While retail media’s growth is impressive, turning that momentum into an effective strategy will take more from retailers, writes Lee Metters, Senior Client Partner, Brand Partnerships & Retail Media at Awin. He outlines the moves retailers will need to make to be on the cutting edge in 2026.
Retail media is scaling at speed. Most major retailers have launched a network; brands are fortifying budgets; and investment shows no sign of slowing down.
But scale doesn’t automatically mean effectiveness. And right now, many retail media programmes aren’t operating as efficiently as they could. They’re using old strategies, measuring the wrong things and, critically, overlooking the bigger shifts happening beneath it all.
2026 won’t be about whether retail media works, but rather about who’s really making it work properly – and who is building smarter partner marketing strategies rather than chasing scale alone.
Here are the four shifts that I predict will separate the serious players from the ones just going through the motions.
1. Moving beyond owned channels
Retailers have spent a lot of effort building onsite retail media programs, and yes, many have become quite sophisticated. But they’re missing a massive opportunity: extending those campaigns beyond owned environments.
In 2026, retailers will start diverting meaningful supplier budgets into affiliate networks, content partnerships, and discovery channels because purchase decisions increasingly happen outside retailer sites. This shift reflects a growing focus on the diversity of partnerships.
With AI significantly reshaping search behaviour, product discovery is moving into new environments such as conversational interfaces, AI-powered recommendations, and publisher content. If your brand or product isn’t showing up in those spaces with accurate, persuasive information, you’re effectively invisible.
Smart retailers will realise that high-quality content doesn’t just help, it’s critical. Getting suppliers to fund offsite content distribution will be one of the biggest retail media shifts we will see in 2026.
2. Pushing incentives higher up in the journey
Retailers are no strangers to gift-with-purchase incentives at checkout. They’ve used them for years because they work. Offering a relevant brand partner reward at the point of conversion boosts completion rates.
The question for 2026 is: why wait until checkout to use them?
Expect to see incentives pushed up earlier in the journey: on product pages, in category listings, or even in offsite acquisition channels. If a well-placed reward can be somebody’s impetus for purchase, there’s no reason to save it until the end.
The challenge here will be measurement, as attribution muddies when incentives show up earlier. Retailers will need frameworks, and the ones who figure out incrementality testing and multi-touch attribution will have a major edge over those who don’t.
3. Quality (not quantity) will rule in brand partnerships
Brand partnerships used to rely on volume. It’s the “sign up as many as we can, throw them at our audience and see what sticks” philosophy. That’s done. Advertisers are growing smarter about targeting, looking for real audience overlap, lifestyle alignment and intent signals rather than just scale. That means brand hosts will see a drop in partnership opportunities, but the ones that materialise will perform significantly better.
Take the work The AA did as an example. Instead of wide and scattered distribution, they focused on high-intent moments, offering breakdown cover to customers buying Bluetooth car systems at Currys or van equipment at Screwfix. The focus on timing and relevance let them reach far more appropriate audiences than a broad, volume-led approach.
This is the new way. The retailers who truly master delivering a curated experience, and timing, will win. The ones still chasing volume for its own sake will fall behind.
4. Trust as the deciding factor
The truth is, we can discuss innovation and opportunity all we want, but the reality is that customers today confront an unforgiving cost-of-living environment. This means they’re buying less and thinking harder about what they do buy while sticking to brands they trust.
In 2026, therefore, trust will become the deciding factor for retail media effectiveness.
Partnerships that feel purely transactional or even just misaligned will collapse. Customers want recommendations from brands they believe in, and they can spot cynical matchmaking a mile away.
In short, any retailers who prioritise short-term monetisation over real value will suffer performance drops. The ones who take authenticity seriously and double down on customer relevance will draw ahead.
And poor execution doesn’t just hurt the advertiser; it also damages the retailer’s credibility. Transparency, integrity, and genuine alignment will be the competitive differentiators.
The bottom line
Retail media has momentum. The outstanding question is whether that momentum actually turns into effective strategies.
The retailers and brand partners who will come out on top in 2026 will be the ones who understand that reach without relevance is pointless, that data without smart execution is just cost, and, most importantly, that customer trust is everything.
Read more opinion from expert contributors to Retail Media Age.
