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Agentic AI intelligence for advertising executives

70 stories · Updated throughout the day

The marketer’s new playbook for AI-powered competitive intelligence

This article explores how marketers can leverage AI for competitive intelligence, moving beyond static dashboards to predictive analysis. The piece outlines AI-driven approaches for real-time competitor monitoring and strategic decision-making in marketing operations.

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Adform & Adsquare Launch Industry-First Agentic Real-Time Framework Integration

Adform and Adsquare have launched an industry-first implementation of the Agentic Real-Time Framework (ARTF), integrating real-world data capabilities with agentic advertising technology. This partnership enables real-time optimization and decision-making for programmatic advertising using agentic AI systems.

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Why Agentic Measurement Will Reprice The Ad Market

Agentic AI is poised to transform advertising measurement by enabling real-time data collection and analysis, replacing legacy measurement systems that create information delays. This shift will fundamentally reprice the ad market by providing unprecedented visibility into campaign performance and audience insights.

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Crossmedia’s AI Is Built to Free Planners From Excel Hell

Crossmedia is deploying AI to automate manual media planning and buying processes that currently rely on disconnected spreadsheets, aiming to create an integrated ecosystem that reduces grunt work for planners and buyers. The solution directly addresses legacy workflow inefficiencies across the media planning function.

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Beet@20: Doug Rozen of Cadent Warns AI Won’t Replace You, but AI Experts Might

Doug Rozen of Cadent discusses AI's impact on advertising, warning that while AI won't replace professionals, AI experts will become critical hires. The commentary touches on ad frequency optimization and streaming ad effectiveness, key areas where agentic AI is reshaping how advertisers manage campaigns and audience exposure.

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The AI paradox: Marketers trust AI to buy media, not build brands

Marketers show a trust paradox with AI, readily adopting agentic tools for media buying and campaign optimization while remaining skeptical of AI-generated creative and brand-building strategies. The article explores how advertising executives are leveraging automated decision-making for programmatic functions but hesitating to rely on AI for strategic creative work.

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Omnicom’s ‘fewer middlemen’ push is reaching publishers – just not their P&Ls

Omnicom is implementing a "fewer middlemen" strategy that is changing how its agencies interact with publishers, potentially streamlining the ad buying process and reducing intermediaries in the supply chain. This operational restructuring could have implications for how programmatic and direct deals are negotiated, though financial impacts on publisher P&Ls remain unclear.

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TruTxt Launches AI-Powered Translation & Monetisation Platform for Publishers

TruTxt has launched an AI-powered platform that automatically translates and monetizes foreign-language publisher content, enabling publishers to unlock revenue from previously underutilized traffic. The solution uses agentic AI to optimize content accessibility and programmatic ad placement across multiple languages, directly impacting publisher monetization strategies.

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Measured Has A New Tool That Lets Marketers Chat With Their Incrementality Data

Measured launched an MCP server enabling marketers to query their incrementality data through conversational AI platforms like ChatGPT and Claude, turning media performance analysis into natural language interactions. This agentic AI application allows brands to optimize media spend allocation by chatting with their measurement data rather than navigating traditional dashboards.

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Future of Marketing Briefing: OpenAI is working with Skai to bring retail and commerce advertisers into ChatGPT

OpenAI is partnering with Skai to enable retail and commerce advertisers to access ChatGPT inventory through existing advertising infrastructure. This integration allows advertisers to leverage agentic AI capabilities within ChatGPT while maintaining familiar ad tech workflows, similar to OpenAI's previous Criteo partnership.

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3 things you must know to get AI-native advertising right

The article explores how conversational AI is transforming advertising through real-time recommendations, dynamic creative optimization, and autonomous systems. It provides guidance on implementing AI-native advertising strategies effectively across the ad tech ecosystem.

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OpenAI turns on cost-per-action ads inside ChatGPT

OpenAI has launched cost-per-action (CPA) advertising within ChatGPT, marking the platform's entry into performance-based advertising models. This represents a significant shift toward enabling advertisers to optimize spend based on user actions rather than impressions, creating new opportunities for agentic optimization of ad performance within conversational AI.

