GenAI in Advertising Technologies in 2026. The UMG's Opinion

Let's look at the prospects for the generative AI in AdTech market in 2026.

In 2023, generative artificial intelligence in the field of AdTech was reviewed and evaluated by industry experts and practitioners with a focus on personalization. GenAI, as a new technological paradigm, opened up a previously unavailable opportunity to assemble, assemble, and deliver hyperpersonalized messages in real time. Starting from fully adaptive, dynamically changing text and visual messages and ending with the instant creation of unique and maximally relevant media content.

Technology giants and platforms such as Microsoft and Snap, as well as other significant companies in this field, were already demonstrating and showing the market the first, pilot and demonstration examples of such integration, while major international brands such as Heinz and Coca-Cola were experimenting with new, emerging formats with interest. based on AI, such as generating images or video sequences based on a text description (text2image and text2video). And despite the fact that the entire range of technologies and practical applications was then in the initial and unregulated stage of development and implementation. Even the most conservative industry forecasts and analytical reports unanimously promised and predicted impressive growth in the total market volume related to the use of artificial intelligence in marketing and advertising, up to the amount of 78.8 billion US dollars by the final milestone — 2030.

There was a prevailing and widespread expectation among industry professionals that generative AI, rather than any other technological solutions, would eventually become the main, defining and indisputable driver of the next generation of personalization and smoothly. It will inevitably be integrated into all major marketing platforms and technology stacks as a standard, familiar and mandatory tool, without which effective work in this area will soon be simply unthinkable.

The advertising technology market is undergoing and going through one of the most intensive stages of transformation. Generative artificial intelligence, often referred to professionally by the acronym GenAI, has ceased to be an experimental and partly hypothetical toy in the hands of a narrow circle of technical enthusiasts and pioneers.

Instead, it is recognized as a full-fledged, reliable and ready-to-use production tool that is effectively implemented and applied in key sectors of the digital economy, including media, modern marketing, and proper advertising technologies.

In its current stage of development and implementation, generative artificial intelligence has a range of specific, practically applicable skills and capabilities.

Already today GenAI can:
1. Generate texts, scripts, images, videos, and ready-made animations
2. Automatically create personalized creatives for audience segments
3. Adapt advertising messages to a specific platform and format
4. Accelerate data analysis and generate ready-made reports

However, along with this obvious and rapid growth of technological capabilities, the number of related challenges, risks and problematic aspects is naturally growing.

Mass production of creatives
By 2025, most large and medium-sized advertisers and marketing agencies have already managed to fully integrate generative models and platforms into their standard, daily-used content pipelines and workflows. For many, if not most, of the advertising campaigns launched today, almost the entire necessary range of visual and text materials, ranging from static banners to complex videos, are created, generated and compiled automatically with minimal involvement of a human designer or copywriter.

This approach, which has already become standard, makes it possible to achieve several key operational and economic advantages at once.

Firstly, GenAI leads to a significant, multiple-fold reduction in the total cost of producing a unit of creative content by an average of three to five times.

Secondly, GenAI provides an unprecedented opportunity to conduct A/B testing and test dozens of different creative hypotheses, concepts and visual solutions simultaneously and in a short time.

Thirdly, the technology directly contributes to increasing the final relevance and response of the audience due to the instant, point-by-point adaptation of the generated material to the characteristics and behavior of a specific, narrow segment of consumers.

Real-time personalization
Modern advertising networks and software platforms for placement are actively and widely using the technology of dynamic generation of advertising creatives directly at the time of the display. The system adjusts and changes all the components of the message element in real time: the background image, the key text, the call to action, and even the general emotional tone of the message to match the current context and the demonstrated behavior of a particular user.

Localization and cultural adaptation
Generative artificial intelligence also provides tools for deep and rapid localization of content, going far beyond the simple mechanical translation of text into another language. GenAI allows you to adapt a message almost instantly, taking into account the subtle cultural context of the target region or community.

