel. While CTV makes up a relatively small fraction of the overall programmatic market, more than 2 in every 5 new programmatic dollars spent are going to the channel. Without proper safeguards, programmatic inventory becomes more vulnerable to fraud, driven by reduced ad verification, increased traffic volume, and a fragmented supply chain.
Bot fraud, which artificially boosts the number of video ad impressions, is one of the most common types of ad fraud in the CTV open marketplace. DoubleVerify and Roku recently identified “CycloneBot,” a highly sophisticated fraud scheme that not only spoofs impressions but also simulates prolonged CTV viewing sessions, making the invalid impressions more difficult to detect. The bot can spoof 1.5 million devices, equating to 250 million invalid ad requests every single day. Fortunately, thanks to Roku’s Advertising Watermark and DoubleVerify’s verification process, the bot was detected. Moving forward, Roku is looking adapt their watermark into an industry standard to better combat such fraud schemes.
Beyond these fraud risks, CTV’s rapid rise in popularity has also led to significant brand safety challenges. Without safeguards in place, advertisers’ CTV ads could end up running alongside low-quality or unsuitable content—or, in more extreme cases, harmful or misleading misinformation or disinformation.
Take, for instance, YouTube’s dominating presence in the connected TV space. In early 2024, Nielsen announced YouTube was the top streaming platform by time spent watching by viewers for an entire year, with viewers across the globe watching more than 1 billion hours of YouTube content on their connected TVs each day. But platforms like YouTube pose a substantial brand safety risk, given that they are filled with user-generated content (UGC). While ads on the channel might run alongside more traditional tv programming that viewers are accessing via streaming on their CTV, they could also very well appear next to UGC that may or may not be a brand suitable environment.
Made-for-advertising (MFA) CTV apps pose an additional brand safety challenge. Much like MFA websites, MFA CTV apps often employ aggressive tactics that create a low-quality experience for viewers. And like ad fraud, this problem is more common in the open marketplace, with an estimated $144 million in programmatic ad spending going to such low-quality CTV apps each year.
Overall, while CTV was once seen as a brand safety haven, its rapid growth and evolution now require advertising teams to carefully consider brand safety when investing in the channel.
Another brand safety concern advertisers must navigate in the CTV space is its meteoric popularity among political advertisers.
Traditional linear TV has long been a go-to for political advertisers, and it’s no surprise that political CTV advertising has exploded as viewers have shifted to streaming. In fact, in 2024, 45% of all digital political ad spending is forecast to go to CTV. For some teams, serving ads alongside political content might be viewed as a boon, as this content often draws a lot of attention. On the other hand, political content and ads can be negative and divisive, making adjacent ad placements unsuitable for some teams. And with the explosion of generative AI, coupled with many tech behemoths making significant cuts to their trust and safety teams, the prevalence of political mis- and disinformation is growing all the more rampant in digital spaces. This adds an additional layer of consideration for advertisers looking to make the most of CTV in 2024.
As advertisers consider their CTV brand safety plans, it’s critical to think through the implications of advertising alongside political content, particularly during high-impact time periods like the weeks leading up to Election Day.
Amidst this complexity, how can advertisers meaningfully prioritize brand safety on connected TV? Though this is still an area that is evolving and developing, there are steps advertisers can take now to maximize the CTV opportunity while protecting against fraud as well as brand safety and suitability concerns.
First, teams can take advantage of high quality, premium inventory offered through programmatic guaranteed and private marketplace deals. “When it comes to these types of deals, the brand safety plan is essentially built into the deal itself,” says Kali Baldino, VP of Media Investment at Basis Technologies. “When you’re working with the provider to build these premium deals, you’re indicating what types of content you want to run on—and what types you want to avoid—from the start.” These options offer a higher level of control and quality assurance compared to open marketplaces, reducing the risk of ad fraud. They also offer enhanced control over where ads are placed, allowing advertisers to ensure their ads are appearing in brand suitable placements.
Additionally, when bidding on the open marketplace, advertisers can use tools like allowlists, blocklists, or CTV-specific contextual targeting segments to focus their ads on desired placements. “We’ve seen a lot of success by focusing on the types of content teams do want their CTV ads to appear alongside and building a brand safety strategy around that,” says Baldino. “However, I’d advise against getting too specific, as that can limit a campaign’s reach.” By using these tools intentionally, teams can achieve a balance between brand safety and campaign reach, maximizing the impact of their campaigns while mitigating potential risks.
