Every year, the Experian team attends the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas to study the latest technological advancements and innovations that shape the AdTech industry. The energy at CES 2025 was palpable, with a whirlwind of conversations around artificial intelligence (AI), connected TV (CTV), privacy-first solutions, and sustainability in advertising. Here are four standout themes from this year’s event.
1. The AI evolution: More buzzwords, but growing potential
AI dominated discussions this year, but the gap between hype and practical application was still evident. While some vendors showcased innovative tools for campaign optimization and audience creation, much of the buzz felt aspirational.
The use of AI to generate audiences based on new types of data is a promising sign of things to come. Data providers, including those collaborating with Experian, are beginning to test AI tools to enhance audience accuracy and scale. The AI space still feels frenetic, but the potential for transformative change is undeniable.
“AI was a hot topic, with discussions ranging from campaign optimization tools to audience selection. While many leaned on buzzwords, there were glimpses of legitimate use cases.”
Brooke Logan, VP of Data Strategy and Partnerships
2. CTV: A race for quality and curation
CTV remained a popular topic at CES, particularly around the challenges of fragmentation and scale. Sellers are grappling with an oversupply of inventory, leading to a renewed focus on curation. Conversations highlighted the importance of premium audiences, brand safety, and identity resolution. In the fragmented CTV landscape, advertisers want to be able to define an audience once, have that audience be highly addressable, and then activate everywhere.
One standout theme was the shift in CTV monetization strategies. With linear TV revenues declining, major publishers are exploring ways to maximize yields on streaming platforms. Direct-sold premium inventory still reigns, but programmatic is gaining traction—a trend we’re seeing driven by publishers seeking scalable solutions.
“CTV remains fragmented. While premium inventory is largely direct-sold, big publishers are exploring ways to boost yield on streaming as linear revenue declines.”
Lauren Portell, Sr. Account Executive, Advanced TV
3. Privacy-first solutions
The regulatory landscape continues to evolve, and advertisers are responding with innovative, privacy-centric methodologies. For industries like healthcare, privacy-first solutions are being developed from the ground up to comply with current and future regulations. The emphasis on cookieless and contextual advertising remains strong, with data providers utilizing first-party data to enrich audience targeting strategies.
“Providers across verticals that are typically more sensitive are developing methodologies from the ground up based on current and future potential privacy regulations.”
Adam Kobus, Director of Data Partnerships
4. Eco-conscious advertising: Building a sustainable future
Sustainability emerged as a growing focus, as indicated by initiatives like Scope3 and Experian’s own carbon reduction goals. Companies are exploring ways to reduce the environmental impact of ad serving and data management. For example, platforms like AdGood are transforming unused CTV inventory into opportunities for non-profit initiatives. While not strictly eco-focused, these efforts signal a shift toward more conscientious advertising practices.
“Sustainability is gaining attention, with efforts to reduce the carbon footprint through eco-conscious advertising, data management practices, and ad serving.”
Erin Wolf, Sr. Account Executive, Demand Partnerships
The buzz around Experian
The launch of the Experian marketplace and the Audigent acquisition were major talking points, underscoring Experian’s commitment to innovation in AdTech. Together, Experian and Audigent will be an end-to-end solution where publishers big and small can empower marketers to better understand their customers, create precise audience segments, and activate those audiences across the best inventory.
Likewise, Experian’s new data marketplace connects TV operators, programmers, supply partners, and demand platforms with top-tier third-party audiences across retail, CPG, health, B2B, and location intelligence. All audiences delivered from our marketplace benefit from our best-in-class offline and digital identity graphs, which ensure addressability across all channels like display, mobile, and CTV.
An exciting year ahead
CES 2025 underscored the rapid evolution of the advertising ecosystem. From AI to CTV and privacy-first solutions, the industry is adapting to new challenges and opportunities. As Experian continues to lean into these trends, our role in powering data-driven advertising through connectivity remains more focused than ever.
We’re excited to see how these themes will evolve throughout the year and look forward to collaborating with our partners to shape the future of digital advertising. Follow us on LinkedIn or sign up for our email newsletter for more informative content on the latest industry insights and data-driven marketing.
