The IAB Tech Lab has released new guidance on AI system bot-and-crawler management strategies to help publishers and content owners develop approaches that inform non-human agentic agents. The goal is to give companies across the advertising ecosystem a clearer understanding of how to manage and give access to non-human traffic on their websites.

One of the clearest examples of this shift is Business Agent for leads. Instead of relying solely on traditional click-through experiences, Google is introducing conversational AI interactions directly within Search Ads. According to Google Ads Liaison Ginny Marvin, prospective customers will be able to ask detailed questions about services, expertise, availability, or pricing and receive responses grounded in a business’s website content.

Download this new research report to see what 119 US media-buying decision-makers told us about how they define quality, which measurement frameworks they trust, where the trade-off between scale and quality hits hardest, and why confidence in “premium” inventory continues to erode.

For the second time in as many years, Dentsu has released a "mid-year" update to its annual global ad-spending forecast -- revising the outlook for this year down slightly but revising 2027 upward more significantly. The relatively mid-year downgrade follows a much more pronounced downward revision in Dentsu's December 2025 year-end outlook.

As AI increases the demand for continuous access to high quality datasets, existing attribution and reporting models across digital signage, retail media and programmatic digital out of home are reaching their limits.

Is the entire idea of the 'customer journey' starting to dissolve? AI agents will increasingly search, compare, recommend and buy on behalf of consumers, compressing what used to be a sprawling digital maze into a single conversational exchange. In this emerging economy, Capgemini argues brands are no longer competing merely for human attention; Capgemini argues brands are no longer competing merely for human attention; they are competing for machine preference.

Meta is doubling down on its subscription offerings. On Wednesday, the social networking giant announced it’s now rolling out its consumer subscription plans globally for its flagship apps, Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp, and beginning tests of new subscriptions for businesses, creators, and Meta AI users.

A resurgent WPP Media led the new business global rankings in the first quarter of 2026, according to COMvergence's Global New Business Barometer. The company’s net new business (factoring in wins, retentions and losses) for the period was $1.98 billion, with key wins including Jaguar Land Rover, Estée Lauder, and SC Johnson.

45.5% of marketers consider business outcomes the most important factor when buying and negotiating media, per iSpot. The shift underscores how TV is evolving into a more performance-driven channel, especially as marketers face mounting pressure to justify ad spend.

Collaborations with creators across the globe and a 24/7 social content hub support the CPG’s largest sports partnership activation to date.

Google has introduced a generative artificial intelligence (AI) model that pushes Gemini deeper into Search. Gemini 3.5 Flash, a reasoning model designed to power agentic workflows, is the newest generation of Google’s flagship model family. The company called it a new era for search.

The Coca-Cola Company and its partners are promoting a new framework to help marketers compare the effectiveness of paid, owned, earned and shared media using a single measurement standard. The initiative, called Universal Media Measurement (UMM), was developed through a collaboration among Coca-Cola, the consultancy Top Line Marketing, and Kantar.

AI can now sweep out the clutter. I don’t mean a chatbot overlaid on the same old buying platform, or a generative AI that summarises your campaign reports. I mean autonomous agents that buy, sell, target, and verify on behalf of their respective parties.