By Julie Selman, SVP, Head of EMEA, Magnite
Commerce media is fast emerging as a cornerstone of the digital economy. Retail media and commerce media ad spending is set to increase by 17.7% in 2025, making it one of the fastest-growing channels in the UK. It’s clear this isn’t just a trend, but rather the start of a new era for advertising.
Commerce media is rewriting the rules of customer connection, enhancing their experience and making the online shopping journey more relevant, convenient, and engaging. In 2025, commerce media networks are now at the forefront of transforming digital advertising and changing how advertisers buy, optimise and measure media campaigns.
On the face of it, the rise of commerce media might appear to be just another shift in the advertising landscape; however, it offers a unique new revenue opportunity that publishers are perfectly placed to capitalise on.
The emergence of commerce media
In an era where consumer consent and privacy are fundamental concerns, brands are seeking smarter ways to access and activate consumer data. With marketing budgets under pressure, advertisers are eager to reach their desired audiences at scale with more accuracy than ever.
Over the past few years, major retailers have embraced the opportunity before them and created their own retail media networks (RMNs). While initially a way to generate additional revenue across their own online and offline sites, commerce media builds on this model. By extending beyond a retailer’s own channels to curate premium inventory across a wider ecosystem, commerce media combines retail-level data with diverse media touchpoints to deliver both scale and precision.
Commerce networks are now evolving into a curation of inventory beyond their own walled gardens to provide the scale and reach advertiser demand.
High-quality data is the cornerstone of any effective curation strategy, suggesting that commerce media can play a crucial role moving forward. By leveraging data, advertisers can create real-time audiences tailored to actual user actions. Publishers are especially well-positioned in this ecosystem thanks to their close relationships with consumers and access to valuable first-party data, making them desirable partners for emerging media networks. For advertisers, this not only means access to richer datasets but also the ability to operate in a brand-safe environment that supports better consumer experiences.
With commerce media and curated data, advertisers can adopt a vertical-specific approach that is full-funnel, more precise, timely, and ultimately more effective at boosting ROI.
Leveraging commerce media
To stay competitive in today’s evolving digital ecosystem, publishers must be forward-thinking and adaptive. Publishers should embrace the opportunity to collaborate, unlocking potential new revenue streams and amplifying their collective reach.
Building trust through strong consumer data protections is essential to success for retailers and publishers, and aligning with the right technology providers can help make this possible. For example, through an SSP (supply side platform), retailers can remove IDs from the bidstream or limit their visibility, control which marketers and DSPs (demand-side platforms) can activate campaigns, and manage buy-side data collection to help prevent data leakage. Media owners are increasingly seeking these same protections and controls from their direct sell-side partners, meaning commerce media players that curate deals with external publishers can benefit from ongoing innovation in this area.
Commerce media, where content, data, and buying intent converge, presents a powerful opportunity for publishers to drive revenue growth, deepen audience relationships, and deliver measurable value to brand partners. This involves using data-driven and partnership strategies to connect with audiences throughout their buying journey, offering personalised experiences and valuable insights for both consumers and brands. By pairing these insights with innovative ad formats, such as shoppable or interactive ads, publishers can further strengthen their appeal to advertisers and it can shorten the path from inspiration to purchase and deliver richer performance metrics.
Strategic partnerships with retail media networks (RMNs) allow publishers to tap into retail-level purchase data and closed-loop attribution models. These collaborations can enhance targeting precision and provide advertisers with tangible ROI metrics, addressing a challenge publishers have faced in the past.
The alliance of traditional media publishers and commerce media networks is a win-win for both parties. At the same time, consumers benefit from more relevant ads and offers tailored to their personal preferences.
The next chapter of advertising
In 2025, commerce media isn’t the next big thing in advertising or just another ‘test-and-learn’ channel to be explored. It is now a core part of forward-thinking marketing strategies.
For publishers, the shift to commerce media represents a significant opportunity. To succeed, they must go beyond traditional monetisation tactics and fully leverage the scale, targeting precision, and first-party data advantages that commerce media provides.
No longer confined to traditional ad models, forward-thinking publishers can harness this opportunity to unlock new revenue streams, deepen audience engagement, and offer measurable value to brand partners. Partnering with RMNs, adopting dynamic ad formats, and enabling direct commerce capabilities will be key to standing out.
In this next chapter of advertising, those who adapt quickly and strategically will be best positioned to thrive.
*Magnite is a client of Bluestripe Communications, owned by Bluestripe Group, publisher of RMA
