Rewriting the rules of paid media creative

Programmatic precision has been part of media buying for years. With the help of AI, creative execution could be next.

If there's one constant in marketing, it's the ever-changing nature of customer buying behaviours, channel dynamics, and economics of acquisition. Each aspect plays a crucial role in any campaign.

What's even more striking is how narrow the window is for success or failure. Consumers receive up to 5,000 brand messages a day and decide if any are relevant in just 400 milliseconds. In that micro-interaction, standing out relies on being relevant at precisely the right moment.

It's no wonder, then, that senior executives say performance marketing is one of the top budget priorities this year. After all, data- and outcome-driven marketing, directly attributed to commercial growth, is measurable and can be optimised in real time.

However, there's a complication. The mainstays of performance marketing - paid search, paid social, and paid media - are also in flux. The rise of AI-driven search and changes to platform algorithms are disrupting traditional approaches and putting pressure on return-on-ad-spend and related metrics.

While programmatic buying can secure a digital placement targeting a specific individual within the 400-millisecond window, the question is whether the creative is built to perform in that instant.

The answer, in most cases, is no. But what if performance creative could be dynamically built, rendered and served in that moment - whether static or video, multilingual or platform-specific? That's the new opportunity for performance marketers, where combining data and content can help put media buying and content creation on a similar programmatic footing.

A shifting landscape

While there is always pressure on marketers to do more with less, that's not always because budgets are shrinking. Adobe's 2025 AI and Digital Trends Report shows that 82% of CMOs and marketing leaders globally are looking to increase budgets this year.

But budgets are moving, with growing investment in owned platforms like retail media networks or walled gardens like Facebook, Amazon, and Google. In these spaces, measurement data stays in-house, reflecting the changing nature of digital advertising and paving the way for context-driven performance marketing executions.

How is AI changing how brands create content?

There is a step-change in brand and product discovery ushered in by AI-driven search. Adobe's Analytics insights show traffic to US retail sites from generative AI sources grew by 1,300% between November 1 and December 31 2024 compared to the prior year.

As consumers adopt new behaviours and journeys are short-circuited, it means performance marketing must work harder, become smarter and more contextual to get cut-through.

Just as programmatic media buying revolutionised digital ad sales by increasing reach and reducing wasted impressions, 'programmatic content' is now within reach for every marketer - offering the same precision and enabling personalisation of creative executions at a granular level.

The AI-driven approach that automates ad placement, optimises bidding and enhances real-time targeting can now be applied to creative. Using cross-channel performance data, and identifying which image, video and copy attributes resonate with different audiences, generative AI tools can then enable rapid and personalised creative execution.

Performance marketing grows up

This new era looks very different from the last.

Where past strategies followed users across the web based on their behaviour, today's approach is smarter, more respectful and rooted in context.

Traditional performance marketing was about who the customer was and what they did and deploying paid media budgets accordingly. Today, it's about showing up where the customer is - with something that fits in their now.

Rather than relying on third-party audience data and cookies, brands are building audience segments from declared data and first, second and third-party sources. That brings in what people actively share, choose, and signal through their interactions and behaviours.

With fewer data points but deeper insight, the shift turns passive tracking into active understanding. Brands are using those signals to create relevance that feels personal - not persistent.

Performance, powered by creative and AI insights

In this new landscape, where campaign strategies are methodically structured and media investment is significant, content is king, but is it working hard enough? Creative must adapt dynamically to match the moment, the format, the platform, and the consumer's mindset.

Understanding what drives performance is more crucial than ever. So, what problems can generative AI solve in content marketing?

AI-powered platforms like Adobe GenStudio for Performance Marketing enable marketers to take data-driven approaches to create personalised display, social, eDM or video assets. Entire campaigns - from emails and paid social to display - can be produced, tested and optimised at speed, all while aligning with brand guidelines.

When Adobe first used generative AI-powered email tests, we were able to quickly build and test five versions of an Adobe Photoshop email. The speed of content creation allowed us to test new subject lines for a campaign every two weeks, resulting in 8.5% higher open rates. Across the globe, we've seen a more than 57% boost in email click-through rates since being able to test at scale.

Automatic attribute tagging helps pinpoint which granular asset elements drive the highest engagement and conversions. Insights from platforms are mapped to creative executions in a single, seamless dashboard - giving brands clear, actionable data.

Creative metrics are moving to the centre of campaign measurement, unlocking the ability to shift from static campaigns to dynamic, evolving brand stories that maintain integrity, all powered by real-time data. This is how top brands are scaling content localisation without sacrificing quality.

The future of performance marketing: A new era of connection

As digital advertising continues to evolve, the brands that will thrive understand the shift from transactional to meaningful connection.

By embracing smarter, context-driven engagement approaches, marketers can deliver more than just targeted ads - they can create experiences that resonate at every touchpoint. The power of AI, data and dynamic content isn't just about measuring success; it's about bringing brand storytelling into the performance marketing realm.

In this new world, performance is no longer defined by clicks or impressions alone. It's about building trust, earning attention and crafting experiences that feel authentic and timely. The brands that can truly understand their customers will be the ones that lead the charge.

Because the future of performance marketing isn't about knowing where your audience has been. It's about knowing where they are and capturing their attention in 400 milliseconds or less.

And in that shift lies the opportunity for growth.