This article explores the top insights and key takeaways from Dentsu’s 2025 Retail Media Industry Report. View the full report here.
Retail media networks (RMNs) are approaching a pivotal moment. As on-site monetization reaches its upper limits, the next phase of growth lies beyond retailers’ owned and operated channels. This shift marks challenges and opportunities for RMNs and brands alike.
Understanding the key trends that are driving retail media is crucial for RMNs to position themselves for success and Dentsu’s 2025 Retail Media Industry Report provides valuable insights into how RMNs are evolving. This blog summarizes key takeaways from the report to help retailers, brands, and tech providers best prepare for the future of retail media.
The writing is on the wall: onsite advertising is nearing its ceiling. Even industry giants like Amazon and Walmart are reaching the upper limits of what they can monetize on their own properties, signaling a watershed moment. According to the Dentsu report, off-site spending is projected to grow 1.5 times faster than on-site spending through 2027. By that time, it’s estimated that $1 in every $4 retail media dollars will be allocated to off-site channels.
This shift underscores the growing importance of developing robust off-site capabilities for RMNs to remain competitive in the market, and for tech providers, presents a massive opportunity to facilitate transition -- enabling retailers to leverage their first-party data across channels like CTV, social media, and third-party publishers.
53% of brand RMN spending is now allocated to off-site media, including in-store activations and social display ads.
- Dentsu 2025 Retail Media Industry Report
As off-site advertising gains prominence, retailers’ first-party data becomes increasingly valuable. Those with robust loyalty programs are particularly well-positioned, sitting on a goldmine of consumer insights. The ability to monetize and activate this data for personalized ad targeting beyond a retailer’s website is becoming a key differentiator in attracting brand advertisers.
This transformation could be especially crucial in light of regulatory changes and cookie deprecation, which have poised first-party data strategies to become a cornerstone of retail media success.
Although the opportunity is clear, off-site retail media still presents challenges, particularly in measurement and attribution. Dentsu’s report emphasizes that off-site advertising lacks the closed-loop attribution of on-site ads, making it harder to prove ROI. Retailers and their partners will need to develop advanced measurement solutions, potentially leveraging data clean rooms, to provide brands with meaningful insights into off-site campaign performance.
While it’s true that off-site retail media may have lower margins compared to on-site (20-40% vs. 70-90%), the sheer scale of the off-site opportunity more than makes up for this difference. By efficiently managing off-site inventory, retailers can expand their ad offerings and tap into a vast new revenue stream.
Consider this: as offsite retail media grows, it’s not just about maintaining current revenue levels -- it's about exponentially expanding the pie. Not only is this diversification crucial for long-term growth, but RMNs that successfully navigate this transition stand to capture a significantly larger share of overall advertising budgets.
As RMNs expand offsite, they're entering territory long dominated by the likes of Meta and Google. But retailers have a unique advantage: their deep understanding of consumer purchase behavior and intent. To succeed, retailers must differentiate themselves by offering purpose-built solutions that leverage their unique strengths in customer data and shopping behaviors -- a shift that will require thinking beyond traditional ad models.
With the expansion to off-site channels, RMNs can offer true full-funnel advertising solutions for the first time. This means attracting not just lower-funnel, conversion-driven campaigns, but also upper-funnel brand awareness budgets. Retailers who can effectively bridge the gap between awareness and purchase will be well-positioned to capture a larger share of advertising budgets.
Imagine a campaign that starts with broad reach on CTV, narrows to targeted display ads across the open web, and culminates in highly personalized onsite placements. This holistic approach not only drives better results for advertisers but also positions RMNs as indispensable partners in the broader marketing ecosystem.
The shift to offsite advertising represents the next great frontier in retail media -- an industry which overall, is at a pivotal juncture. For RMNs, it's no longer a question of if, but when and how they'll make this transition. As we look to the future, it's clear that the most successful RMNs will be those that can seamlessly blend on-site and off-site capabilities, leverage their first-party data effectively, and provide brands with comprehensive, full-funnel solutions. Companies that can navigate the challenges and make the most of the growing opportunities ahead will be looked at to lead in this dynamic market.
