As the relationship between data and AI deepens, both push- and pull-based marketing strategies will benefit.
“This is where social media and retail media shine, because by nature, they can use recent data on what you’ve consumed, and so the products [you are served] will be a lot more personalized right out of the box,” said Yang Han, co-founder and CTO, StackAdapt, in the recent EMARKETER Summit: Top Trends for 2025.
AI can help brands engage their target customer, said Ryan Nelsen, CMO, StackAdapt.
“At the end of the day, marketing is really about helping the world know who you are as a brand, what you stand for, and why they should pursue your products or partner with you,” said Nelsen. “Where's the value that we can provide, from a technology standpoint, from a people standpoint, and a partnership standpoint?”
The next major leap will be figuring out how to have predictive AI and generative AI interact together to produce a more useful end-to-end value exchange, said Han.
“Imagine we have generative AI automatically being able to utilize predictive AI tools for ad targeting and 360 optimizations, so it can learn and improve on its own, with human-based guidance,” he said.
“I’m especially looking forward to seeing how AI unfolds in the programmatic space,” said our senior analyst Evelyn Mitchell-Wolf.
Data will play an important role in the future of AI for marketing. “AI ultimately requires data to thrive, [so] you need to feed it healthy and legally sourced data,” said Han. “There are a lot of innovative ways to utilize both third-party and first-party data together.”
Of course, no matter what tools or technology you are using, measurement strategies that only occur on a single device or focus on a short-term KPI will not give you a true picture of your marketing ROI.
“The classic example would be Google Analytics, which is last-click based on your browser,” Han said. “It can't account for your mobile actions, your connected TV views and so forth. The world has evolved to be multi-device, but many technologies haven't kept up with changes in consumer behavior.”
“The purchase funnel is absolutely not linear, so it's more important than ever before for advertisers to really recognize that they're meeting consumers where they are,” said our principal analyst, Sarah Marzano. “This requires accepting a certain degree of complexity as you navigate how to activate across platforms and channels.”
Focus where your audience is, added Nelsen. “Don't add a new channel unless there's data to back it up. I'm not a big believer in getting new tech just to get new tech. Test, iterate — there's a lot of power in making sure you're using the technology you have today to the fullest extent.”
This was originally featured in the EMARKETER Daily newsletter. For more marketing insights, statistics, and trends, subscribe here.