For 2025, all forecasts show that digital will dominate the global ad economy, with spend reaching $513 billion and accounting for 62.7% of global ad spend, according to Dentsu’s latest Global Ad Spend Forecasts (December 2024).
But the question isn’t whether to invest in digital. That ship sailed years ago.
The question is, are you putting your money where it actually matters?
The algorithmic era is well and truly upon us, and with 79% of all global ad spend predicted to be algorithmically enabled by 2027, CEOs and businesses can ill afford to be left behind.
This momentum is further confirmed by WARC’s Global Ad Spend Projections (2024-2025), which says that digital ad spend is driving industry-wide shifts, with retail media, connected TV, and programmatic advertising leading the charge.
Here’s what it means for your business and how to navigate this transformation.
Where the $513 Billion is going
Retail Media becomes the new king of digital
Retail media is on fire. Dentsu projects it’ll grow 21.9% in 2025, making it the fastest-growing digital ad channel.
It’s not hard to see why.
Platforms like Amazon, Walmart, and Target are sitting on mountains of first-party data. With third-party cookies disappearing, this is where you’re going to find the most targeted, high-intent audiences.
Think about it: these platforms know what people are buying, browsing, and considering. That’s gold for advertisers.
What you’re not hearing enough about is retail media’s ability to drive long-term customer loyalty. When campaigns are tailored to shopper behavior, brands can create ongoing relationships rather than one-off transactions. CEOs should push for loyalty-driven campaigns alongside immediate ROI efforts.
What to do:
If retail media isn’t part of your 2025 budget, fix it. This isn’t just an e-commerce thing; it’s driving growth across industries. Retail media is even branching into offsite advertising, like connected TV (CTV). So don’t limit your thinking.
Connected TV (CTV): Scaling premium attention
Broadcast TV is losing its grip. It’s expected to shrink by 2.5% in 2025, but CTV is exploding with 18.4% growth, according to Dentsu.
Growth of ad-supported streaming services like Hulu, YouTube, and Netflix will also open opportunities for marketers to reach premium audiences within high-attention environments.
Why does this matter?
CTV combines the scale of traditional TV with the precision of digital, offering measurable ROI and granular targeting. Where ad dollars need to go is with cord-cutting by consumers faster than ever.
Marketers often overlook the power of regional targeting within CTV campaigns. CEOs should ensure their teams are leveraging CTV to hit both national audiences and hyper-local markets for maximum relevance and efficiency.
What to do:
Get your teams focused on ad-supported streaming platforms. Whether it’s pre-roll ads on YouTube or mid-roll spots on Netflix, this is where attention lives now. Build campaigns that leverage storytelling and premium inventory.
Programmatic: Automating ROI at scale
Dentsu predicts that programmatic advertising will rise by 11.1% in 2025, with more than 70% of digital ad spend going through programmatic. This does not mean replacing human strategy, but rather automating mundane processes and freeing up resources for strategy and creative.
The challenge here is not one of adoption; the problem is expertise.
Far too many businesses lack the internal skillsets to make programmatic investments pay.
Don’t just hire tech-savvy people, build a team that understands how to make automation work for your brand. Programmatic isn’t just a set of algorithms, it’s about combining smart data targeting with big creative ideas that make an impression and drive action. Find those who can balance the numbers with storytelling, create stickiness and sell ads. It is a highly technical yet creative job.
What to do:
CEOs need to hire or upskill talent that understands how to fully leverage AI-driven programmatic platforms; this will ensure that campaigns are optimized in real-time, both for performance and ROI.
Paid Social: Reaching younger audiences
Social media continues to be an important medium through which to reach both Gen Z and Millennials. According to Dentsu, paid social will increase by 8.7% in 2025, with much of this growth driven by platforms like Instagram – 79.7% of Gen Z use Instagram every month – and TikTok.
What makes paid social unique?
Today’s integrated ecosystems-meaning those that merge shopping, video, and gaming all on the same platforms-offer new ways for consumers to engage with one another.
Influencer marketing is gaining attention, as 42% of CMOs predict investments here.
