Posh's blend of community and commerce captures the theme of this year's Under 30 Marketing & Advertising class of founders and marketing leaders turning fast-moving technologies into new engines of creativity and connection. As the boundaries between tech, entertainment and advertising blur, these innovators are building tools, platforms and campaigns that reflect how people actually engage with brands today. Some are leveraging AI to reimagine the creative process.
The vendor landscape is turning into a sea of sameness. So what's worthwhile and what's worth chucking in the bin? The best way to separate AI hype from reality is to roll up your sleeves and try out the tech for yourself, says Ikkjin Ahn, CEO and co-founder of machine learning-based ad tech startup Moloco, on this week's episode of AdExchanger Talks. It's like watching a movie, he says. How do you know if it's good before you even try it?
Media shops organized around a simple machine: More client cash flowing through their pipes means more revenue. Fees. Volume incentives. Data leverage. Margin on margin. Their economics compound. A dollar placed becomes infrastructure for the next dollar. Creative agencies built the opposite. Every idea is a bespoke project. Every campaign starts from scratch. Deliver, invoice, repeat. There's no compounding. No flywheel. Just craft sold by the hour.
Multimodal AI represents the next frontier in AI, enabling machines to understand and evaluate multiple data types, providing greater understanding and flexibility than a single data type could ever offer. In this WTF explainer guide, Digiday and Dstillery explore what multimodal AI is, how to apply it in real-world settings, its benefits to advertisers and how it's well-positioned to solve current and future challenges.
Omnicom said more than 4,000 jobs would be cut as part of the IPG integration, mainly in administrative roles but some leadership positions will also be impacted. After the job cuts, roughly 85% of the roles will be client-focused, while 15% will be administrative, the company said. The financial benefits would surpass $750 million in annual cost savings initially projected to investors, it added.
Magenta Telekom and Readpeak boost awareness and activations with native content-driven creatives, reaching people as they travel outside of the EU. Roaming charges whilst abroad are always a source of concern when visitors and holidaymakers are travelling outside of the EU. These worries often lead to people avoiding using their mobile data abroad altogether. To combat this, Magenta Telekom introduced travel packages for non-EU countries allowing customers to easily activate these packages online, by phone, or through the MeinMagenta app.
Shopping has always been a game. And now it's being rigged against you. This is the story of a little piece of technology that you have been taking for granted. Almost every time you've gone to the store, this little guy has been fighting for you. It's called the price tag. And over the past decade, companies have been on a secret mission to kill it without you noticing.
Adform, the most powerful and safe media buying platform built for game changers, announces the next chapter in its partnership with Spotify, the world's most popular audio streaming subscription service. The direct integration of Adform into the Spotify Ad Exchange makes it easier and more effective for advertisers to reach and engage Spotify fans at scale. With the market projected to reach USD$43bn (£32.5bn) this year, this partnership is poised to supercharge advertisers' audio investments and strengthen omnichannel strategies.References: WARC. 2025. "The Big Picture: Audio 2025." WARC. https://www.warc.com/content/paywall/article/the-big-picture-audio-2025/en-gb/en-GB/159947?
London's business landscape moves fast. Footfall patterns change week to week, customers expect seamless experiences, and local businesses are constantly looking for tools that help them attract attention without adding extra operational work. That's why so many cafés, salons, gyms, retailers and service providers across the city are adopting modern QR code systems to streamline customer journeys. Not the old, static black-and-white squares, but flexible, dynamic versions that allow companies to update menus, offers or booking links instantly.
Black Friday has been one of the UK's biggest yearly shopping events for well over a decade now, long-cemented into advertisers' calendars. This year, UK shoppers are expected to spend £9.52bn over the four-day Black Friday weekend, over half of which is projected to be spent online. Challenges continue to rear their heads, as the ad landscape becomes more complex, fragmented, and AI-powered.
As artificial intelligence transforms advertising analytics, many organizations are rushing to adopt AI tools, hoping for a "magic button" that instantly democratizes data access. It's an appealing vision: marketing teams asking questions in plain English and getting instant insights without SQL expertise or analyst bottlenecks. But generic AI tools often stumble when confronting the specialized world of advertising analytics. They lack a crucial understanding of attribution models, customer journeys and cross-channel measurement.
AI adoption is already widespread among B2B marketers. In fact, 95% are using AI-powered tools in some capacity, according to Content Marketing Institute, though most applications remain experimental, like generating marketing copy (used by 89%) and creative assets such as images and video (53%). Meanwhile, AI is reshaping how buyers discover vendors. 80% of global B2B tech industry buyers use generative AI as much as traditional search when researching vendors, with 47% using it specifically for market research and discovery, according to Responsive.
As you can see in this new set-up, there are various Advantage+ options built into your ad structure, as well as Meta's "Opportunity Score," which p rovides a 0-100 point summary as to how well your campaign is set up to maximize performance (based on Meta's automated optimization tools).
It was essentially trading the way a trafficker would, but automated. It looked at insertion orders (IOs) that came in [from brands and media buyers], it set up the campaigns, it set the campaigns live, and it started optimizing them. We were like: "This is amazing!" Well, for about a day. It spent a few thousand dollars in one go. And then we got scared.
"I need people who are empowered, keen, enthusiastic and willing to share knowledge," he says, outlining the importance of talent to the effective deployment of data-hungry systems and services in the digital age. Rather than finding a suitable challenge for a technology that's already been procured, Ruffle wants his team to engage with their functional peers. "As a data leader in business, success is all about people coming to us and saying, 'We've got a problem. Can you find the solution?'"
