This is an unprecedented and truly exciting moment for media and creative. We’re hurtling towards a future where AI and data are foundational forces, accelerating at a velocity unlike anything I’ve experienced. I still remember the clunky joy of my first Gateway PC, the mystery of that first AOL disk, and the sheer magic of the smartphone. Each sparked revolutions, but AI is moving at a pace that makes those past shifts feel almost leisurely. After years of initial exploration, we’re now applying and embedding AI, and it’s here that the true power of creative is finally ready to be unlocked.
Why Now? The Benefits of Creative Technology
I get to sit across from countless advertisers, so I see firsthand the usage and benefits of creative technology partners at scale. And let me tell you, what’s happening out there is incredibly important.
Over the years, we’ve consistently seen that marketers with the best performance leverage the most modern tech available, always informed by their own data, to deliver profitable business outcomes. For best-in-class AI marketing tools to truly sing, they need strong building blocks and data. Creative data? It’s a fundamental building block we, as an industry, haven’t tapped into nearly enough to date. Think about it: creative consistently drives over 50% of ROI, representing a colossal untapped opportunity for brands, especially in today’s competitive markets.
When you can determine the right message, right place, right time – that’s where the magic happens, where the most value can be realized. We’ve long had the tools for “right place, right time,” but AI creative solutions are now giving us the third, crucial piece of the puzzle: the right message.
What’s Better? Distinct Intelligence at Scale
So, what makes today’s creative technology so much better than traditional creative testing? First off, media consumption has exploded. People are in more places, consuming more types of content than ever before. The traditional purchase funnel has been disrupted; consumer behavior is no longer linear due to the “4 Ss” – Searching, Shopping, Scrolling, and Streaming, often simultaneously.
Traditional A/B testing gave you a very slow and narrow view of that consumer, typically only across a single channel. Whereas today, leading creative technology helps you understand patterns across vast, cross-channel consumer data – and then immediately activate those learnings. This ability simply wasn’t available before. Leading brands are now running tests analyzing hundreds of creative assets and billions of impressions over multiple months. This “aerial view” was historically impossible, and can clearly tell you where and with whom each ad performs better. You can begin to systemize this intelligence at scale.
What’s even more compelling is that because this process uses first-party data and brand assets, it provides completely proprietary results. For instance, while we consistently find that branding early and often on YouTube improves performance (back to the ABCDs), only creative technology can reveal what specific form of branding performs best for your brand at the beginning of an ad: is it a logo, product, character IP such as a mascot, or even celebrity IP? This upfront branding insight becomes unique to your brand, helping it to truly stand out.
We’re seeing tangible improvements in ROI from leaders across industries who are truly leaning in and figuring out how to operationalize these learnings. We’ve had a lot of media data at our fingertips for years. The time is now to make sure we use creative data – understanding what performs best, what we are most proud of – to your advantage.
What’s Next? From Subjectivity to Strategic Speed
Creative has historically been a subjective topic, creating friction points within organizations. What if Creative Technology could help standardize how we talk about it? Having a consistent tool for assessing creative effectiveness helps us develop a shared language around creative decision-making. Think about a performance campaign readout: if one channel delivers a fraction of consumers at twice the cost, you present this to leadership and immediately get approval to shift budget. That language is shared, those decisions are easy. We haven’t strengthened this muscle in terms of creative yet, because there’s been no common KPIs, no baseline to compare it to. Over time, we can align teams on what is important and why within our creative decisioning, and present recommendations with that shared language.
Frankly, as an industry, we haven’t gotten comfortable moving at the speed of technology, and that’s a challenge to overcome because AI is accelerating the pace of innovation. I often say if the world started today, we would wake up asking what tech, tools, and data are available to make smarter, faster, better decisions – and we would begin with that toolset. Instead, we all iterate slowly from our traditional ways of working. But it’s time to get serious. AI is rewiring our pre-existing workflows, fundamentally changing how we interact with and digest data.
You’re Up.
Your challenge, as a leader, is to begin re-designing your AI Advertising Ecosystem as a collaborative network of platforms, tech, and creative partners. Prioritize these strategic partnerships, redefine your workflows, and operationalize creative intelligence to secure a truly differentiated edge in the market. The time for slow, subjective decision-making is over – high-octane creative is here.
Author
Scott Falzone
US Telecom Managing Director