Traditional Media Planning Faces a Challenge When Three Systems Absorb Nearly 80% of Spending.
WARC propose to think about complete systems rather than isolated channels.
Image: WARC Future of Media 2026 · original publication Image source ↗
What happened
WARC describes an extraordinary concentration of advertising spending on medium retail, paid and social search, and propose "systems planning" as an answer.
What changes
Media purchases are connected with purchase data, search intention and social behaviour within large ecosystems.
Why it matters
Optimizing each campaign independently can hide dubious, dependent and cover gaps.
Implications for businesses
A small strategy can adopt the same logic: defining what system captures intention, what creates demand and what converts.
One Rhino’s take
It's not about being everywhere. It's about knowing what function each place has and how to get information back to the rest of the system.
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