On March 4th, The ARF Creative Council hosted its “Brand Meets Game: Navigating Creative Strategy in High-Profile Sports Sponsorship” panel, a conversation about how brands develop creative strategies and measurement frameworks for major sports partnerships. Moderated by Creative Council member Jillian Rice (Ipsos), the panel featured Matthew Gottlieb (NBCUniversal), Kristen Rumble (The Coca‑Cola Company), and Trey Ballard (Bank of America). Panelists shared perspectives on how companies activate around major sporting events, maintaining authentic connections with fans while delivering measurable business outcomes for their brands. Kristen and Trey showed ads for their brands that had appeared in sports broadcasts to illustrate how their brand messages aligned with the spirits of the events.
The discussion explored how successful sports marketing requires a balance of cultural relevance, strong creative strategy, and disciplined measurement. Speakers highlighted the importance of planning well in advance of major sporting moments, leveraging audience insights to shape storytelling, and ensuring that brand activations feel natural within the broader sports experience.
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On February 25, leading authorities from OptiMine shared new research examining why marketing mix model (MMM) refresh cadence matters more than many brands realize. Attendees heard the latest insights from OptiMine’s Model Refresh Cadence project, examining how model degradation occurs over time and how refresh frequency impacts reliability and decision-making. Panelists shared real-world case studies based on brands that have successfully moved to faster refresh cycles, highlighting what changed operationally and what improved as a result.
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On February 19, 2026, the ARF Attribution Working Group hosted a deep‑dive session focused on the rapidly evolving landscape of Shoppable Ads, exploring how new formats are emerging, how they function across platforms, and how measurement practices are adapting. The discussion delved into shoppable ads across retail media networks, social platforms, display inventory, and connected TV environments, highlighting how these formats are redefining the relationship between media exposure and commerce outcomes.
The conversation built on the Working Group’s broader initiative to evaluate five emerging advertising channels, an effort informed by industry interviews and an agency/advertiser survey. The session was moderated by Chip Godfrey (Director, Data Strategy, J.D. Power, and a member of the ARF Attribution Working Group). The panelists were Yannick Koger (Sr. Manager, NA Retail Measurement Solutions, Pinterest), Jared Oliver (Manager, Advanced Analytics & Modeling, Ocean Spray and a member of the Attribution Working Group), and Phil X. Jackson (Director, Global Digital Marketing Effectiveness & Innovation, Haleon).
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On January 22, we introduced a fundamentally different paradigm: One-Demand Decision AI powered by Large Causal Models (LCMs) that move enterprises from descriptive insights to prescriptive growth recommendations through counterfactual causal reasoning. Attendees gained a clear understanding of how one-demand causal AI transforms descriptive correlation into prescriptive causation, what it takes to implement unified decision platforms at scale, and why now is the moment to rethink the measurement stack from first principles.
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