How automation and AI is reshaping the traditional upfront marketplace

That shift is seen at Disney and Warner Bros. Discovery, for example. In covering this year’s upfronts, Digiday reported that Disney sees 70% of its biddable inventory demand driven by upfront advertisers. Meanwhile, nearly half of Warner Bros. Discovery biddable demand stems from upfront advertisers. 

“As much as I hate to admit it, there is cost savings for an agency or brand to not have three or four people trafficking when it can be done through a computer,” Michael Burgi, senior editor, media buying and planning, at Digiday, said on a recent episode of the Digiday Podcast. 

Programmatic overhaul of the traditional marketplace

It’s an overhaul of the traditional marketplace. Just a few years ago, conversations were just starting about how programmatic spend commitments count toward upfront commitments. This year, tradition has been flipped on its head — proven by the Disney and WBD example.

To Burgi’s point, the catalyst for programmatic taking over the upfront is likely the industry’s need for efficiency, better audience targeting and cost savings. That only sets the stage for more execution and planning being handed over to AI agents. 

“As much as the upfront is a buying cycle, there’s so much planning that revolves around the upfront,” Burgi added. “It feels like that is a natural place for that kind of [AI] smarts to be applied.” 

Handing more to AI agents

Increasingly, the industry has cozied up to the idea of AI agents and bots taking over more execution and planning tasks. Earlier this year, NBCUniversal, RPA, Newton Research, and FreeWheel tested using AI agents to purchase advertising during a live NFL playoff game. (Find a closer look at how that experiment went here.) 

It’s only a matter of time before tech takes over the upfront deal. On one hand, there’s AI agents. On the other, companies like Amazon and Google are automating streaming inventory, which could push the upfront toward enterprise tech deals.  

Still, as with all things AI, humans are only willing to give up so much control. At the Digiday Programmatic Marketing Summit last month, a lot of the conversation focused on guardrails and guidelines. The question is how much control are media buyers willing to hand off to AI agents. What does the sweet spot look like between humans and machines when it comes to the upfronts?

“The chief investment officers, until they retire, aren’t going to give up too much more ground to do that, because relationships still have a part of this business,” Burgi said.