McKinsey identifies five operational priorities that separate winning commerce media networks from the rest. The challenge for most networks is not knowing what to do, but how to execute — requiring new skills and roles, deeper data and technology integration, and tighter coordination across commercial, product, and analytics teams. Leading CMNs are redesigning how they plan, build, sell, and measure media rather than layering point solutions onto legacy models.

Key Data Points

• Be explicit about where to win: benchmark against buyer alternatives and concentrate investment on a few differentiated strengths

• Industrialize measurement: integrate incrementality and performance measurement into a single system — trust, not data volume, drives durable spend

• Make omnichannel real: define audiences once and activate across on-site, off-site, upper-funnel, and in-store channels with holistic reporting