Commerce media networks across multiple industries are at varied stages of maturity, with few reaching advanced integration of strategy, technology, measurement, and operations, according to new research commissioned by Koddi and conducted by Forrester.
The findings, based on a survey of 788 global decision-makers, benchmark the progress of sectors such as retail, travel, financial services, real estate, transportation, and automotive.
Maturity segments
Companies surveyed were split into three distinct segments. Almost half (49%) fell into the Nascent category, indicating they were early in their commerce media journey, generally running pilot initiatives with limited first-party data. A further 38% were classified as Emerging, showing developing structure, defined revenue targets, and growing cross-team collaboration. Just 13% met the criteria for Trailblazers, where commerce media has become a core growth strategy, supported by connected technical infrastructure, AI-driven targeting, and measurement fully linked to business outcomes.
Sector progress
Retail emerged as the most mature sector, with 22% of respondents achieving Trailblazer status. Despite this, most retailers still need to unify their media ecosystems to improve scalability. Financial services also showed strong development in data maturity, with 26% able to offer full-funnel commerce media. However, their approach remains conservative when it comes to campaign activation, reflecting a prioritisation of governance over media expansion. Both retail and financial services need stronger data collaboration, automation, and attribution to promote scalable commerce media programmes.
Growth potential
In sectors such as real estate, home services, QSR (quick-service restaurants), travel, and hospitality, the study identified solid foundations but significant room for development. Real estate and home services benefit from high audience trust, yet lack the unified systems and automated workflows to enable large-scale monetisation. QSRs possess extensive transaction and loyalty data, but most are still experimenting in test-and-learn phases rather than operating at scale. The travel and hospitality segment leads in intent data collection, though the prevalence of fragmented systems and extended conversion cycles has limited maturity; only 8% were classed as Trailblazers.
Operational complexity
Companies in Emerging segments are more likely than Nascent peers to have set revenue targets, initiated early partnerships, and fostered cross-functional collaboration. Despite this, many face hurdles such as operational complexity and gaps in measurement accuracy, factors that must be addressed before they can progress to Trailblazer status.
Automotive and transport
The automotive and transportation sectors are predominantly in the Nascent phase. Automotive networks are rich in data resources, but fragmented execution has impeded progress, resulting in just 3% achieving Trailblazer status. Transportation and logistics firms excel with real-time data but have yet to establish unified governance and automation mechanisms, which are seen as prerequisites for reaching scale.
Industry outlook
Projections indicate that the commerce media market is set to exceed USD $1.3 trillion by 2030. Growth trajectories differ widely across verticals, from pilot efforts to fully developed enterprise programmes. The benchmark study suggests that sectors can benefit from adopting best practices from one another and addressing shared bottlenecks to hasten progress.
"The growth potential in commerce media is enormous, and unlocking it is a priority for businesses. One of the most important insights in this study is how differently each vertical is maturing. Retail leads in media sophistication, while financial services lead in data. Both can offer insights that the rest of the industry can learn from. This benchmark gives businesses a clear map of where strengths exist and how to apply those learnings across sectors to accelerate growth," said Nicholas Ward, President and Co-founder, Koddi.