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AI agents are exposing martech’s weak point

A new API report card reveals significant integration gaps in martech platforms that are becoming apparent as marketers increasingly deploy AI agents for automation and workflows. The findings highlight critical weaknesses in how martech systems connect and interoperate, which directly impact the ability to build effective agentic AI solutions across marketing stacks.

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Kargo Announces Integration with ChatGPT Advertising (ANZ)

Kargo, an ad tech platform, announced an integration with ChatGPT Advertising, positioning itself as a technology partner in OpenAI's commercial ecosystem. This integration enables agentic AI capabilities for creative optimization and ad orchestration across premium digital surfaces, combining AI-driven creative and contextual intelligence with programmatic advertising infrastructure.

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Google Enters The Ecommerce Wars; Big Brother Is Listening (Maybe)

Google is positioning itself in ecommerce using agentic AI capabilities, while Cox Media Group settles allegations over misrepresenting an AI-powered ad product. The article explores how agentic AI is reshaping ecommerce strategy and highlights regulatory scrutiny around AI ad tech claims.

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Ad Tech Briefing: Agencies reposition for the agentic era

Advertising agencies are restructuring their operations and technology stacks to prepare for agentic AI adoption, with key debates emerging around infrastructure choices, system interoperability, and who controls autonomous agent workflows. The article explores how agencies are positioning themselves to leverage agentic AI while managing vendor relationships and operational governance.

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Thrad & Cursor Host First Ad Tech Hackathon on Agentic Commerce Infrastructure

Thrad and Cursor are hosting a hackathon focused on building infrastructure for agentic commerce, with over 150 developers and founders developing solutions for AI agents to handle commercial workflows including media buying and negotiations. This event directly addresses the technical foundations needed for autonomous agents to operate within advertising and commerce ecosystems.

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Autonomous Ad Buying Just Ain’t Ready Yet; A CMO By Any Other Name

WPP Media's Emily Lai discusses the limitations of autonomous AI-powered ad buying, noting that 80-90% of campaigns are too complex for AI to handle independently. The article explores the current state of agentic AI in programmatic advertising and where human oversight remains necessary.

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Agencies are moving closer to supply, and it’s reshaping the programmatic middle layer

Holding company agencies are adopting containerization to gain greater control over programmatic infrastructure, moving closer to supply-side operations and reshaping the traditional middle layer of the ad tech stack. This structural shift reflects agencies' strategic move to consolidate capabilities and reduce dependence on third-party platforms in programmatic buying and selling.

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Contextual Ads Have Finally Graduated from ‘Cookie Backup Plan’ Status: Seedtag’s Tina Iannacchino

Seedtag's Tina Iannacchino argues that contextual targeting is becoming a critical strategy as publishers face cookie deprecation, referral traffic collapse, and AI search competition. The article examines how contextual advertising—traditionally viewed as a backup to first-party data—is now essential to publisher viability and ad effectiveness in a post-cookie landscape.

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The Upfronts: Day 3

Coverage of the 2026 Upfronts' final day, highlighting NFL rights deals, AI ad-tech pitches, and industry consolidation shaping the competitive landscape. The article captures key announcements and strategic positioning from major players during the annual upfront marketplace event.

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Your campaigns span 12 channels. Why does it feel like 12 jobs? by AdPlus

AdPlus examines the operational complexity of managing campaigns across multiple channels and how fragmented tools impact performance marketers. The article addresses pain points in cross-channel ad operations that agentic AI solutions could potentially streamline and optimize.

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Prog AI Live: AI’s Slippery Slop

Prog AI Live explores how the definition of premium inventory shifts in an agentic AI world, examining whether traditional quality signals like prestige publishers and high-quality video remain relevant as AI agents reshape advertiser behavior and decision-making in programmatic buying.