Instead of viewing influencers as standalone campaigns, CEOs should build longer-term partnerships with creators who align with their brand values. This allows for consistent messaging and deeper audience trust.
What to do:
CEOs need to look beyond superficial one-off campaigns and start connecting their social strategy to platforms where e-commerce is baked in, if for no other reason than younger audiences simply expect nothing less.
What’s holding businesses back
The Algorithmic Gap
Dentsu calls this the algorithmic era, and they’re not wrong.
By 2027, 79% of global ad spend will be algorithmically driven. That means automation, machine learning, and data will be running the show. Yet, so many businesses are still unable to tap into this technology effectively.
The concern isn’t adoption; it’s trust.
With growing privacy regulations and ethical considerations, businesses will have to be thoughtful in how they collect and use data.
The solution is quite straightforward: bridge the trust gap with transparency throughout each stage of a CEO’s advertising funnel by helping customers understand exactly how their data is being used. It goes without saying that campaigns mirror such integrity.
What to do:
Double down on data. Build a first-party data strategy that’s privacy-compliant and future-proof. Then, partner with platforms that align with your brand’s goals, whether it’s sustainability, targeting, or customer engagement.
Outdated Spending Habits
In that sense, Broadcast TV, radio, and print are shrinking, and many companies are still handing sizeable chunks of their budgets over to these declining channels.
According to Dentsu’s forecast, print will further decline 2.5% in 2025, while traditional TV has lost ground to the trend of going digital with a younger audience.
CEOs need to create annual audits of legacy spending, not just quarterly performance reviews. Legacy habits die hard, and a regular top-down evaluation can help eliminate low-value investments before they drain resources.
What to do:
Audit your media spend. Every dollar tied up in legacy channels is a dollar not invested in faster-growing, higher-ROI platforms like retail media or CTV.
The Sustainability Imperative
Dentsu underlines the fast-rising trend that as many as 45% of CMOs already consider carbon-neutral media strategies a must-have. Already, brands like KLM are using algorithmic ad models to reallocate spend into more sustainable channels.
Sustainability is not a box to be checked but an emerging way in which your brand differentiates in a crowded market. CEOs should have tangible results for their sustainability work by monitoring the carbon impact of your campaign and the performance of that campaign.
What to do: Align ad spending to broader ESG goals. It matters for sustainability. And consumers care. So should your ad strategy.
A path to success in 2025
- Double down on retail media: As the fastest-growing segment within digital advertising, retail media warrants an increasing share of your budget in the coming year. Invest equally in the power of on-platform and offsite campaigns, including CTV.
- Invest in algorithmic tools: By 2027, nearly 80% of ad spend will be algorithmically driven. It’s time for CEOs to double down on investing in tools that optimize ad placement, cost, and performance.
- Focus on CTV and digital video: It’s where premium content meets high engagement. Construct mobile-led campaigns optimized for high-attention video formats.
- Rethink paid social strategy: Generic campaigns are a thing of the past. Focus instead on platforms like Instagram and TikTok, where e-commerce and video lead the pack.
- Kill the waste in legacy: Every dollar stranded in declining channels such as print or broadcast TV is an opportunity missed. Move spend to high-growth digital channels.
Conclusion
The future of advertising belongs to businesses that can evolve as fast as the platforms shaping consumer behavior.
CEOs must now start to shift their thinking from being passively along for the ride of trends to taking an active role in redefining how their brands engage. Retail media and connected TV are not new channels; they’re actually ecosystems where purchase intent, storytelling, and engagement come together.
Success in 2025 requires a lot more than a budget shift; it’s a cultural shift toward experimentation, precision, and speed within the business.
The algorithmic era requires making better and quicker decisions to outpace competition through real-time data. CEOs who can empower their teams to execute, arm them with the right tools, talent, and autonomy will shine. More importantly, they will set a new benchmark on what is possible in this digital new world.
Let your ad strategy reflect reality today, not the yester-year nostalgia.
The opportunity is worth $513 billion, waiting to be explored.
