By Damian Garbaccio, Chief Commercial and Marketing Officer, Affinity Solutions
Retail media has long helped advertisers reach consumers based on purchasing behavior and connect media investments to sales. But as consumer journeys become increasingly fragmented, a view limited to one retailer’s ecosystem can no longer tell the full story.
Predictive analytics, AI and cross-platform connectivity are moving retail media beyond retrospective reporting. Advertisers can now anticipate behavior, trace media’s influence across retailers and optimize investment against meaningful business outcomes.
That evolution was the focus of “Driving Fast: Marketing’s Superhighways and Superpowers,” a panel I moderated at Advertising Week New York 2026 with Jon Gibs, Group Director of Media Insights and Measurement at Walmart Connect, and Jill Smith, Executive Vice President of Global Media at Circana.
The discussion centered on three priorities shaping what comes next: using purchase data predictively, expanding retail intelligence beyond endemic advertisers, and improving interoperability and measurement across the industry.
1. Turn Purchase Data into a Predictive Advantage
The first shift is from explaining what consumers purchased to anticipating what they are likely to do next.
Historical purchasing patterns remain valuable for evaluating performance and informing future investment. Yet they offer an incomplete view of a market changing in real time. AI and more sophisticated purchase intelligence can help marketers identify emerging behaviors and act before a purchase decision is made.
Walmart Connect, for example, combines consumer reach, purchase-based targeting and closed-loop measurement to help brands understand purchase intent. The opportunity is not simply to identify what shoppers bought, but to anticipate what they may need next.
Jill described how Circana is also moving toward predictive audiences that can identify consumers who may switch brands, exit a category or reduce discretionary spending.
These signals give brands an opportunity to respond before behavior changes. Early signs of defection, for instance, could inform a shift in messaging or promotional strategy designed to retain those shoppers.
By processing billions of consumer signals and uncovering patterns that would otherwise remain hidden, AI can help advertisers recognize shifts sooner and respond more effectively.
Faster insight, however, should not lead to constant optimization. Jon and Jill both stressed that cadence must reflect the campaign objective and purchase cycle. Lower-funnel campaigns may benefit from frequent adjustments, while brand-building initiatives often need longer measurement windows to reveal their impact.
The strategic advantage is clear: purchase intelligence can help marketers move from reacting to consumer behavior to anticipating and influencing what comes next.
2. Extend Retail Intelligence Beyond Retail
The expanding capabilities of purchase intelligence are also creating new opportunities for non-endemic advertisers.
Retail media has historically been associated with brands that sell products within a retailer’s ecosystem. But purchasing patterns reveal more than product preferences. They can signal lifestyle needs and future intent.
Jon explained how an automotive manufacturer could combine purchases in Walmart’s automotive category with third-party data to identify potential vehicle buyers. Jill offered another example: fitness brands could use purchases of organic or protein-rich foods as signals of potential interest in wellness offerings.
The opportunity goes beyond audience discovery. Advertisers also need to understand how media influences purchases outside the platform where an ad appears.
Jill highlighted the importance of measuring retail media’s halo effect. An ad delivered through Walmart Connect, for example, may ultimately influence a consumer to purchase the product from another retailer.
That broader view changes how success is evaluated. Instead of limiting measurement to transactions within one platform, brands can assess the wider commercial impact of their media investments.
Combining first-party retail intelligence with other data sources and independent measurement can help marketers uncover overlooked audiences, assess media opportunities more intelligently and optimize toward incremental outcomes across channels and retailers.
3. Build Interoperability on Transparency and Trust
Realizing the full potential of purchase intelligence requires the industry to address persistent fragmentation. Consumer journeys rarely unfold on a single platform. A shopper may discover a product on CTV, search for reviews and then complete the purchase in a physical store.
When those interactions sit in disconnected ecosystems, advertisers struggle to understand how each touchpoint contributed to the outcome.
Interoperability is therefore becoming a business imperative. Rather than create more silos, the industry must make intelligence accessible across platforms so advertisers can connect signals, activate insights and measure performance more comprehensively.
Jon discussed Walmart Connect’s efforts to expand its technology and media partnerships, making its data and services available through platforms advertisers already use. The objective is to reduce complexity and integrate retail intelligence into existing workflows.
Connectivity alone, however, will not close the measurement gap. Advertisers also need transparency into how performance is evaluated and confidence that reported results reflect genuine business outcomes.
Jill emphasized the need for a shared understanding of success, particularly when measurement partners define incrementality. Jon captured the mindset well: “trust, but verify and then improve.”
Better measurement may not require one universal source of truth. It does require collaboration, consistent expectations and the ability to validate results across platforms.
My takeaway is that the next era of retail media will be defined by how effectively the industry connects intelligence to action and media exposure to business outcomes. Breaking down silos and building trust across the ecosystem will enable advertisers to make smarter decisions, invest more effectively and drive meaningful growth.