In addition, advertisers can ensure fraud prevention, brand safety, and brand suitability on CTV by working with partners to help monitor and validate ad placements to ensure they meet teams’ brand safety standards and reduce the risk of fraud both pre- and post-bid. For instance, partners like Peer39 can help protect brand safety through contextual targeting solutions that ensure ads are placed in suitable environments; Comscore provides audience measurement and analytics to help verify ads and ensure they are being shown to legitimate viewers on CTV platforms; and DoubleVerify offers solutions to verify ad placements, prevent fraud, and measure viewability, as well as to ensure ads are not placed alongside inappropriate or unsafe content. Just how effective are these types of brand safety and ad fraud verification? One study found that advertisers not using verification experienced an 11.2% fraud rate, compared to a rate of 0.6% for those who did use verification to protect their CTV campaigns.
Finally, when it comes to navigating political content, there are several steps that teams can take to ensure their CTV ads are not running alongside unsuitable political content and/or misinformation or disinformation. First, during times when political content is most prevalent (i.e., the weeks leading up to Election Day or primaries in battleground states), advertisers can up their spend on platforms where political content is not allowed, such as Netflix and Disney+, and may choose to suspend their ad spend on platforms that tend to see more divisive political content, such as X. Additionally, they can use blocklists or allowlists to eliminate placements known to be associated with political content and/or misinformation. Even more, contextual targeting can help teams to place ads only within content categories that are relevant and appropriate, thus minimizing (though, admittedly, not completely eliminating) the chances they appear next to controversial or undesirable political content.
By approaching CTV campaigns intentionally and with a strong brand safety plan in mind, teams can navigate the complexities the channel poses and avoid potential brand safety and fraud risks.
Connected TV advertising offers significant opportunities to advertisers, but it isn’t without its drawbacks. Amidst its soaring popularity in recent years, ad fraud and brand safety concerns have become more pronounced on the channel, making it more critical that advertising teams craft intentional and proactive plans to ensure suitable ad placements that inspire trust and foster connection with target audiences.
By seeking to understand the ad fraud and brand safety challenges in the space, crafting a CTV brand safety plan, and working with partners to avoid fraud and ensure ads meet brand safety standards, advertisers can make the most of the CTV opportunity while protecting themselves from the rising threats of ad fraud and brand safety risks.
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Want to learn more about connected TV advertising, especially within the context of a more holistic digital video approach? Check out our guide, Video Unleashed: The Ultimate Guide to Digital Video Advertising.
“Buzzword: A keyword; a catchword or expression currently fashionable; a term used more to impress than to inform, esp. a technical or jargon term” – Oxford English Dictionary
All industries have their buzzwords, but the advertising space seems to invite a few more than its fair share. And, in many ways, it makes perfect sense: Advertisers are experts at selling brands, ideas, products, and services, and language is a key component of any pitch. Trendy words and phrases can help signal that the person or business using them is at the forefront of innovation.
Of course, as the OED notes in their definition of “buzzword,” these terms and phrases can be used more to impress than to inform. As a result, when words become buzzwords, their meanings and applications often become less clear.
That said, taking stock of the buzzwords of the moment can be instructive for advertisers looking to better understand their competitors and the industry. The marketing terms and phrases that are in vogue can tell us a lot about what’s top-of-mind for advertisers: their pain points, their needs, their anxieties, and more.
As the advertising industry transforms thanks to tectonic factors like AI, the shift towards privacy-first marketing, and media fragmentation and the increasing complexity of advertising work, the terms advertisers hear and use frequently can tell a meaningful story about the broader advertising landscape. To better explore this, we asked marketing experts at Basis to share their buzzword-related insights—specifically, which buzzwords they hear all the time, their level of value and meaning, why they’re currently so popular, and what their popularity says about the state of the industry.
Most-Heard Buzzwords: AI, Growth hacking
Colleen’s Take: Often, it feels like advertisers bring these words into conversation to demonstrate that they’re in touch with the latest trends. However, they aren’t always relevant or helpful.
