Advertising is still spending like audiences haven’t moved, but the data says otherwise. As global ad investment crosses the trillion-dollar threshold, marketers are being forced to confront a growing mismatch between where budgets flow and where consumers actually spend their time. Find out what makes the industry tick in this interview with Terry Kane, Managing Director, Middle East and Africa, The Trade Desk.
Where is global advertising heading in 2026?
At The Trade Desk, we continue to see a clear shift toward the open internet taking the first dollar, and ultimately the largest share, of media plans. That’s because the open internet is where consumers spend the majority of their time engaging with the internet’s most premium content. Our research shows that the average person now spends two-thirds of their digital time on the open internet, even though most advertising budgets today still flow to Amazon, Meta and Google. Over time, we expect that imbalance to correct as marketers align spend more closely with where audiences actually are.
AI is accelerating the path to the open internet due to its ability to deliver vastly superior price discovery and fungibility at scale. AI is also fast-tracking outcomes for marketers that are ready to activate their data and apply automation in a thoughtful intelligent manner.
Connected TV (CTV) remains our largest and fastest-growing channel and continues to grow at a faster rate than our overall business. The shift to biddable CTV is accelerating, and we expect decisioned CTV to become the default buying model in the years ahead as inventory is bought and sold more efficiently.
Is the advertising industry under pressure at the start of 2026? It was estimated at over $1 trillion last year; what are the estimates for this year?
The advertising industry is undergoing a significant recalibration as marketers are under pressure to prove performance, manage tighter budgets, and navigate rapid changes driven by AI, automation, and shifting consumer behavior. As a result, investment is moving toward channels that offer better measurement, flexibility and price discovery.
A recent forecast from Dentsu projects that global advertising spend is forecast to increase by another 5.1 percent in 2026, surpassing 1 trillion US dollars for the first time. So while the industry as a whole continues to grow, the real story heading into 2026 is where that growth is flowing and how quickly advertisers are demanding more accountable, data-driven buying models.
Digital budgets continue to rise while traditional media shrinks. How will this reshape global advertising over the next five years?
Digital budgets will continue to outpace traditional media and over the next five years that shift will fundamentally reshape global advertising. Ultimately, in practice, every advertising format will become digital, whether it’s TV, audio or even print, driven by efficiency, data and automation. Connected TV and premium digital channels will capture a growing share of global ad spend while digital audio will see significant increases in spend. As this transition accelerates, programmatic and data-driven buying will become the primary way advertisers plan, allocate, and optimize budgets, changing not just where money is spent, but how advertising is executed at a global scale.
Where is GCC ad spend growing fastest, and which channels are brands prioritizing?
The big shift is toward digital and away from traditional formats like print and linear TV. When you look around Dubai, Doha, and Riyadh, your programmatic digital out-of-home is growing at a premium rate. Brands can run an out-of-home campaign, collect the audience data, and then retarget those same people on personalized devices, laptops, or other channels.
This makes omnichannel more realistic, unlocking huge potential for personalized and relevant advertising. As a result, print, linear TV, and any unmeasurable channels relying on “spray and pray” media approach are suffering. Brands today demand more transparent ad spend, targeting, measurement, and brand safety.
Where do you see the inefficiencies of ad spend today?
Inefficiencies exist at nearly every step of the journey. Digital-native brands do it very well. These companies that are ecommerce first or are born in the ecommerce era, focus on KPI goals, performance, lifecycles and customer lifetime value. Those are the brands that thrive. Most of the market still doesn’t fully understand the potential of programmatic. Education is needed, from planning, execution, real-time inventory and decision-making to measurement.
Currently, about 70% of media spend in the region is in walled gardens, but the audience time is not spent inside a walled garden, and that’s the inefficiency.
How does this shift affect CMOs and the broader ecosystem?
The metric of conversation needs to change, particularly in our part of the world, from marketing metrics to business metrics. This is a reality shift. It means moving from vanity metrics of likes and views, through to thing slike customer lifetime value, like ROAS, ROI, and loyalty.
How will AI change advertising?
In five years, we are going to have a completely different landscape of technology, consumable content, targeting, marketing, advertising, and alignment to business goals and objectives like never before in history. Now, where am I seeing these massive shifts?
Everyone will have a personalized experience online. Content will be personalized, and media must not be disruptive; it must be relevant to the individual. That relevancy will require unprecedented customization.
Today, companies build campaigns with tens of thousands of creative pieces firing on one campaign. In five years, that 10,000 will become an effectively infinite level of customization. This can only happen with big data, the technology behind it, and the copilot world of human ownership of the AI’s decisions.AI is going to disrupt everything. Looking three years ahead, we will be working in a completely different industry.
That’s why I’m passionate about the MENA region ramping up knowledge and expertise in programmatic skills and training. We offer every agency the opportunity to build programmatic skillsets, get certified on The Trade Desk, understand AI on our backend, and service clients in a truly programmatic way versus old traditional methods, which are still clinging to this market.
Upfront deals, rebates, biggest discounts; we think the world is much smarter than that. Consumers are smarter, and AI is both the carrot and the stick to make smarter advertising possible.
Every step of the way, content creation will change. Publishers in our markets risk falling behind unless they improve content creation, delivery, and data passing. Currently, data signals from bid streams from publishers to DSPs are still very nascent, limiting the depth of knowledge expected by brands. This has to change. Smart publishers are waking up to transparency, data partnerships, and programmatic pipelines. Creative agencies are opening up to modular, adaptable, and real personalized content. It’s happening, but it needs to happen faster. Those who adapt faster will take the pie; those who don’t will lose and may no longer be here.
