Political Ad Spending Drives Up Media Costs

The DL: Political money is crowding regional brands out of fourth quarter media. With roughly $8.2 billion of midterm spending headed to TV and CTV, agencies report linear CPMs in Texas up 10% to 15%, some programs far higher, and premium streaming rising too. Local sellers can also bump regular advertisers for political buyers through pre-emption clauses, and the safe havens that ban political ads are getting pricier as advertisers flock to them. This matters for our regional clients in health care, higher education and restaurants, who cannot simply skip a market the way national brands can and who rely on holiday momentum. The practical takeaway is to review pre-emption terms and make-good options, line up flexible inventory beyond linear, and weigh the cost of going dark, which one agency says is hard to recover from.

Young Adults Shift to Ad-Supported Streaming

The DL: Young adults haven’t left TV. They’ve moved to ad-supported streaming. Samba TV shows 25–34 ad reach up across every category it tracks, which backs up some of the CTV weighting we’re already using with our clients. The catch is that reach doesn’t buy memory: most viewers can’t name the advertisers on shows they watch. For 2027 plans, the takeaway is to protect CTV in the mix for 18–34 audiences and put real effort into CTV-specific creative and rotation, rather than repurposed social cuts if possible.

SMBs Adapt to AI Search

The DL: AI tools like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Perplexity are becoming a real discovery channel for small and medium-sized businesses, and most SMBs have noticed. A recent EMARKETER and Semify survey found that 38.7% of SMB marketers saw meaningful new traffic from AI tools in the past year, and 76% now rate appearing in AI-generated answers as very or extremely important. But awareness is running ahead of execution. Measuring ROI is the top obstacle (cited by 56%), because AI recommendations often skip the clicks and referral data that traditional search tracking depends on. Only 14.7% of SMBs feel very confident optimizing for AI search. No one has pulled ahead yet: 40% think they’re on equal footing with competitors. EMARKETER analyst Kelsey Voss advises SMBs not to wait for a standard AI visibility metric, and to start now by setting baselines and tracking outcomes they already measure, like leads, calls, and bookings.

MediAI Minute

Proving AI's Value in Healthcare

DL: As public skepticism about AI grows, healthcare communicators are rethinking how they tell stories about the technology. Rather than emphasizing AI's potential, the focus is shifting to tangible results, including advances in cancer detection, sepsis prevention, and communication for patients with ALS. It is important to address concerns about accuracy, safety, and human oversight. For PR professionals, the takeaway is to lead with real-world applications, measurable outcomes and the people benefiting from the technology, rather than relying on broad promises about innovation.