Over half (52%) of senior data and technology executives worldwide use generative AI to boost internal productivity, according to a June survey from MIT Technology Review Insights.
While commerce media networks expand, retailers can take advantage of the efficiencies and measurement capabilities that they can provide.Retail media networks alone are expected to claim one-fifth of US digital ad spending by 2029, according to EMARKETER’s September forecast.
The rise of AI browsers like OpenAI’s Atlas and Perplexity’s Comet is setting up a possible bifurcation of the web. These agent-driven browsers navigate pages, click through tasks, and fetch information on a user’s behalf while traditional browsers anchor the search-centric behaviors most people rely on. The divergence could result in further fragmentation where there are two versions of websites. Brands that structure their content for both—with product metadata, clear semantic HTML, and agent-ready pages focused on specs, summaries, and FAQs—will have a higher chance of visibility across browsers.
Personalized AI is no longer a nice-to-have feature—it’s a driver of adoption that inspires trust in the efficacy of AI solutions. Nine in 10 Gen Z and millennial leaders would be more inclined to use AI at work if responses were personalized, per a survey from The Harris Poll commissioned by Google Workspace. CMOs should ensure AI tools on deck can learn style and brand voice and deliver outputs that are aligned with employees’ goals and tasks. Encourage employees to experiment with custom GPTs and Google Gems to develop role-specific tools that can follow workflows across the organization.
31% of US SMB marketers and business owners use AI-driven design or layout recommendations to optimize landing pages, according to a June 2025 survey from Ascend2 and Unbounce.
Microsoft is lowering its expectations for enterprise AI revenues as customer spending proves more cautious than anticipated. It reduced its sales quotas for AI software after many reps missed sales growth goals for the fiscal year that ended in June, per The Information. The problem could stem from clients’ challenges in measuring ROI from AI initiatives and determining savings from automating tasks. Competition to prove product value is intensifying, and Microsoft’s softening expectations for sales suggest that AI isn’t a guaranteed revenue engine. This lowered forecast marks both cautious customer spending and a shift toward value-driven AI adoption over experimentation.
Most age groups show negative sentiment as the dominant response to personalized ads, with negativity ranging from 36% to 58%, according to an August 2025 survey from Verve and Censuswide.
The fastest-growing B2B organizations share one defining trait—their marketing, sales, and customer success teams operate as one coordinated system, not three departments, per a new study from Trilliad. The payoff is hard to ignore. Companies with high coordination are twice as likely to anticipate revenue growth above 10%. Integrated teams outperform. Integrated tech multiplies team impact. Integrated data turns AI from a pilot project into a growth engine. The path forward is clear—connection is the strongest competitive advantage a B2B organization can build.
Accenture announced it will roll out ChatGPT Enterprise to tens of thousands of employees for internal workflows and client-facing products, per Reuters. The move follows Deloitte adopting a similar expansion—deploying Anthropic’s Claude to more than 470,000 employees across 150 countries. With big consultancies adopting the same AI agent playbook, the risk of AI-driven sameness grows. Companies seeking stricter compliance and tighter risk management might benefit from Accenture’s and Deloitte’s agentic offerings, even as a starting point toward longer-term, more independent agentic adoption.
New Apple research points to the iPhone company pairing large language models (LLMs) with traditional sensors to build a more precise understanding of what a user is doing in real time. It’s likely to show up in sensor-enabled smartphones, computers, and smart home hubs hinged on ambient intelligence. Brands should explore how to design for moments, not messages. Build content and promotions that surface organically depending on a user’s activity, be it cooking, commuting, or exercising—so brands show up when it matters most.
A new study shows that while commerce media enthusiasm is high, actual readiness is far lower. Nearly half of respondents believe they are operationalized, yet only 13% qualify as advanced across leadership, technology, and measurement. Most fall into nascent or emerging categories, limited by siloed workflows, manual creative processes, and fragmented data systems that prevent closed-loop attribution. Advertisers seeking accountable, performance-driven programs may be surprised by how few networks can truly support scaled, automated operations. The findings highlight a widening gap between ambition and capability—and the need for unified data, automation, and clearer measurement.
The New York Times is posting advertising momentum as its proprietary AI stack reshapes how marketers reach premium audiences. Q3 ad revenues climbed 11.8%, with digital ads rising more than 20% and generative AI tool BrandMatch now powering more than 150 campaigns. NYT’s first-party data engine interprets emotional cues, reading patterns, and topic affinities to deliver precise contextual placements—fueling strong campaign lift for partners such as Crown Publishing and Belmond. With 11.76 million digital subscribers and a diversified product suite, NYT’s fully owned ecosystem gives it targeting capabilities most publishers cannot replicate.
Personalization remains one of the most reliable attention drivers, but recent data shows consumers are still uneasy about how brands achieve it. People across age groups feel more negative than positive toward personalized ads—even though they pay more attention to content that feels relevant. The result is a widening gap between consumer expectations and marketer behavior. To unlock personalization’s upside, brands must apply AI to improve relevance and transparency, not just scale output.
OpenAI is rolling out a group chat option for ChatGPT to all logged-in Free, Go, Plus, and Pro users globally. The company said in a blog post that the feature is intended to help users collaborate with one another in the same conversation—such as working with friends, family, or coworkers on plans, decisions, and brainstorming. To capitalize on this new engagement tool, marketing leaders should start experimenting with group-based AI workflows and prepare for new discovery channels.
US connected TV (CTV) viewers fall back on YouTube when they can’t find anything else to watch, per Hub Entertainment Research. Ninety percent of 16- to 34-year-olds turn to YouTube at least sometimes when other streaming services don’t meet their viewing needs. Nearly three-quarters viewers age 35 and older make that switch at least sometimes. Poorly performing search and recommendation tools may be partially to blame. Streamers should target demographics and viewer interests and behaviors via platform analytics and interactive or live polls to capture attention, earn trust, and boost stickiness.
Three major AI releases—Microsoft’s Agent 365, Google’s Gemini 3 Pro, and xAI’s Grok 4.1—could point the way to how businesses will deploy and govern AI. Following OpenA’s GPT 5.1, each new product update approaches intelligence from a different angle: Microsoft is offering operational control, Gemini is touting multimodal reasoning and search, and xAI is demonstrating emotional fluency. The brands that map these tools to specific workflows—governance with Microsoft, discovery and search with Google, and engagement with xAI—could see faster execution, sharper insights, more resilient customer experiences, and tangible ROI.