Technology will be the most important differentiator for agencies of the future.
According to government census data, there are about 115,000 advertising agencies in the US alone. These agencies sell creative, public relations, media buying and planning, SEO and content programs to differentiate their clientsâ brands in the mind of the consumer⌠with no real differentiation themselves.
Most agencies build little motts of âproprietary processesâ, âsignature frameworks or modelsâ, or âindustry specific specializationâ to defend themselves from competitors. These word salads look good on paper, but offer no real distinct value. The value driver is human talent. Thatâs it.
Technology, and an agencies ability to deftly apply it to marketing problems, will be the main driver of unique value in the years to come. AI (we prefer the term machine intelligence) is the tech of the day. Hereâs 3 ways weâre applying it to our business.
AI Applied to Research and Insights: The mass proliferation of consumer information, opinions, and preferences online has opened a treasure trove of mineable data for marketing purposes. Weâve built a series of APIs (application program interfaces) to pull data from the open web and run it through a series of large language models to distill mass public opinion on any topic, brand, or IP.
AI Applied to Workflows: When you hear the word agentic, think âautomatedâ. These machines have no agency beyond the inputs, constraints, and outputs they are designed to produce. However, this doesnât negate their profound impact. Automation of tasks in business is a massive unlock to profitability. Rapid prototyping and product engineering is done with code assist AI agents. Weâve automated our margin calculations for every project. AI now mechanically calculates all our marketing reports post campaign.
AI Applied to Measurement: Using the same data pipelines as point 1 and the same automations as point 2, our ellain platform can now ingest campaigns and spit out reports automatically. More accurate, computerized campaign reporting, hundreds of labor hours saved, and more insightful feedback now appear with a few clicks of the button.
Add talent on top of these systems, and one gets a winning recipe for differentiated, high value marketing.
When building a castle, remember to sink the foundations deep.
Upcoming Marketing and Technology Events:
Xsolla Connect at Refinery Rooftop Monday at AWNY, Oct 5. A space to connect to the gaming advertising community.
Creativ Company Evening at the Parlour Room at AWNY, Oct 6. Moderated by NY Times journalist Marty Swant, the conversation will feature the AI lead at StarBucks, Lennox Matsinde, and Creativ Companyâs head of R&D, Vibhu Bhan.
SGX and 1stAveMachine AI Forum with Google Deepmind at AWNY, Oct 7. Come to experience hands-on AI technology with Google!
Agentic World 2026 in Miami, Oct 5-7. Come see how top brands are putting AI to work in customer experience!
Jupiter Festival 2026 in Miami, Oct 6-9. Four days of media, entertainment and tech talks in Miami Beach.
3 Stories Shaping Media, Gaming and Tech
Disney raised prices for Disney+ and Hulu on September 24th, pushing both ad-free plans past $21 a month in its fourth price hike in four years. Ad-free Disney+ and ad-free Hulu each rise $2.50 to $21.49 a month, and the ad-free Disney+/Hulu bundle rises $2 to $21.99. Ad-supported standalone plans go up only 50 cents to $12.49, and the ad-supported Disney+/Hulu bundle stays at $12.99. Bundles that include ESPN Select rise $2 with ads and $3 without, while ESPN Unlimited bundles stay the same. New subscribers pay the new prices now, and existing customers will see them on their next bill. The increase comes a week after ESPN raised its own prices, and ahead of a combined Disney+/Hulu app that CEO Josh DâAmaro plans to launch by the end of the year.
Why it matters: The pricing structure matters more than the increase. Disney widened the gap between ad-free and ad-supported standalone plans to about $9 a month and left the ad-supported bundle alone, which pushes subscribers toward ad tiers. For advertisers, that means more ad-supported Disney+ and Hulu audience going into the 2027 upfronts, and more leverage for Disney when it sells streaming reach alongside ESPN sports. It also lands in the same week the ParamountâWarner Bros. Discovery deal cleared, so buyers will soon be dealing with two huge streaming sellers competing for the same budgets. The thing to watch is price fatigue. With ad-free plans now above $21, more people may cancel or switch plans, and that affects the audience numbers behind upfront guarantees.