‘Growth hacking,’ which refers to rapidly increasing a brand or client’s user base or revenue with minimal budget/resources, feels especially demonstrative of the industry today. I see this buzzword used frequently by brands (particularly start-ups) to describe an approach where every dollar spent is heavily scrutinized. If it’s not driving measurable growth, it's cut.
Reading Between the Lines: The underlying story is that brands and agencies have been battling economic turbulence and other financial pressures for several years now, and they’re doing everything they can to try and drive revenue and increase the efficiency of their spend.
Most-Heard Buzzwords: ID bridging, ID spoofing
Noor’s Take: 2024 has been marked by discussion about alternative addressability solutions, as third-party cookies were expected to be fully deprecated before year’s end. As the adtech industry sought out new methods for consumer tracking, ID bridging gained traction as a proposed option. This solution intends to link user IDs via matching across channels and platforms to create a cohesive profile.
ID bridging has received a fair amount of criticism, including concerns around privacy, the formulation of unreliable IDs, and the need for volumes of first-party data. The handling and linking of related data points for ID bridging makes room for another problematic buzzword: ID spoofing. ID spoofing occurs when bad actors manipulate IDs in a bidstream to masquerade as other user IDs which may be more attractive to advertisers.
While Google no longer intends to deprecate third-party cookies in Chrome, marketers must still grapple with signal loss and the shift towards privacy-first advertising, meaning that these terms will likely continue to make the rounds.
Reading Between the Lines: Both terms have brought new points of contention and confusion to the advertising space. We Are Raptive founder Paul Barrister summed up the issue by saying: “After a year+ of talking to dozens of companies about ID bridging, I can confidently say that all ID bridging conversations are a series of miscommunications and misunderstandings.”
Most-Heard Buzzwords: Halo effect, "Right message, right time, right place”
Molly’s Take: Neither of these phrases are necessarily easy to measure and achieve.
The popularity of the term “halo effect” reflects that brand awareness is growing as a known need as a response to the industry’s laser-focus on performance marketing in recent years. Meanwhile, “right message, right time, right place” speaks to the fragmentation of the media landscape and the importance of marketing strategies that are aligned with the customer journey. Advertisers are returning to this adage, which has been around since our industry began, to guide their strategies as they grapple with fragmentation and media complexity.
Reading Between the Lines: These terms reflect a wider trend of advertisers returning to the basics as a way to cope with the significant transformation and complexity that currently characterizes the industry.
Most-Heard Buzzword: AI
Andrew’s Take: People have seen the power of generative AI with ChatGPT and are trying to imagine all the applications for creating efficiency. The popularity of the term “AI” speaks to advertisers’ goal of leveraging technology to be more efficient and effective. The industry is looking to stretch budgets as much as possible and do more with less, and many believe that AI can be used to do that effectively at scale.
While there are many real applications for AI, there are also people who try to take advantage of the buzz around it and apply it to things that don’t quite fit (i.e., AI-washing). It seems like this happens every time something is capturing headlines—for example, when blockchain technology was all the rage a couple of years ago.
Reading Between the Lines: As AI develops, it’s critical for advertisers to weed out the PR plays from what's real. This applies to all buzzwords.
In reviewing the buzzwords that advertising leaders hear most frequently, two distinct themes emerge, each providing meaningful insights for advertisers looking to better understand the current landscape.
The first is financial pressures. Advertisers have been dealing with economic instability for years now, and agencies are under particularly acute financial stress. The popularity of terms like “growth hacking” signal the urgency marketers feel around making the most of their budgets. The same can be said of marketers’ infatuation with AI, as businesses increasingly look to the technology to drive revenue and increase efficiency.
The second is that, even with Google calling off its plans to deprecate third-party cookies in Chrome, advertisers are still scrambling to market their brands and clients effectively amidst signal loss and media fragmentation. In this context, new and uncertain tactics like ID bridging can seem like an attractive way to help advertisers connect with their target audiences—and that attractiveness is amplified by marketing teams’ urgent need for alternative addressability solutions—but their effectiveness isn’t proven, and they may open advertisers up to additional risk.
Ultimately, while buzzwords can often be frustratingly vague or overhyped, they also offer valuable insights into what’s currently top of mind for advertisers. The critical task for marketers is to discern meaningful information and thought leadership from mere buzz designed solely to impress. By critically engaging with these terms and understanding their real-world applications, advertisers can set themselves ahead of many of their peers and position themselves favorably in context to the industry’s greatest hopes and fears.
