AI Marketing News

Google released its 2025 ad safety report revealing that Gemini AI models blocked a record 8.3 billion ads globally, up 63 percent from 5.1 billion the year before. More than 99 percent of policy-violating ads were caught before being shown to users. The company also shifted its enforcement strategy from banning entire advertiser accounts to blocking individual ads, reducing false advertiser suspe...

At Canva Create 2026 in Los Angeles, Canva revealed its transformation from a design tool into a full marketing platform after five acquisitions in six weeks. The company acquired Ortto for marketing automation with over 11,000 customers across 190 countries, Simtheory for AI agents that autonomously qualify leads from Salesforce, plus Doohly for digital outdoor, Cavalry for animation, and MangoAI...

Bluefish just raised 43 million dollars in Series B funding to help brands monitor and manage how they appear inside AI platforms like ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, Perplexity, and Amazon Rufus. About 10 percent of the Fortune 500 already uses the platform, including Adidas, American Express, LVMH, and Ulta Beauty. Bluefish processes millions of AI prompts per day and positions itself in what it calls...

Meta is projected to overtake Google as the world's largest digital advertising platform for the first time ever in 2026, according to new eMarketer forecasts. Meta is forecast to reach 243 billion dollars in global ad revenue this year versus Google's 239 billion, driven by 24 percent growth fueled by Advantage Plus AI tools and Reels. Meanwhile, a federal court formally issued the prohibition or...

Visa unveiled Intelligent Commerce Connect, a universal payment gateway that lets AI agents browse, compare, and buy products on behalf of consumers. The platform works across any card network through a single integration, and includes a discovery layer that makes merchant catalogs visible to AI agents. McKinsey projects AI agents could drive 1 trillion dollars in US transactions by 2030, and Visa...

Canva acquired five companies in six weeks, including marketing automation platform Ortto and agentic AI startup Simtheory. Combined with recent purchases of Doohly, Cavalry, and MangoAI, Canva is transforming from a design tool into a full marketing platform with customer data, automation, AI agents, animation, and ad optimization built in. The combined vision debuts at Canva Create on April 16....

Meta declared the era of link in bio is over at Shoptalk Spring, launching native affiliate product tags inside Instagram Reels. Creators with 1,000 or more followers can now tag up to 30 products per Reel, with Meta taking zero commission on affiliate sales. The feature is live in the US, Brazil, India, Indonesia, and Thailand, with Amazon and Shopee integrations confirmed next. Crunchbase publis...

OpenAI disclosed an aggressive advertising roadmap to investors, projecting 2.5 billion dollars in ad revenue this year, growing to 100 billion dollars annually by 2030. The company is targeting a Q4 2026 IPO with a valuation goal of one trillion dollars. Self-serve ChatGPT ads are now live for any brand with no minimum spend requirement, building on early traction of 100 million dollars in annual...

Meta launched Muse Spark, the first AI model from Meta Superintelligence Labs under Chief AI Officer Alexandr Wang, nine months after Meta's 14.3 billion dollar Scale AI deal. The model features a shopping mode that combines AI reasoning with user behavior data from Instagram, Facebook, and Threads to power personalized product recommendations across Meta's 3 billion plus daily active users. Muse...

Anthropic hit a 30 billion dollar annualized revenue run rate, overtaking OpenAI and tripling from 9 billion in just four months. The company behind Salesforce Agentforce, Meta Manus AI, and The Trade Desk Kokai now has over 1,000 enterprise customers each spending more than a million dollars a year, signaling a massive shift toward enterprise AI spending. Meanwhile, new IAB research reveals a gro...

Google launched Veo 3.1 Lite today at 5 cents per second for AI-generated video, less than half the cost of its existing fast tier, while also cutting Veo 3.1 Fast pricing. The timing is striking as OpenAI shuts down Sora after burning 15 million dollars a day in compute costs and losing its billion-dollar Disney partnership. Meanwhile, AI virtual try-on startups like Catches, AIUTA, and Genlook a...

Macy's launched Ask Macy's, an AI shopping assistant built on Google Gemini, and customers using it spend 4.75 times more per visit. The tool acts as a digital stylist with complete-the-look outfit recommendations that grow basket size, tested at scale with half of site visitors before broad rollout. Meanwhile, Meta is testing full autopilot for Advantage Plus campaigns where advertisers input a p...

OpenAI acquired TBPN, the daily tech talk show hosted by John Coogan and Jordi Hays, marking its first move into owned media. TBPN generated 5 million dollars in ad revenue in 2025 and is on track for 30 million in 2026. The acquisition signals a shift toward AI companies controlling the media that shapes how people understand their technology. Meanwhile, HubSpot announced that its Breeze AI agent...

OpenAI's ChatGPT advertising pilot hit 100 million dollars in annualized revenue just six weeks after launch, with self-serve access opening in April and international expansion into Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. Over 600 advertisers are now active, and the 200 thousand dollar minimum is going away. Reddit unveils Collection Ads, deal overlays, and a Shopify integration at Shoptalk 2026, wit...

Meta reveals MRS Research, an elite AI team led by ex-TikTok VP Yang Song, built to transform Instagram and Facebook feed algorithms using large language models. The team, recruited from TikTok, OpenAI, Google, and Amazon, is working directly with Meta's ads division to improve ad targeting precision. Criteo expands its GO platform with full self-service access, letting small and mid-sized busines...

Salesforce unveils 30 new AI features for Slackbot, turning it into a full enterprise agent that listens to meetings, updates your CRM, and runs reusable AI workflows. Microsoft Advertising tests a double-row shopping carousel on Bing with LinkedIn professional targeting that Google can't match. Arete helps businesses turn AI into measurable marketing performance. Learn more at https://www.arete.s...

Shopify launches Agentic Storefronts, making 5.6 million merchants discoverable inside ChatGPT, Google AI Mode, Copilot, and Gemini with AI-referred orders up 11x. YouTube replaces BrandConnect with Gemini-powered Creator Partnerships across 3 million creators. And Google's March 2026 core update tightens E-E-A-T while organic search faces structural pressure from AI Mode and local ad expansion. A...