S6E1 Retail Media’s New Reality: DSP Shifts, Agentic Commerce & Brand Strategy for 2026

Season 6 of The Retail Razor Show kicks off with a deep dive into one of the most important topics in commerce today: retail media. Ricardo and Casey sit down with Jeff Cohen, Chief Business Development Officer at Skai, to unpack the newly released 2026 State of Retail Media Report, created in partnership with Stratably.

This episode explores how brands, versus retailers, are navigating the rapid evolution of retail media. From DSP shifts and CTV growth to AI adoption and agentic commerce, measurement challenges, and the widening gap between leaders and laggards, this conversation delivers the insights every brand marketer needs heading into 2026.

What We Cover

• Why retail media now commands nearly 30% of US digital ad spend
• The rise of retail media maturity and what separates leaders from laggards
• Why organizational structure is now a top predictor of retail media success
• The growing importance of Amazon DSP and Amazon Marketing Cloud (AMC)
• How brands should evaluate incrementality, attribution, and ROI
• Why CTV and sponsored brand video are accelerating
• The role of AI and agentic commerce in shaping future shopping journeys
• What brands must do in 2026 to stay competitive

Download the 2026 State of Retail Media Report (free):

https://skai.io/reports-and-whitepapers/2026-state-of-retail-media-report/

Subscribe to the Retail Razor Podcast Network: https://retailrazor.com/

Subscribe to our Newsletter: https://retailrazor.substack.com

Subscribe to our YouTube channel: https://bit.ly/RRShowYouTube

About our Guests

Jeff Cohen, Chief Business Development Officer, Skai

https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeffreycohen/

Jeff Cohen leads global business development at Skai, overseeing partnerships and innovation across the commerce media ecosystem. A recognized thought leader, he is focused on uniting brands, agencies, retailers, and publishers around the next era of growth. Previously, Jeff was Principal Evangelist at Amazon Ads.

Chapters:

00:00 Preview Teaser 

00:53 Show Intro 

03:45 Welcome Jeff Cohen 

06:24 Retail Media Maturity and Brand Strategies 

08:30 Leaders vs. Laggards in Retail Media 

12:12 Organizational Structure and Retail Media Success 

17:35 Amazon Ads and DSP Insights 

24:36 Evaluating Performance Across Platforms 

27:45 The Shift to Full Funnel Advertising 

29:46 Challenges in Measurement and Attribution 

30:50 The Role of AMC in Retail Media 

33:01 Incrementality and Budget Constraints 

35:45 AI's Impact on Retail Media 

37:10 Strategies for Brands in an AI World 

42:54 Key Takeaways and Final Thoughts 

48:21 Show Close

Meet your hosts, helping you cut through the clutter in retail & retail tech:

Ricardo Belmar is an NRF Top Retail Voice for 2025 and a RETHINK Retail Top Retail Expert from 2021 – 2026. Thinkers 360 has named him a Top 10 Thought Leader in Retail and AGI, a Top 50 Thought Leader in Management, Careers, and Transformation, and a Top 100 Thought Leader in Agentic AI and Digital Transformation. Thinkers 360 also named him a Top Digital Voice for 2024 and 2025. He is an advisory council member at George Mason University’s Center for Retail Transformation and the Retail Cloud Alliance. He was most recently the partner marketing leader for retail & consumer goods in the Americas at Microsoft.

Casey Golden is the North America Leader for Retail & Consumer Goods at CI&T, and CEO of Luxlock. She is a RETHINK Retail Top Retail Expert from 2023 - 2026, and Retail Cloud Alliance advisory council member. After a career on the fashion and supply chain technology side of the business, Casey is obsessed with the customer relationship between the brand and the consumer and is slaying franken-stacks and building retail tech! 

Includes music provided by imunobeats.com, featuring Overclocked, and E-Motive from the album Beat Hype, written by Heston Mimms, published by Imuno.