Disney, Netflix, AI, More—New Winners In Digital Advertising

The worrisome, repeat noise about the lack of aggressive competition in digital advertising just doesn’t correspond to the reality of the industry. If you follow this column, you’ve know we cover the spectrum of ongoing dynamics in the field. For sure, there are complaints about news outrage fatigue, strangling AI slop, massive layoffs and odd doings at media companies owned loudly or quietly by billionaires (Hello, X, WashPo, LA Times and TIME to name just a few).

All the handwringing couldn’t be further from the truth in the real marketplace.

A simple step back to look at the big picture shows the entire digital ecosystem is growing at an incredible clip. Massive sums are being invested in AI, with a record, eye-popping $40-billion funding in OpenAI just announced. On the advertising front alone, spending in the U.S. reached $309.3 billion in 2024, a 15.1% increase over 2023, and it is expected to reach $460 billion by 2028. Other industries would kill for that kind of growth. And it’s not exclusily focused on a few, it’s spread among many, and new, players.

For sure, the digital ecosystem has and will continue to change—radically. Who’s up, who’s down actually takes a lot of attention to understand. The simplistic view of the industry just isn’t the smart take. We’re all wearing seat belts and goggles as we discover the joys of being crash-test dummies in lightning-speed realignments that used to take years but are now happening in months and weeks (recent case in point: the rapid adoption of generative AI). Digital is hot all over, the state of play is dynamic—and growing like crazy.

Creative Plays that Get People to Opt Into Watching Ads

Disney reports its streaming platforms (Disney+, Hulu and ESPN) have an estimated 157 million global monthly active users on ad-supported tiers, including 112 million in the U.S. So, the lesson should be: Despite the influence of any incumbents in the field, new creative players with the right content can get a lot of people not just to watch ads but to opt into watching them.

Simultaneously, Netflix, which we should remember started offering ads only two years ago, is projected to top $3.2 billion in ad revenue this year thanks to live sports and events, and more than half of that will come from the U.S. and Canada. Not bad for a nascent part of its business.

CTV advertising? Emerging and struggling, some say. But this year it will reach $33.35 billion and is on its way to eclipsing linear TV in 2028. Change sometimes is hard—and then sometimes seems easier than we’d thought it would be.

That other new virgorous channel, retail media, is also booming. Total retail media ad impressions surged past 75 billion at the end of 2025. Amazon remains the giant in this space, reporting $56.21 billion in revenue in 2024, and just five years ago that mostly retailer was barely a player in digital ads. Other retailers like Walmart, Target, Best Buy, Chewy and Sephora looked around and saw they, too, could compete in the digital advertising game and are now seeing a bigger and bigger share of ad impressions (and ad $$) come their way.

Retail Media and Communities Add to the Market Juice

There are more interesting fireworks in retail media, too. Despite all the noise about Chinese influence in other place, it turns out that small Chinese sellers make up nearly half of the new sellers added to Walmart’s retail media marketplace, following Amazon’s path (also 50%). With on-again/off-again/on-again/who-knows?again tariffs and how they are reshaping global trade dynamics, much could shift in that landscape and already has: Fast fashion retailer Shein’s profit was down 40% at the end of 2024, threatening the viability of the company’s IPO in 2025 and leaving the opportunity for other retailers to fill the void. Can U.S. domestics slip in to fill any voids–and capture not just the retail revenue but the data dominance?

Also gaining ground are new corners of the digital media universe: Trusted recommendations from influencers are an ever-growing force for brands (CMOs, you ignore them at your peril) and the latest consumer powerhouse is communities that let customers talk to peers about products they love (and hate). They are gaining new power in the buying equation.

And all that doesn’t even count the unforeseeable but certainly likely incredible speed at which new media can explode onto the scene. Snapchat took almost four years to hit 100 million users. TikTok got there in 9 months. ChatGPT did it in 8 weeks. Threads in 5 days! As I said, the state of play is dynamic and downright … quantum.

So don’t believe in the negative or be a skeptic and fatalist: It’s an incredible time to be in the media business—whether you’re creating content, capturing attention, or some mix of both. Your business could be, faster than you know, larger than the largest now. Just look around at what is happening IRL.