Dive Brief:

• Target’s retail media network Roundel has introduced a new artificial intelligence-powered feature designed to help advertisers use the retailer’s first-party data and real-time shopping customer behavior to optimize offsite media campaigns, according to a company blog post. 
• With Precision Plus by Roundel, advertisers can leverage data to build and launch campaigns aligned to specific awareness, consideration and conversion goals across platforms including Google, Meta, Pinterest and The Trade Desk. 
• The retailer plans to invest heavily in Roundel throughout the year, including testing new in-store ad experiences like demos, sampling and digital screens; enhancing creative formats across the omnichannel journey, and providing more support for partners during seasonal campaigns.

Dive Insight:

Roundel has become a bright spot for Target at an otherwise troubled time for the retailer. The company’s revenue derived from its advertising business rose roughly 24% year over year to $649 million in 2024, with Roundel making up the lion’s share of the segment.

Target’s plans to invest in Roundel come at a pivotal time for retail media networks and may be designed to address some of the challenges brands have faced when trying to make use of retail media. Even though the space has become crowded with competition, most networks have yet to deliver on their promises of data usability for more efficient and effective marketing campaigns, according to research. 

The size and impact of retail media networks have been overstated, according to Forrester, due to the dominance of one player: Amazon. In 2024, Amazon Ads’ business was worth $47 billion, which was larger than all of the other retail networks combined. The next largest network was Walmart, with only $3.4 billion in revenue.

Precision Plus by Roundel joins other recent updates like the introduction of more competitive pricing for ads that are intended to boost Roundel. Other features being spotlighted by the retailer include Target Product Ads, which use Target data to meet customers where they are and have shown to increase sales growth by as much as 35%; a new self-service creative studio; geo-enabled measurement tools and a digital-out-of-home feature that can place ads on billboards near Target stores that is connected to Roundel for closed-loop measurement. 

Roundel works with more than 2,000 vendors, including publishers like Pinterest, PopSugar, NBCUniversal, Hearst, USA Today and The New York Times, to deliver ads for brands such as Apple and Mars Wrigley. The company claims its network drove more than 250 million visits to Target properties in 2024. 

Other retailers are also trying to make their media networks more competitive. Walmart, for instance, purchased electronics company Vizio for $2.3 billion last year, giving the retailer a foothold in the connected TV marketplace. The company also revamped its Sam’s Club Member Access Platform (MAP) with a stronger focus on personalized ads.