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Privacy-forward pharma media supports more informed healthcare journeys Effective pharma marketing depends on reaching patients, caregivers, and healthcare professionals (HCPs) with useful information in appropriate, privacy-forward ways. The goal is to make relevant education easier to find, support more informed conversations, and help brands understand how media contributes across the health journey. In this Ask the Expert session, Natalie Mancuso, SVP, Data Partnerships at DeepIntent, joins Sheila Wirick, who leads the health team at Experian, to discuss how to craft patient and HCP campaigns, privacy-safe activation workflows, connected TV (CTV), and measurement approaches built for pharma. Why should your media plan start with understanding the patient and provider The patient-and-provider journey should inform your media plan, as treatment decisions in pharma are increasingly informed, personal, and patient-driven. With more health information available than ever, patients are playing a more active role in understanding their options and participating in treatment conversations. As other industries become more customer-centric, pharma media planning needs to become more patient-centric. “We’ve got patients who are more informed, more involved in their treatment decisions than ever. The accessibility of data and information and the ways we can consume it with just AI alone is so vast that if we’re not arming people with the right information in real time, we’re missing the boat.”Natalie Mancuso, SVP, Data Partnerships This means media should be aligned to where a patient or provider is in the decision journey and what they need at that moment. Early on, media may play an educational role by building awareness of a condition, symptom, or treatment category. Later, it may help support more specific questions, treatment consideration, access, affordability, or adherence. The patient-provider conversation remains the key boundary. That exchange should stay private and clinically led. Media can play a valuable role before and after those moments by offering information that helps patients and providers feel more informed. How can brands connect patient and HCP messaging responsibly? It’s critical for agencies and brands to deliver relevant messaging to inform each stakeholder’s needs throughout the treatment journey, especially ahead of key clinical milestones. To execute this, brands must exercise privacy-forward activation, keeping patient and HCP identity, activation, and measurement paths separate, while using a common workflow layer to support the same brand goal. Experian helps pharma marketers do this by acting as an independent, privacy-forward identity, data, and workflow layer. We bring together high-fidelity matching, governed onboarding, and non-clinical consumer context, so patient and HCP engagement can be activated more accurately across channels and connected to reporting. The distinction is not only where each audience is reached. HCPs may be engaged in both professional and personal environments, but their needs are different from patients’. For example, an HCP may receive messaging about co-pay savings for eligible patients, while a patient may receive information about patient support programs. These are different messages for different audiences, but they ladder up to the same goal: informing both parties in a privacy-forward, relevant way. Hear from Natalie Mancuso in our 2026 State of advertising report In our 2026 State of advertising report, Natalie shares why identity serves as the connective infrastructure that links planning, activation, and measurement across connected TV (CTV), programmatic, commerce media, and walled garden environments. Download the report Watch Natalie’s Q&A What does privacy-forward activation look like in pharma? Pharma brands often start with fragmented patient and HCP signals. Privacy-forward activation turns those inputs into usable audiences by first confirming that the data can be used, then translating identity in controlled environments that protect personally identifiable information through tokenization or other methodologies. For DTC, that means building and matching audiences without relying on inferred health conditions from browsing behavior. For HCPs, it means connecting professional identity to verified sources in a way that supports activation and measurement. In a category shaped by HIPAA, state privacy laws, internal review, and consumer sensitivity, building privacy in from sourcing through activation is what makes responsible health media possible. How can CTV play a more useful role in pharma? CTV can play a more useful role in healthcare when it’s connected to a larger, privacy-forward plan and not treated as just an awareness channel. DeepIntent connects CTV and digital exposure data using identity signals, such as National Provider Identifiers (NPIs), hashed email addresses, IP addresses, device IDs, and household signals, where permitted and reviewed. That identity layer helps support sequencing and suppression across streaming, endemic, mobile, and digital settings. In