Though marketing to Generation Alpha might seem like a far-off reality (after all, wasn’t it just yesterday we started to talk about connecting with Gen Z?), today’s youngest generation is already beginning to demonstrate a remarkable influence. With Gen Alphas forecast to amass $5.46 trillion in spending power by 2029, the time for brands and marketers to begin understanding these young consumers is, well, now.
Born between 2010 and the present day (the generation will include those born through 2025), the oldest Gen Alphas are just entering their teen years. With an estimated 2.8 million-plus Gen Alphas being born each week across the globe, they are projected to number more than 2 billion in total by 2025. As the first generation born entirely in the 21st century, they have grown up with near-constant access to technology, and their digital habits are already being formed.
Gen Alphas are not passive online users. They actively engage, create, and influence digital content, and prefer personalized, immersive, and interactive online experiences. As such, this generation’s emerging online behaviors and media preferences are already redefining how every sector interacts with them. For advertising teams to effectively connect with these young consumers when and where they’re spending time, they must understand what motivates them, how they’re currently engaging online, and how their behaviors are anticipated to evolve in the coming years.
Following in Gen Z’s footsteps, Gen Alpha is predicted to be the largest and most diverse generation yet. In the United States alone, there are approximately 45.6 million Gen Alphas now and they have already surpassed the general population in diversity. And by 2025, they will outnumber baby boomers.
This young generation is already showing distinct characteristics that are key for brands and marketers to understand. For instance, a striking 92% of Gen Alphas believe it is important to be themselves, reflecting a strong sense of individuality and authenticity. And, interestingly, most Gen Alpha parents report that their kids would rather play outside than in front of a screen, suggesting that traditional forms of play still hold significant appeal despite the rise of digital entertainment.
When it comes to Generation Alpha, the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic cannot be overlooked. Many of this generation’s members were born during the height of the pandemic or started school in its midst, experiencing firsthand the uncertainty and turbulence it brought. Gen Alpha’s early exposure to such a significant global event influenced their general outlook and mental health significantly. Notably, 75% of 8- to 10-year-olds say they are already thinking about mental health, and 37% of Gen Alpha parents are concerned their children will be worse off than they were in this regard.
Though they are showing distinct and unique preferences and behaviors, members of this generation are also significantly influenced by their parents. With more than half of this generation being born of millennial parents, researchers have dubbed them “mini millennials,” since so many of them are developing similar habits and brand preferences as their parents. That said, like each generation that has preceded it, Gen Alpha represents a new segment of consumers whose unique life experiences and values will shape the future of marketing.
Generation Alpha is the second wave of true digital natives, with an even deeper immersion in the digital world than the first digital native generation, Gen Z. In the US alone, there are 36.2 million children aged zero to 11 who are active internet users in 2024, nearly 12 million more than those aged 12 to 17. This early and extensive exposure to the internet sets Gen Alpha apart and will likely shape their online habits, preferred media channels, and other behaviors in the years to come.
Notably, 43% of Gen Alphas have a tablet before the age of 6, and 58% have a smartphone by the age of 10. This early and widespread access to digital devices from such a young age means that Gen Alpha is not simply familiar with technology—they are growing up with it as an integral part of their daily lives. For brands and marketers, understanding this deep digital integration will be key to engaging with this generation effectively as they grow older.
Additionally, 39% of Gen Alpha spends at least three hours a day looking at screens, and 24% spends at least seven hours a day on smartphones, underscoring how substantial a role technology already plays with this generation. And in 2024, 80% of internet users aged 11 and under will use a tablet at least once per month; 59.6% are connected TV viewers at least once per month; and 29.2% are smartphone users at least once per month. Even when they aren’t directly interacting with them, screens are everywhere in Alphas’ lives—in their classrooms, their parents’ hands, their living rooms, and even the stores they frequent. This pervasive digital media presence shapes their experiences, preferences, and behaviors. As they grow older, brands will need to think about how they will be able to connect with Gen Alpha given their deep immersion in the digital world.
It will be several years before Gen Alpha reaches an age where they can be advertised to. However, by seeking to understand their behaviors and preferences today, marketing teams will be well-positioned to connect meaningfully with them when they come of age.