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AI Is Finally Doing Real Work In Ad Ops (But Only When It Works With Your Existing Tech)

Publishers are deploying AI agents in ad operations to automate manual tasks like GAM report analysis and revenue troubleshooting, but success depends on seamless integration with existing technology stacks. Industry leaders are shifting from conceptual AI discussions to practical, workflow-integrated solutions that deliver real operational efficiency gains.

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The latest AI-powered martech news and releases

Pacvue is developing AI assistants that integrate live retail media data directly into chat interfaces, replacing manual spreadsheet processes and breaking down data silos. This agentic AI application streamlines retail media workflows and data accessibility for advertisers and agencies managing campaigns across retail platforms.

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Not Every Ad Server Needs AI. Here’s Where It Actually Matters

An ad tech expert examines where AI actually adds value in ad serving infrastructure versus where it's simply a marketing label. The piece cautions buyers against overpaying for AI capabilities that don't deliver genuine innovation in programmatic buying and selling workflows.

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Why Is Ad Intelligence Still Built For A Pre-AI World?

The advertising industry has abundant data on competitor spend and campaign performance but lacks the AI-driven tools needed to translate that data into better decision-making. The article argues that ad intelligence platforms must evolve beyond pre-AI architectures to leverage agentic AI for competitive analysis and strategic optimization.

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The AI marketing advantage hiding in your metadata

Properly organized and structured metadata provides a competitive advantage for AI-powered marketing applications, enabling better search functionality and personalization capabilities. The article highlights how metadata organization is foundational for implementing AI-driven marketing strategies effectively.

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In agentic commerce, your brand promise must be provable

As AI agents increasingly mediate consumer purchasing decisions, brands must ensure their value propositions are verifiable across pricing, service, delivery, and loyalty metrics. The shift from emotional brand choice to agent-evaluated criteria requires advertisers and marketers to prioritize data transparency and measurable brand promises in their go-to-market strategies.

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Programmatic Advertising Expands to Car LED Screens

Adtelligent has launched programmatic advertising capabilities for LED screens mounted on car roofs through partnerships with Uklon Ads and Advision, expanding digital out-of-home (DOOH) inventory into automated buying channels. This integration brings mobile vehicle-based advertising into the programmatic ecosystem, enabling brands to access a new category of dynamic ad placements.

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Customer experience outweighs brand in AI-assisted shopping

AI recommendation engines are increasingly prioritizing customer experience signals like reviews and comparisons over traditional brand equity when surfacing products to shoppers. This shift has significant implications for how brands approach advertising and positioning in AI-assisted retail environments.

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DeepIntent’s Natalie Mancuso: Healthcare CTV Drives Better Performance than General Online Video

DeepIntent reports that healthcare CTV advertising delivers twice the new-to-brand prescription rates compared to general online video when paired with sequential messaging and clinical conversion tracking. The findings highlight how agentic optimization and advanced measurement approaches improve performance in specialized verticals like healthcare advertising.

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Writing Content For The Robots; Amazon’s Alarming Affiliate Adjustments

The Economist is preparing for agentic AI-driven content discovery by creating stripped-down, agent-readable content optimized for AI answer engines like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Claude. This represents a strategic shift in how publishers approach content strategy and distribution as agentic AI systems reshape audience discovery and engagement.

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Can retail media networks survive the shift to agentic commerce?

The article examines how agentic AI shopping agents are disrupting traditional retail media networks and questions whether RMNs can adapt to an agentic commerce environment. It explores the strategic implications of autonomous AI agents handling purchasing decisions and their impact on how brands can reach and influence consumers through retail channels.

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These AI Agents Want To Handle All The Annoying Parts Of Media Buying

AI agents are being deployed to automate the manual, time-consuming aspects of programmatic media buying operations, including data management, report reconciliation, QA checks, and client communication. These tools aim to handle repetitive backend tasks that remain largely manual despite advances in automated bidding technology.

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Richer contextual signals in the bidstream help agencies and publishers alike

Seedtag discusses how enhanced contextual signals in the programmatic bidstream are improving decision-making for both agencies and publishers. The article examines how combining identity-based and contextual data creates better targeting and buying outcomes in programmatic environments.

