Where the next $40B of ad spend is going
Retail media, CTV, audio. A back-of-envelope reallocation of the budgets in motion.
Ad budgets are not shrinking. They are moving, and the direction is consistent enough that you can actually plan around it.
Retail media keeps winning
Retail media is the closest thing to a sure bet in the forecast. It is measurable, it sits close to the purchase, and in several verticals it is still underpriced relative to the outcomes it delivers. Money flows toward measurable outcomes; retail media is where the measurement is cleanest.
CTV grows up
Connected TV finally has the supply and the measurement to absorb serious brand budget. The pricing is still messy and the fraud surface is real, but the trajectory is not in question.
The open web is not losing the spend race because it got worse. It is losing because the competition got measurable.
Where that leaves the open web
The open web is not dead, but its share of the incremental dollar is thinner than it was. The publishers who hold their share have one of three things:
- A genuine audience that buyers cannot reach elsewhere.
- First-party data that survives the privacy changes.
- An environment premium — brand-safe, fast, and trusted.
The takeaway
If your only pitch is reach, you are competing directly with retail media and CTV on their strongest ground. Independent publishers need a story about audience and trust, because that is the part of the market the next forty billion dollars is not automatically taking.