Retail Media Measurement’s Biggest Gap Is Also Its Biggest Opportunity

We’ve been busy hitting the fall commerce media events circuit. If you’ve been at any of these shows, you know the real value usually isn't on stage — it's in the between-session conversations, the moments where people say what they're actually thinking instead of what's on their slides. Across dozens of those conversations, one theme kept surfacing no matter who we talked to: commerce media has never had more momentum, and the people building it have never had a bigger opportunity in front of them.

The momentum is real

Per EMARKETER, US commerce ad spend is on track to exceed $80B in 2026 (up 22.2% YOY). That's real, durable growth — a channel with budget, attention, and belief behind it.

The retail media measurement opportunity, by the numbers

Two-in-three CMOs (67%) say they plan to increase their retail media investment this year. Yet, only 53% believe their media networks currently provide the retail media measurement and attribution needed to prove reliable retail media incrementality (NIQ CMO Outlook: Guide to 2026). That 14% gap is a roadmap. It shows exactly where the next generation of retail media leaders has room to build, and it's a wide-open lane for whoever moves first.

A sign the industry is maturing

The industry itself is already adapting. Rather than continue to chase pure retail media incrementality, more of the conversation has shifted toward measuring ad-exposed performance, onsite and in-store, tied to any resulting purchase. That’s not a step back. It’s a sign the space is growing up: trading an ideal-but-unreachable standard for one that’s actually usable, provable, and easier for brands and retailers to rally around.

What actually closes the gap

That shift points toward what actually improves retail media measurement from here — and it's not one thing, it's two working together. The first is unified, provable performance: brands and retailers being able to see, in one place, what spend produced what result, without needing a data science team to reconcile five different platforms' definitions of a "conversion." The second is relevance: content that doesn't just get measured well, but actually fits the retail moment it shows up in — personal enough to matter to the shopper, native enough to feel like part of the experience rather than an interruption to it. Provable performance earns the room's confidence. Relevance earns the shopper's attention. Media networks that can offer both won't just be trusted — they'll be the ones brands actively choose to grow with.

What we’re seeing firsthand and where your opportunity lies

We're seeing this play out already, and one pattern stands out: some of the most durable answers to the "prove it worked" question aren't coming from better ad tech at all — they're coming from revenue that's structurally easier to prove as incremental in the first place. Non-endemic, post-transaction monetization is a good example. It's new revenue, not existing budget wearing a different label, so there's no cannibalization question to answer.

Rather than treating incrementality as an abstract, all-or-nothing bar to clear, we've been working alongside clients on these kinds of approaches — ways to demonstrate growth that show up where it matters most to them, in the metrics that make it into board decks and earnings reports, not just campaign dashboards.

It's a small shift in framing, but it changes the conversation: instead of "can we prove this ad worked?" the question becomes "can we show this program is growing the business?” This is a question that, when designed with proof in mind, retail media is increasingly equipped to answer.

The networks and leaders who pair provable performance with real relevance aren't just going to earn trust, they're going to set the standard the rest of the industry follows.

If this is on your radar too, tell us what you're seeing — we’re happy to share a few things that have been working well for our partners.