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DoubleVerify Launches AI-Powered Threads Suitability Controls?

DoubleVerify has launched AI-powered content suitability controls for Meta Threads, enabling advertisers to automatically screen and avoid unsuitable content placements. This agentic AI capability enhances brand safety and ad performance optimization on the social platform.

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How to make your content visible to AI buying agents

As AI agents increasingly influence vendor selection and purchasing decisions, brands must optimize their content with structured, machine-readable formats to remain visible and competitive. The article addresses how marketers can adapt their content strategy to ensure discoverability by agentic AI systems that are reshaping the buying process.

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Marketing is entering its ‘air traffic control’ era by AtData

AtData describes marketing's evolution into an 'air traffic control' model where multiple AI systems must coordinate in real-time to interpret customer trust, risk, intent, and identity signals. The shift reflects how agentic AI systems are increasingly managing complex, multi-touchpoint customer journeys that require simultaneous decision-making and orchestration.

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Channel Factory’s Nico Greco: Brand Safety Rules were ‘Designed for Human Authors,’ not AI-Generated Content

Channel Factory's CRO argues that traditional brand safety tools and guidelines were built for human-created content and are inadequate for the volume and sophistication of AI-generated material flooding digital environments. The article highlights a critical gap in brand safety infrastructure that advertising platforms and agencies must address as agentic AI content creation scales.

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Why Amazon and YouTube pitched operating systems, not just TV inventory at this year’s upfront

Amazon and YouTube positioned their upfront offerings around operating systems and infrastructure rather than just inventory, with negotiations increasingly centered on identity, infrastructure, and AI-driven buying capabilities. The shift reflects how CTV platforms are leveraging agentic AI and data infrastructure to enable more sophisticated programmatic buying and targeting.

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The Economist prepares for a two‑track internet: one for humans and one for AI agents

The Economist is preparing agent-readable content versions to accommodate AI agents accessing its free content, signaling media companies' recognition of agentic AI as a distinct consumer segment. This move reflects broader shifts in publishing strategy as outlets prepare for a dual-track internet serving both human and AI agent users.

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Inside The Trade Desk’s Claude-powered campaign agent

The Trade Desk is leveraging Anthropic's Claude LLM to power a campaign agent that automates campaign building and optimization. This represents a direct application of agentic AI to programmatic advertising operations, with potential implications for DSP functionality and campaign management workflows.

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Publicis Buys LiveRamp in $2.5 Billion Push Into AI-Driven Advertising

Publicis Groupe is acquiring LiveRamp for $2.5 billion to strengthen its capabilities in AI-driven advertising and data collaboration technology. The deal positions the agency holding company to leverage LiveRamp's identity resolution and data platforms to enhance agentic AI applications across campaign targeting, optimization, and marketing operations.

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CMOs Have To Be More Tech-Enabled Than Ever – And So Do Their Agencies

Advertising agencies are increasingly deploying AI-powered platforms to automate and optimize key functions including creative testing, audience targeting, and campaign planning. The article highlights how CMOs and their agencies must develop greater technical sophistication to leverage these AI tools effectively across the advertising ecosystem.

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Future of Marketing Briefing: The brands winning at AI started with process not tech

The article argues that successful brands implementing AI in marketing prioritize process optimization over technology adoption itself, positioning agentic AI as a distraction from foundational strategic work. It focuses on how marketing leaders should approach AI transformation by first establishing proper workflows and organizational structures before deploying AI agents.

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Marketers put up guardrails as AI agents reshape programmatic buying

Marketers are implementing governance frameworks and safety measures as AI agents increasingly automate programmatic buying decisions. The focus is on maintaining human oversight, transparency, and control over autonomous AI-driven bidding and targeting strategies.

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The art of doing more with less: The new marketing operations stack

This article discusses how marketing operations teams can optimize their technology stacks by moving from managing multiple disconnected tools to orchestrating integrated outcomes using AI. It addresses the practical challenge of 'AI spaghetti mess' that emerges when organizations adopt numerous AI tools without strategic coordination.

