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This can be a bonus behind-the-scenes have a look at our conversations with executives for Digiday’s 2025 Media Company Report, which examined the present and future state of media businesses, from the angle of complete consumer spending and spending by media channel, and delved into the affect of agentic AI on the company panorama.
Digiday hosted a spotlight group of seven senior media company executives who oversee media funding at holding company-owned and impartial media businesses to collect first-person accounts of consumer spending. Businesses and networks that participated within the focus group had been:
- Meeting World
- Horizon Subsequent
- IPG Mediabrands
- Mediahub
- Mile Marker
- Novus
- PMG
What follows are their ideas on how they and their shoppers are incorporating AI into day by day workflows and their expectations for consumer spending in 2026.
How GDP and worldwide sports activities might affect 2026 spend
Drew Corry, svp of strategic funding and market technique at IPG Mediabrands: “[Ad spending] must be up, however it’s going to be artificially pushed by issues just like the World Cup and the Olympics. These tend to push funding up. The very best we are able to inform, it appears like it might be reasonable development when you took that out. There’s nonetheless numerous uncertainty and unanswered questions on main international locations because it pertains to tariffs. We’ve seen some shoppers and a few corporations pull ahead spending, however on the again half, whether or not or not that’s wanted, the jury remains to be out.”
Mike O’Connor, evp and head of funding at Horizon Subsequent: “If the upfront is any indication, the marketplace for 2026 appears barely stronger than 2025. You’ve received a confluence of the Olympics and the World Cup — all of this stuff which are driving spend. Broadly talking, it feels a bit of rosier, a bit of sunnier than 2025.”
Andrea Montano, evp of technique, insights and connections at Meeting World: “We have a look at GDP too. I used to be taking a look at latest numbers [as of August 2025], and the U.S. is taking a look at a GDP development of about 2%. That’s modest. A part of it additionally will depend on your consumer roster — multiregion shoppers, or true international shoppers. We’re a bit of bit extra optimistic [about 2026 spending] as a result of the worldwide GDP is trying a bit stronger. If that continues, I believe, within the U.S., we’ll be a bit of bit extra bullish about it. However once more, 2% GDP development will not be so incredible.”
Scott Shamberg, president and CEO at Mile Marker: “By way of my private use of [AI], it’s permitting me the capability to do extra. However, trying ahead, how and the place we undertake AI and the way we use it to help the people [at our agency], and align them towards increased affect work, we have a look at it in two methods. There’s the bucket of, how do you develop into extra environment friendly with repeatable and scalable duties? And, how do you utilize AI to advance capabilities? It’s beginning to weave its approach in, in a kind of buckets, in virtually each resolution that we make for ourselves and for the consumer.”
Andrea Montano, evp of technique, insights and connections at Meeting World: “Each govt consumer is asking what their AI roadmap must be. It’s pairing your [agency] imaginative and prescient with the place they [clients] are as a tradition and their dedication to AI, as a result of they could nonetheless simply be dabbling. We attempt to line these up as a result of we’re as profitable as our shoppers are in the case of [AI]. In any other case, we’re not utilizing it to its full potential. That’s going again to the place we discover the efficiencies. That’s why everybody’s speaking about extra outcome-based compensation fashions as properly. It’s not concerning the head depend. It’s about the way you make smarter selections extra rapidly, to have the outcomes that you really want and be compensated accordingly. There might be some shifts with how now we have industrial agreements with shoppers on account of AI, which might be unimaginable — helpful on either side.”
Rob Davis, president and CMO at Novus: “There are two important questions [from clients]. One is simply how and the place are you [the agency] utilizing it. How are you going to scale back charges by saving time and power? How is what you’re doing going to make us smarter than the competitors? Then, there’s a really particular query that I don’t suppose I’ve talked to a consumer within the final 4 to 6 weeks that they haven’t requested, ‘how is it impacting each paid and natural search?’ I talked to a consumer the opposite day who mentioned ‘our web site visitors is down 30%.’ They’re attributing most of it to AI [agentic AI’s effects on search results]. It’s very class dependent, or consumer particular, however that particularly is a very popular subject.”
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