Agencies Push Budget Growth Hopes to 2027 as AI Anxiety Mounts, Digiday Research Finds

A new Digiday+ survey finds agency professionals have pushed meaningful budget growth expectations back to 2027, while concerns about AI's impact on the industry continue to intensify.

Budget Optimism Delayed

According to Digiday+ Research, agency professionals have largely abandoned expectations for a near-term surge in advertising budgets. Respondents who previously anticipated a rebound in 2025 or 2026 have shifted their optimism further out, now clustering around 2027 as the more realistic window for meaningful spending growth. The findings suggest that macroeconomic uncertainty, combined with ongoing pressure on marketing budgets, is forcing agencies to recalibrate timelines that had already been pushed back in prior survey cycles.

For retail media networks, which have benefited from incremental budget shifts as brands seek more measurable, lower-funnel channels, a prolonged period of budget caution could slow the pace of new investment. Brands may prioritize proven, performance-oriented placements over experimental retail media formats while financial headwinds persist.

AI: Opportunity and Unease

The research also surfaces a growing sense of unease around artificial intelligence among agency respondents. While AI tools are increasingly embedded in campaign planning, creative production, and audience targeting workflows, a rising share of agency professionals expressed concern about the technology's longer-term implications for staffing, pricing models, and client relationships. The dual dynamic — rapid adoption paired with institutional anxiety — reflects an industry that is integrating AI faster than it can establish governance or business model guardrails around it.

In retail media specifically, AI is playing an expanding role in sponsored product auctions, audience segmentation, and attribution modeling. The apprehension flagged in the Digiday survey may foreshadow friction between retailers pitching AI-powered ad products and agency buyers who remain uncertain about how those tools interact with their own AI investments.

Why It Matters

For retail media networks competing for a share of agency-controlled budgets, a two-year delay in expected spending growth is a material headwind that could slow network expansion plans and put pressure on CPM and CPC pricing. At the same time, agencies' ambivalence about AI creates both a risk and an opening: retailers that can clearly articulate how their AI-driven ad tools complement — rather than displace — agency expertise may find it easier to deepen partnerships during a cautious budget environment.