Despite how young they are now, this generation is already forming brand affinities, both because they’ve gained some brand savvy through encountering different products and ads online, and because of their parents’ influence. In fact, just under half of Gen Alpha’s parents report that their kids already have favorite brands, and the cultural phenomenon of Gen Alpha “Sephora Kids”—aka kids dropping substantial money on skincare aimed at adults—has been making headlines. This early brand affinity presents an opportunity for marketers to start building brand awareness now by engaging with Gen Alpha’s parents. At the same time, it’s important for marketers to understand this generation’s emerging behaviors around digital video, gaming, and social media so that they can craft marketing strategies that will meet their unique needs when they reach an age when they can be directly marketed to.
Digital video is already establishing itself as an essential channel for reaching Gen Alphas: In 2024, 81.4% of internet users aged 0-11 watch digital video at least once per month, and half of Gen Alphas are streaming video daily.
In the US, children spent an average of 64 minutes per day on online video apps, representing a significant amount of their daily media consumption. YouTube tops the list as the most popular video app in the US for this audience, with Alphas averaging 84 minutes per day on the platform, followed by Netflix (49 minutes), Disney+ (30 minutes per day), and Hulu (30 minutes per day). The amount of time spent on these video platforms highlights their central role in Gen Alpha’s daily routines.
For advertisers, the fact that Alphas are spending such a significant amount of time on digital video now indicates that it will likely be a primary channel for engaging and connecting with them in the years to come. Unlike Gen Zers, who primarily discover brands through traditional social media, 51% of Gen Alpha say they first hear about brands through YouTube videos. Popular content types such as “storytime,” “review,” and “day in the life” videos captivate these young viewers, making them effective formats for brand messaging. Given the popularity of this digital channel now, it will likely only become more critical for connecting with Gen Alphas as they step closer to adulthood.
Another key channel for marketers to consider for connecting with Gen Alpha is gaming, given that 47.7% of internet users aged 0-11 engage in digital gaming at least once per month. Where relaxation is the number one reason for Gen Z to game, Alphas tend to see games as a way to express themselves or embrace their creativity. This distinction highlights the potential for brands to engage with this young audience by creating interactive and customizable in-game advertising experiences that allow Gen Alpha to explore their identities and showcase their creativity.
Though digital media is a near inextricable part of most Gen Alphas’ daily lives, members of this younger generation are showing early indications that they want a balance of online and in-person experiences. For instance, 78% of young consumers—including Gen Alpha—say they prefer shopping in-store. Gen Alpha’s preference for brick-and-mortar both paves the way for in-store digital advertising, such as digital out-of-home and retail media, as well as underscores the importance of crafting holistic omnichannel advertising experiences that remain consistent from digital spaces to in-person experiences.
Despite most social media sites requiring their users be 13 or older, many underage users are still accessing these platforms. Case in point: 65% of those between ages 8-10 already spend up to 4 hours a day on social media. And as they grow older, Gen Alphas appear on track to catch up to their Gen Z predecessors in terms of time spent on these platforms. This emerging trend underscores the growing importance of social media in Alphas’ daily lives.
For Gen Alpha, social media isn’t just about connecting with friends and family; it’s also about engaging with creators they admire and trust and discovering new things. In fact, 49% of kids say they trust influencers as much as their own family and friends when it comes to product recommendations. This offers brands a unique opportunity to collaborate with influencers and creators who resonate with Gen Alpha’s values and interests, thereby fostering deeper connections and brand loyalty. Additionally, younger generations are increasingly turning to social media rather than traditional search engines as their primary search tools, a trend likely to continue with Gen Alpha. This reliance on social media for search provides brands with an additional way to connect meaningfully with this younger generation in the years to come.
Like each generation that has come before it, Gen Alpha is poised to reshape the digital advertising landscape with their unique characteristics and preferences. As one of the first generations to grow up entirely in the digital age, their engagement with technology, digital video, gaming, and social media is already profound—and will likely only continue to deepen as they grow older.
For brands and marketers, understanding this dynamic generation now will be key for connecting with them as they amass more buying power. By focusing on authenticity and creativity and aligning with Gen Alpha’s values, brands can build lasting connections with what is poised to be the largest and one of the most influential generations.