practice, CTV can introduce targeted education or broad brand awareness, and later touchpoints can provide sequential information in the right channels. Instead of repeating the same message, brands can make pivots based on engagement and context. “For us, it starts with identity and not panels. When we’re resolving CTV and digital exposures to the same person, we’re leveraging signals so that every touchpoint across streaming, endemic, and mobile is recognized as the same individual, not model lookalikes.”Natalie Mancuso, SVP, Data Partnerships For pharma, campaign performance should not be measured by reach alone. A stronger approach looks at whether sequenced engagement contributes to meaningful downstream signals, including: Prescription activity Provider engagement Referral patterns Patient compliance Adherence signals, where measurement is permitted Why should messaging and reporting change in pharma? Pharma campaigns are journeys with changing information needs. Reporting should guide the campaign optimization. “If I’m launching into a market with a new class of drug, I’m asking what education needs to be put into the market – from both an HCP and a consumer standpoint – to build awareness?”Natalie Mancuso, SVP, Data Partnerships Clicks and website visits still have a place, but they can’t tell the full pharma story. DeepIntent processes data in real time, giving brands an up-to-date read on how media connects to campaign engagement. Campaign signals can help teams optimize audience logic, creative, channel mix, or sequencing during a live campaign. Heading Test for Media & Text Block Content Test for Media &Text Block Learn more Heading Test for Media & Text Block Content Test for Media &Text Block Learn more Heading Test for Media & Text Block Content Test for Media &Text Block Learn more Explore how privacy-safe pharma activation can make an impact Experian brings marketing data and identity expertise for health marketing and DeepIntent adds pharma-specific activation experience. Together, we help brands connect patient and HCP strategies responsibly, with privacy built in from the start. Watch the full video with our experts to hear Sheila Wirick and Natalie Mancuso discuss patient and HCP messaging, CTV, privacy-safe activation, and outcome measurement for pharma brands. About our experts Natalie Mancuso SVP, Data Partnerships, DeepIntent Natalie Mancuso is SVP, Data Partnerships at DeepIntent and a leader in health-focused AdTech and DSP strategy. With over 20 years of experience growing billion-dollar healthcare brands, she turns complex data into scalable, performance-driven solutions that keep marketers ahead of industry change. Sheila Wirick Director of Health Sales, Experian Sheila Wirick is the Director of Health Sales at Experian with more than 20 years of experience in data and analytics. As Director of Health Sales at Experian Marketing Services, she collaborates with healthcare, pharmaceutical, and nonprofit organizations to apply data and insights that enhance customer retention, brand awareness, and acquisition. She is committed to helping organizations use data to deliver measurable results and meaningful impact. FAQs What makes a pharma audience activation-ready? A pharma audience is activation-ready when patient or HCP inputs can be translated into usable audiences with the right accuracy, controls, interoperability, and destination readiness. For patient engagement, that may include privacy-safe cohort construction, caregiver logic, non-clinical enrichment and appropriate exclusion rules. For HCP engagement, it may include governed identity inputs such as NPI, specialty, practice location, professional address and other verified attributes where appropriate. How can pharma brands sequence messages across channels responsibly? Pharma brands can sequence messages responsibly by giving each channel a clear role and using audience logic to maintain continuity. CTV and out-of-home can support awareness, social can reinforce the message, search can capture active research and point-of-care or rep-triggered channels can support decision moments. The workflow should preserve separation between patient and HCP identity strategies. What should pharma marketers measure beyond clicks and site visits? Pharma marketers should measure whether media connects to outcomes such as audience quality, prescription activity, qualified HCP engagement, verified delivery, referral patterns, therapy starts or adherence signals where permitted. These outcomes often depend on partner-enabled workflows, clean rooms, and aggregated outputs rather than direct end-to-end tracking. How does Experian help pharma brands connect identity, activation and measurement? Experian acts as an independent privacy-first identity, data, and workflow layer for pharma marketers. We help brands bring together identity, high-fidelity matching, governed onboarding, non-clinical consumer context, and partner interoperability so patient and HCP engagement can be activated more accurately across channels and connected more cleanly to partner-enabled measurement. Latest posts
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