For example, by skillfully embedding or taking into account current memes, local trends in social networks, humor features, or significant local holidays and events, which makes communication more organic and perceptible.

The growth of "junk"
Against the background of the widespread availability and ease of use of GenAI-based tools, the digital space of the Internet is rapidly and uncontrollably filling up with the same type, low-quality and often meaningless materials produced in large quantities and at minimal cost.

Vivid examples of this phenomenon are such phenomena as brainrot, a stream of monotonous, boilerplate content, and cases of massive use of deepfake images of celebrities and public figures in product cards on large marketplaces. This practice not only naturally reduces the overall level of user confidence in the platforms themselves, where such content is distributed, but also creates serious legal, regulatory and reputational risks for their operators related to copyright infringement and misleading consumers.

Manipulation and DeepFakes
The technology of forgery and synthesis of visual information, such as the creation of DeepFake, has reached a level where the falsification of faces, brand attributes and official logos is becoming so technically advanced and visually realistic that ordinary users increasingly cannot distinguish a fake from the original and, as a result, are in dire need of additional tools and procedures for independent verification of the source. information.

For advertisers and copyright holders, this new state of affairs means that there is an urgent need to urgently implement comprehensive systems to protect their own creative assets, including digital watermarking technologies and tracking unauthorized use.

Falling traffic to information sites
The massive appearance and integration into search engines of functions that provide "direct answers" to user queries based on generative AI (for example, AI Overview) leads to a significant and steady reduction in the number of direct traffic to primary information sites. This fundamental change in search engine behavior is fundamentally changing the balance that has existed for years in SEO (search engine optimization) strategies and is actually forcing brands, publishers, and media companies to actively seek and explore alternative, non-search channels to attract and retain targeted traffic.

GenAI integration into advertising DSPs/SSPs
Software platforms for purchasing (DSP) and selling (SSP) advertising inventory will increasingly and deeply integrate the native capabilities of generative artificial intelligence directly into their user interfaces and processes. This will allow for the automatic creation, testing and optimization of creative materials and messages strictly within the technological ecosystem itself, without the need to involve external design studios or creative agencies, which will significantly shorten the cycle from idea to campaign launch.

Synthetic influencers
The development of generative visualization, animation, and speech synthesis technologies opens up the opportunity for brands to create completely artificial virtual ambassadors and influencers from scratch and use them in communications. Their digital identity will be fully controlled and customized for specific marketing purposes.

Moving away from classic SEO and moving to GEO
Due to the growing popularity and introduction of AI search, as well as chat interfaces that provide direct answers, there will be an inevitable reformatting of traditional search promotion strategies. The focus will shift towards optimization for generative systems (GEO), which focuses on the native, organic embedding of branded content and responses in the output generated by artificial intelligence, rather than in classic site listings.

Automatic moderation and brand protection
Artificial intelligence will begin to perform not only creative, but also protective functions. It will be used for round-the-clock automatic moderation of the digital space: tracking and blocking deepfake fakes, combating phishing attacks using brand imitation, and continuously monitoring the reputational background in real time, acting as a digital shield.

Merging of media and martech platforms
There is a steady trend towards blurring the clear functional boundaries between specialized advertising, analytical and media tools. As a result, in the near future, within the framework of a single, unified interface of one platform, it will be possible to perform a full cycle of work: from the generation and adaptation of creatives and media planning to the direct purchase of traffic on various sites and the subsequent in-depth analysis of the results and effectiveness. The main thingIn the foreseeable future, generative models of artificial intelligence will inevitably move to a new status, ceasing to be perceived as just an advanced or experimental technology. They will become an integral, basic and ubiquitous infrastructure element, a kind of "cement" and a standard block on which all key processes within complex advertising and marketing ecosystems will be built.

In the foreseeable future, generative models of artificial intelligence will inevitably move to a new status, ceasing to be perceived as just an advanced or experimental technology. They will become an integral, basic and ubiquitous infrastructure element, a kind of "cement" and a standard block on which all key processes within complex advertising and marketing ecosystems will be built.