By Krystal Scanlon • March 26, 2025 •
Ivy Liu
It’s hard to deny that AI will have a larger part of media buying — even as marketers will stall, resist and negotiate every inch of the way.
And who can blame them? The uneasy feeling that handing over control to AI, whether through Google’s Performance Max or Meta’s Advantage+ which each promised easier media buying, puts them further from understanding what they’re actually buying has been gnawing at them for a while. Back in December, media buyers voiced those concerns to Digiday. Now, it looks like they’re finally doing something about it.
That’s certainly true of one client at audience curation business Crowd Louder Media. According to John Davis, director of audience development at the company, they have just cut their Google spend by 50% — most of which was going on Performance Max — and moved half of it into the open web. However they didn’t share specifics on how much that spend accounted for. To be fair, some of this pushback stems from marketers hitting the ceiling on Performance Max, where pouring in more dollars just leads to diminishing returns, Nevertheless, those concerns might’ve been easier to stomach they say, if the platform’s AI had inspired more confidence.
“I have clients who’ve transitioned out of Performance Max completely, to a mix of Google ads, search campaigns and outside of the walled garden, open web campaigns using display and online video and connectedTV, etc,” he said. “I’d even expect to be able to cut a Facebook budget in half as well.”
It’s a similar perspective for Sara Kerr, associate media director at ZGM Modern Marketing Partners.
“I had one client where their Performance Max CPM was pretty much the same as their search CPM, so I cut their PMax spend in half,” she said. “We’re actually onboarding a client right now where they have a horrifically large spend in Performance Max that I’m immediately concerned about. It’s going to be a tough conversation.”
These concerns aren’t new. The lack of transparency around where ads are going, what’s working and whether the return justifies the spend has long been a sore spot. But now, those lingering doubts are turning into action, driven by a growing realization that these AI-driven solutions may not be as efficient as promised.
At best this means wasted budget; at worst it can mean losing control of the entire media strategy.
“Some days it [Google’s Performance Max] might spend almost nothing, and then it might spend double or even triple the budget. I’ve seen it happen,” said Kerr. “For example, I saw it had such a high CPM though I was sure it was only running in search. They [Google] really do need to allow you to see where all the placements are running.”
And what probably didn’t help was the recent Adalytics report that found ads being served next to child porn — a sobering reminder of the risks that can happen when marketers are not in control of their own advertising.
“In the marketing and media space right now, there’s a lack of transparency and questions over where our ads are showing up,” said Mary Ann Pruitt, president and CEO of Mosaic Media. “Plus Google and Meta will most likely also have some legislation and regulations that will take place. All of these things are continuing to fuel what already was a baseline of distrust.”
Still, it’s tough to say whether these moves are a sign of real change or just a stall tactic. After all, platforms don’t take their cues from advertisers — they play their own game and everyone else is left reacting. That won’t change unless marketers start walking away from these solutions. And judging by the latest data, that’s nowhere near happening.
Meta, for example, revealed during its 2024 fourth quarter earnings that Advantage+ revenue surpassed a $20 billion annual run-rate, growing 70% year over year. And while Alphabet didn’t explicitly call out Google Performance Max’s run rate for the same time period, a report by Tinuiti indicated that more than 95% of retail advertisers running shopping ads had adopted PMax. Additionally, PMax made up 69% of shopping ad spend for the median retailer during the same Q4 2024, per Tinuiti’s report.
Maybe this is just another doomed attempt by marketers to wrest even a sliver of control from the platforms. Time will tell.
“Their [Google] typical response is “give it time” and trust us to handle your advertising by leveraging our AI,” said TJ Kropp, head of search at Ramp97. “However, when campaign performance using their AI black box dips, there is no ‘why’. The lack of transparency to reproduce or improve upon campaign results is a significant deterrent. It forces us to focus on ‘traditional’, controllable methods that can drive optimal results.”
Maybe this is just another doomed attempt by marketers to wrest even a sliver of control from the platforms. What’s clear already, though, is the creeping regret that’s settled over much of the industry. Marketers are investing in tools that get the job done but there’s a gnawing sense that something better might’ve been within reach if they’d played it differently. That’s the sting: not failure, but the uneasy feeling they settled too soon. Perhaps, that’s what this pushback really signals — a reckoning not just with platforms but their own uneasy compromises.
“Many marketers today are already comfortable with spending millions of dollars on (non-AI powered) black boxes: connectedTV being one of them,” said Brian Leder, founder and president of Ramp97. “For those marketers who are already comfortable buying in non-transparent environments, we hope there’s no further capitulation to this defacto way of advertising.”
A Google spokesperson said the company is aware of these concerns from advertisers and noted that Performance Max is designed to support diverse business goals, with recent updates like asset-level reporting and impression share metrics driven by feedback. The spokesperson also pointed to tools for budget management, placement transparency and strict policies to ensure brand safety, especially around age-sensitive content.
Additionally, in response to this article, a Meta spokesperson told Digiday: “The vast majority of feedback we hear about Meta Advantage+ is overwhelmingly positive given its proven ability to efficiently drive results at scale. Advertisers have the control to choose what ad tools they use and define the conversions they value most.”
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