2025: The Year of Media EngAIgement

But, for media companies, AI promises to become a powerful tool enabling two really important developments: greater freedom for employees to focus on what they do best, and greater engagement with audiences and marketers.

Last year we saw lots of AI-related content-licensing deals; this year I believe we’ll see more examples of media companies themselves embracing AI in multifaceted ways.

Companies may focus on tailoring their content to appear in AI search results. As has been noted in outlets such as Digiday, digital publishers are likely to leverage AI for predictive targeting, chatbots, e-commerce and gamification to grow engagement across platforms -- increasingly, including live events – to help boost subscriptions and ad revenue. It’s all about converting the casual reader and viewer into a subscriber, in turn having a stronger advertiser-value proposition.

“Content is King,” as the old saying goes. And political-election cycles – a boon for linear TV -- can be a powerful and engaging form. For inventory providers, AI might not only turbocharge relationships with audiences, but political campaigns and PACs may insist on an audience-targeting-driven AI playbook.

In fact, most marketers are likely at least planning to apply AI tools in their own efforts, primarily to improve efficiency; this includes AI-generated ads, and predictive modeling in campaign planning and pricing, among other applications. Think workflow efficiency. And it stands to reason that they’d expect the same effort and innovation from their media partners, especially as relates targeting and measurement.

In prior blogs we’ve discussed cookies, including the privacy concerns. Connected TV (CTV) ad personalization has been cookie-dependent; that’s poised to change. Programmers and marketers are evaluating AI-turbocharged contextual advertising, matching ads with the content being viewed – again, further engaging the consumer. Layering in AI’s predictive attributes, including direction of the timing of ads, offers even greater opportunities.

And this is a key point. We want relevant content -- specific to our needs and wants. But we may not want to share our data. I know we’re discussing cookies… but when it comes to personalization and, at the same time, data-sharing… we want our cake … and to eat it too. AI offers the promise of enabling us to evolve beyond that challenge. It's analyzing the data, but not necessarily specific to the user. It's making recommendations and gathering trends -- and so it's a lot better than where we've been. Marketers will be able to deliver contextual advertising without intruding on consumers’ privacy.

AI-boosted contextual advertising was among predictions offered to Adweek when it recently canvassed ad-industry leaders on their view of the role AI will play beginning this year; a number of fascinating insights emerged.

On the content-generation end, forecasts included home-screen recommendation chatbots on streaming platforms and end-to-end AI TV campaigns spanning media planning to creative to measurement. One prediction -- AI-generated ads in the Super Bowl -- already has proved accurate: Holland America's Super Bowl commercial was almost entirely AI-generated, as noted in tech-enthusiast site Slashgear; this and a plethora of AI-focused spots from in-game advertisers including Google, Meta and newcomer Open AI, has led some to dub 2025’s Big Game “The AI Super Bowl.”

On the all-important aspect of measurement, folks predict an acceleration of the shift to a multicurrency marketplace and new levels of precision and efficiency in targeting, with advanced, custom KPIs tailored to marketers’ goals.

And then there’s closing the deal… and executives see AI’s further potential to tighten the personalization gap between TV and social media, as well as AI-enabled e-commerce based on the consumer’s viewing and shopping habits… not to mention greater ability to connect withaudiences who have heightened purchase intent.

Bottom-line, AI is here, and it's only going to get bigger. So you're either on the bus or under the bus. To use a video-consumption analogy, you can be Blockbuster… or you can be Netflix. Those who embrace the future with positive, aggressive curiosity will have the advantage. And this is especially true in media, where the change is unbelievably rapid and you have to evolve or die.

But let’s get back to the “fear” factor. To borrow from Mark Twain, talk of reduced human involvement is way premature. Human intervention will remain crucial, industry participants agree. The point of AI – from that all-important glass-half-full vantage point – is to free people up to do those things that make them most impactful.

This point is crucial. I look at AI primarily for its potential to improve my connections to two key constituencies: How do I serve my employees and my customers best?

My employees are incredibly busy; I want to give them more time – more time to think, to strategize, to create… even to breathe. We'll never replace the human touch, right? And that extra time would benefit our relationships with our clients. They're looking for results, and what we're looking for is a better customer-employee experience… all of which, ultimately, should translate into efficiencies.

At Viamedia, we’re deploying teams who are out talking to local, regional, and, to an extent, national customers all over the United States who are trying to find solutions to help them grow their business. And that of course includes cable operators and streaming and FAST providers… in short, anybody that's looking to bring demand to their supply.

And so, yes, integrating AI into existing workflows can feel daunting -- but forward-thinking companies must lean into its potential. At Viamedia, we are carefully evaluating how AI can enhance -- not replace -- our team’s expertise. We are exploring AI-driven solutions for ad targeting, ensuring precision without compromising consumer privacy.

Today, AI has to be in the marketing conversation, from front to end. For those willing to embrace the future, it will make for a much more engaging – or, if you like, “engAIging” – discussion.

Posted at MediaVillage through the Thought Leadership self-publishing platform.

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The opinions expressed here are the author's views and do not necessarily represent the views of MediaVillage.org/MyersBizNet.