Welcome to another episode of The Ecommerce Braintrust podcast hosted by Acadia’s Head of Retail Marketplaces Services Julie Spear and Director of Retail Operations, Jordan Ripley. Today we’re joined by two amazing guests: Meghan Corron, Co-founder & CEO at Clerdata, and Andrew Lipsman, a notable industry analyst who heads up Media, Ads, and Commerce.  We’ll be diving into some of the key takeaways from a report Andrew recently presented at RMN Ascendant called “The Future of Retail Media is the Future of ALL Media”, as well as getting Meghan’s take on a lot of the cutting-edge incrementality data and research that’s informing Andrew’s presentation on the state of the industry. Make sure you tune in to find out more!   KEY TAKEAWAYS In this episode, Julie, Jordan, Meghan, and Andrew discuss: The inefficiencies in current digital marketing due to poor measurement systems. The over-credited nature of Google and Meta due to their advanced measurement and frequent consumer interactions. Shift Towards Mobile Search and Social Media: Significant movement of ad dollars toward platforms like Google and Meta. Waves of Digital Advertising: Google, Facebook, and now retail media. Each wave leverages closed-loop measurement to attract budgets. Retail media is noted as a cost-effective yet underinvested channel. Despite higher costs than Google or Meta, RM captures consumer decisions at the point of purchase. Varied success among Retail Media Networks (RMNs) driven by targeting quality and contextual environments. Meghan Corroon compares marketing investments to stock portfolios, highlighting the over and under-investments across different platforms. The issue of siloed ROI reports often exceeds a company's actual revenue. The need for more reliable measurement techniques beyond ROAS to understand the true incrementality of ads. Connected TV (CTV) Opportunities: The emerging promise of CTV in influencing consumer behavior despite higher costs and low ROAS. CPG companies' willingness to experiment with credible measurement evidence. Pressure to grow sales, maintain stock prices, and avoid layoffs driving the need for trusted data. The Concept of clean rooms and their potential to unify data and attribution forms. Slow development and underutilization, with a call for clear application guidelines to improve their effectiveness. The progression from Retail Media 1.0 to 3.0, focuses on various aspects such as on-site search, offsite display, and experiential media. Amazon's pioneering role in retail media integration and its impact. Importance of loyalty programs like Amazon Prime for targeting and measurement.