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Thrad Names Roger Dunn CCO as FMCG Brands Eye AI Conversation Advertising

Thrad, an AI-native advertising infrastructure platform, has appointed Roger Dunn as CCO to drive adoption among FMCG brands. Dunn brings experience from Diageo leading retail media and performance marketing, positioning Thrad to expand its agentic AI conversation advertising capabilities in the consumer goods sector.

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Clinch Announces Enhanced Creative for Snapchat Dynamic Product Ads

Clinch, an agentic AI platform, launched automated creative workflows for Snapchat Dynamic Product Ads that integrate product feed management, creative customization, and catalog enrichment. The solution leverages agentic AI to streamline omnichannel content orchestration for dynamic product advertising at scale.

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Universal Ads’ Adam Royle: Koddi Partnership Brings CTV to Commerce Buyers ‘Where They are Working Today’

Universal Ads and Koddi partnered to integrate CTV buying, planning, and measurement directly into commerce platforms, enabling retail media advertisers to access television inventory through their existing workflows. The integration streamlines the traditionally fragmented process of buying connected TV, reducing barriers for commerce-focused buyers.

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The AI Chat Ad Frontier: What LLMs Change About Brand Safety And Control

ChatGPT ads represent a new advertising channel powered by LLMs, creating novel opportunities and challenges around brand safety and control. The article examines how this emerging surface reshapes the customer journey and advertising ecosystem as impressions and transactions shift from traditional web properties to conversational AI platforms.

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‘We should own it’: Hershey’s programmatic chief on AI agents and media mix modeling

Hershey has developed an AI-enabled media mix modeling (MMM) system to optimize media investment decisions, with the company's programmatic chief indicating further agentic AI applications are planned. The confectionary advertiser is actively exploring how AI agents can inform and automate media planning and buying decisions across the organization.

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The state of agentic advertising

A State of the Industry Report examining agentic advertising adoption across publishers, advertisers, and agencies, covering investment levels, organizational readiness, implementation barriers, and business impact. The report positions agentic AI as the latest optimization approach transforming media buying and selling operations.

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TikTok launches MCP server to let AI agents run campaigns

TikTok has launched a Model Context Protocol (MCP) server that enables AI agents to autonomously manage and run advertising campaigns on its platform. This development directly integrates agentic AI capabilities into TikTok's advertising infrastructure, allowing for automated campaign orchestration and optimization.

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IAB Unveils 2026 NewFronts, Marking a Defining Moment for Streaming, CTV, and AI-Powered Video

The IAB's 2026 NewFronts event highlights the streaming and CTV marketplace's evolution toward real-time, AI-driven operations including agentic execution, creative expression, and measurement. The event signals industry recognition that agentic AI is becoming central to video buying, selling, and optimization across the digital video ecosystem.

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Taboola Data Reveals 76% Advertisers See Improved Performance From Agentic AI

Taboola reports that 76% of advertisers are seeing improved performance from agentic AI solutions, with growing interest in deploying these capabilities across open web ecosystems beyond walled gardens. The research indicates strong advertiser adoption of AI-powered performance tools and expansion of agentic AI use cases in the advertising ecosystem.

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Adform Opens Full-Stack Infrastructure for Agentic Advertising

Adform has opened its full-stack advertising infrastructure to enable agentic AI integration, allowing clients to connect their own AI tools directly to Adform's DSP, ad server, DMP, and ID Fusion capabilities. This move enables AI agents to autonomously manage and optimize advertising operations across the company's integrated platform.

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Smartly’s Laura Desmond: Marketers Need ‘New Creative System’ for AI’s Volume Explosion

Smartly's Laura Desmond discusses how AI-driven creative production will dramatically increase content volume and velocity, requiring marketers to develop new management systems for handling thousands of creative variations. The piece addresses how agencies and martech platforms must adapt their workflows to manage AI-generated creative at scale for advertising campaigns.

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