With the proliferation of retail media properties, it’s beginning to feel like the digital economy is producing walled gardens faster than baby rabbits. This is actually a healthy development. These walled gardens don’t necessarily carry the baggage of the big original ones, and even when they do, it’s a net positive to the broader marketing ecosystem.
To frame this, let’s level-set on what retail and commerce media properties are delivering. If well built, they provide advertisers with a channel to engage with consumers for both near-term return on ad spend (a.k.a. performance) campaigns and broader brand building and storytelling campaigns. Both are well suited for these use cases, but for different reasons.