Meta unveiled two AI tools on September 24th that let anyone build a mobile game by describing it in plain language, then publish it straight into Facebook and Instagram feeds. Meta announced the tools at Meta Connect. Horizon Create is a phone app that turns text prompts into playable 2D or 3D games. Horizon Studio is a browser-based editor that adds visual controls for finer adjustments. Projects move between the two with their assets and history intact, and Meta says the games can include multiplayer, progression systems, art direction and difficulty balancing. Finished games run inside Facebook, Instagram and Horizon feeds with nothing to download, and they get automated age ratings and safety checks. Engagement drives discovery, so games that hold playersâ attention get more reach. Creators can earn money through in-game purchases and Metaâs Horizon Creator Fund, with more monetization details still to come. Both tools are rolling out gradually through an early access waitlist. âIf you have a great idea for a game, you should be able to build it without spending months navigating tools,â said Saxs Persson, Metaâs VP of Horizon.
Why it matters: Meta is moving away from its headset-first metaverse and turning Horizon into a mobile games platform aimed at Roblox, which has 123 million daily users. Its big advantage is distribution. Roblox players have to open Roblox, but Meta can put a game in front of billions of people who are already scrolling. For brands, this could make a branded game less like a months-long, six-figure build and more like producing a social post, and the game would sit in the same feed as paid media. Expect more âplayableâ campaigns and games made by influencers. The risks are quality and brand safety. Ranking by engagement rewards whatever hooks players, not what fits a brand, and a flood of AI-made games will make policing IP harder. The same week, YouTube expanded its Playables games to more than 50 markets. Platforms are betting that the feed itself becomes the next game store.
Gartner is telling CMOs to rethink how they hire and train entry-level marketers, predicting that AI will let most high-performing marketing teams cut traditional entry-level jobs by 2030. The findings come from a Gartner survey of 1,303 senior marketing leaders conducted from January to April 2026, reported by Marketing Dive on September 29th. AI is already changing teams: 18% of marketing leaders have cut some roles because of it, 16% have created new ones, and nearly a third have reworked existing roles. Gartnerâs advice is to stop treating junior staff as the people who handle execution tasks that AI can now do. It says junior marketers should take on higher-value work sooner, such as checking AI output, developing insights and connecting recommendations to measurable results. It also wants new hires judged on critical thinking and judgment rather than technical skills. âCMOs should give junior marketers exposure to higher-value work earlier, building the judgment, strategic thinking and AI orchestration skills they will need to become future marketing leaders,â said Kristina LaRocca-Cerrone, VP Analyst in Gartnerâs Marketing Practice. The research lands as CMO budgets stay mostly flat and recent college graduates face a tough job market.
Why it matters: The entry-level jobs AI is replacing are the ones where most marketers learned the trade. If AI writes the first drafts, pulls the reports and builds the media plans, junior staff lose the repetition that turned them into strategists. That leaves the industry with a pipeline problem: who becomes the senior talent of 2035? Digiday reported the same worry this week, with ad leaders admitting that ânot hiringâ entry-level talent is turning into a crisis the industry created. For agencies, this is about business models as well as HR. Junior hours have long been a big part of how agencies bill and how they train people. Agencies that redesign those roles around reviewing AI output, client insight and judgment will have a stronger bench, and a better answer when clients ask what theyâre paying humans to do. Expect training and talent development to show up in pitches and 2027 org planning, much as AI capabilities did this year.
Stat of the Week â Price now matters more to TV viewers than any streaming perk.
For US TV viewers, price has become the main thing that makes a TV or streaming service feel worth paying for. In a Hub Research survey of 1,600 US TV viewers, low price made up 21% of a serviceâs perceived value in 2026, up from 12% in 2025. Live sports came second at 13%, nearly double last yearâs 7%. The other top features stayed flat or slipped: every season and episode available (8%, down from 9%), no ads in shows (8%, unchanged) and binge-able releases (7%, down from 8%).
For marketers, the takeaway is that viewers care more about what a service costs than about how they watch it. âNo adsâ didnât grow and sits well behind low price, so more viewers seem willing to accept ads in exchange for a lower bill. That helps explain why streamers keep pushing ad-supported plans, like Disney raising its ad-free prices this week, and why free services like Pluto TV and Tubi keep growing. It also means more ad-supported streaming inventory heading into the 2027 upfronts. Live sportsâ jump shows how strongly it keeps viewers subscribed, which makes sports one of the most valuable places for brands to show up.
One Fun Thing - Creativ Co @ Advertising Week
Our executive leadership team will attend Advertising Week New York, from October 5th-8th. Please respond to this email if youâll be in town.
Weâre hosting our own salon Tuesday evening with StarBucks, the NYTs, and my co-founder to discuss this very topic over great food and drinks.