The Interactive Advertising Bureau on September 10 raised its 2026 U.S. ad-spend forecast to 12.3% growth, up 2.8 points from the 9.5% projection it issued in January. The refresh, drawn from more than 200 brand and agency decision-makers, arrives days before IAB Global Creator Week opens across 17 markets, wrapping September 18 after CreatorFronts, the Podcast Upfront, and PlayFronts converge September 15–17.

The composition of that growth matters more than the headline. Customer acquisition jumped nine points to become the top media investment goal at 63%, with brand equity up six points to 43% and repeat purchases essentially flat at 24%. Buyers are chasing new customers because the surfaces where those customers appear have moved.

“Marketers have spent a lot of time asking, ‘How can I use AI?’ Now the question is becoming, ‘How do I reach a consumer who uses AI?’” said Chris Bruderle, IAB’s vice president of industry insights and content strategy.

Social leads channel growth at 16.5%, connected TV at 15.6%, commerce media at 13.6%. Linear television contracts 1.5%. Creator advertising, pegged at $44 billion this year (up from $13.9 billion in 2021 and $29.5 billion in 2024), is expanding roughly four times faster than the industry. Paid search grows 8.1%.

Measurement is catching up unevenly. 86% of buyers are changing how they measure performance within a year; 76% are optimizing content for AI-generated answers, 72% are working on large language models, and 48% now track brand citations directly inside AI tools. Yet 44% call AI-driven search their top challenge, 45% cite journey comparison, and 38% flag AI slop. Per PPC Land, just 16% of brands systematically track their AI visibility, while more than twenty vendors return conflicting results week to week.

“The first half was strong, major live events delivered, and advertisers have increasingly powerful tools in their arsenal to find and engage customers,” said IAB chief executive David Cohen, adding that “there is growth to be found, but there are no easy wins.”

The 2008 shift from print to search rewarded advertisers who moved first. The current fragmentation across creators, chatbots, and gaming looks structurally similar, and the smallest operators are again the slowest to arrive.

Sources