Mars United Commerce, formerly The Mars Agency, released its 2024 Retail Media Report Card Global Yearbook, offering a comprehensive analysis of the year’s top-performing retail media networks (RMNs) and the broader evolution of retail media. The complete 123-page report is available for download here.
As retail media continues its rapid growth and evolution, 2025 is shaping up to be a pivotal year. Building on the advancements of 2024, brands and networks are not only addressing lingering challenges but also seizing new opportunities. From enhanced self-service platforms and omnichannel strategies to the expansion of offsite media and AI-driven technologies, retail media is set to become more innovative, targeted, and impactful.
In this blog we’ll explore the top trends poised to shape retail media in 2025, drawing insights from the Mars United 2024 Yearbook. We’ll highlight how evolving technologies and strategies are expected to redefine how brands connect with consumers and optimize their advertising investments. With increasing demands for agility, creativity, and collaboration, 2025 promises to be a defining year for the retail media ecosystem.
Self-service capabilities are expected to become the industry standard in 2025, marking a significant turning point for retail media networks. Walmart, for instance, is set to fully transition to self-service by mid-2025, enabling advertisers to take direct control of their campaigns.
These platforms allow brands to manage retail media activity with greater flexibility, personalization, and faster responsiveness to market trends. While this shift may increase operational demands for advertisers, the payoff comes in the form of improved control and campaign efficiency, leading to better results.
The trend of expanding beyond retailer-owned platforms will continue in 2025, with RMNs deepening partnerships with social media, connected TV (CTV), and other third-party channels. Offsite campaigns enable brands to engage consumers throughout the purchase journey, leveraging first-party data for precise targeting and closed-loop measurement.
Video formats, including shoppable videos and livestreaming, are expected to take center stage in this space. Retailers like Kroger Precision marketing (KPM), Instacart, and Tesco Media and Insight Platform have already invested heavily in their offsite offerings, and more networks are expected to follow suit.
In-store media will play an increasingly critical role in 2025, with 80% of CPG purchases still taking place in physical stores. Networks are ramping up their in-store capabilities by deploying more digital screens, interactive shopping carts, and endcap displays.
Grocers, in particular, are embracing third-party solutions to accelerate their in-store media offerings. By the end of 2025, 70% of retailers are expected to adopt in-store media, creating unique opportunities for brands to connect with shoppers at the point of purchase and enhance campaign impact.
Advertisers are demanding more transparency and robust measurement tools, and 2025 will see significant innovation in this area. Metrics like profit-adjusted ROAS, incrementality, and customer lifetime value are becoming essential as brands seek to measure the true business impact of their campaigns.
RMNs are stepping up by enhancing their analytics capabilities, providing advertisers with the tools needed to optimize strategies in real-time and build greater trust with their network partners.
2025 will bring a greater focus on hyper-targeted campaigns as brands look to refine their audience segmentation. Retail media networks are developing tools to create custom audiences based on behaviors like past purchases, lapsed users, or other specific attributes.
Data clean rooms are also expected to see wider adoption, providing advertisers with secure environments to analyze first-party data. These capabilities enable custom audience creation, de-duplication, re-targeting, and advanced insights like lifetime value and conversion path, helping brands maximize the precision and effectiveness of their campaigns.
Roughly half of the networks profiled in the Mars United Report offer some type of clean room capability and we can expect widespread offerings available to advertisers to grow in the coming years. “Networks are becoming more open to data decoupling and clean room sharing -- giving agencies and brands more control over how customer data is leveraged.” explained Eric Pankratz, Director of commerce media at Mars United.
Generative AI is poised to revolutionize retail media, automating processes like creative generation, audience segmentation, and campaign optimization. AI-powered search engines launched by Amazon and Walmart now support conversational, lifestyle-based queries, fundamentally altering traditional search strategies.
Amazon Ads is leading the way with innovations such as generative AI-powered creative tools and its “Rufus” shopping assistant (available in the U.S.). These technologies allow advertisers to deliver more relevant and engaging content while also streamlining campaign management and optimization. Generative AI technologies can also enable advertisers to deliver more relevant and engaging content to shoppers, while also helping automate “hands-to-keyboard” search and DSP media buying and optimization.
Omnichannel integration will be a key focus in 2025, as brands and networks work to deliver seamless shopper experiences across in-store, online, and offsite channels.
Retail media networks are increasingly collaborating with marketing and merchandising teams to link media investments with broader trade and ecommerce strategies. While organizational silos remain a challenge, networks that embrace cross-functional alignment will lead the way in creating cohesive campaigns that resonate with consumers.
As retail media continues to evolve, these trends will shape the way brands and networks innovate, collaborate, and engage with consumers. The rise of self-service platforms, the proliferation of offsite media, and advancements in AI and measurement capabilities signal a future full of opportunities.
By addressing challenges like siloed operations and fragmented networks, 2025 offers a chance to capitalize on the lessons of 2024 and unlock the full potential of retail media. Agility, creativity, and collaboration will be essential as the industry embraces these transformative trends and drives a new era of growth.
Are You Ready for the Next Evolution of Retail Media?
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