Everyone is asking AI to optimize their advertising.
By Destaney Wishon · July 16, 2026 · Curated by George's Blog
Everyone is asking AI to optimize their advertising.
I think they’re asking it to do the wrong job.
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The biggest opportunity isn’t having AI make decisions for you, it’s having AI eliminate the hours spent digging through dashboards, reports, and multiple API’s just to understand what’s happening with your brand.
Imagine opening your reporting and immediately seeing:
• What’s changing.
• Why it’s changed.
• Whether it actually matters.
• What action should be taken next.
That’s where AI creates leverage.
So why aren’t more people taking advantage of this opportunity? AI is only as good as the context you give it.
I’ve watched brands plug an optimization engine into their business, set an aggressive ROAS target, and let the software take over.
The result?
Budgets get cut.
Bids get reduced.
Top-line sales decline.
Not because AI failed.
Because nobody gave it the context that 60% of revenue was driven by advertising… or that pulling back Top of Search would hurt organic ranking and future demand.
Context changes everything.
That’s why I believe the future of AI in retail media isn’t about replacing strategists.
It’s about replacing the manual work that keeps strategists from doing strategy.