Social Rocket
Only 57 percent of marketing leaders believe their company's media mix 2026 is right – 2025 it was 64 percent. The new Kantar study “Media Reactions 2026” also shows larger investment plans for AI assistants and smaller creators. For German marketing teams, the key question is how new channels fit together with reliable impact measurement.
More data, less trust in media planning
Only 50 percent of the professionals surveyed trust their own balance between brand building and performance (2025: 60 percent). 51 percent believe they can derive sufficiently actionable insights from their data for marketing goals. These are self-assessments, not proof that 43 percent of companies are investing wrongly.
The study covers 806 senior marketing leaders worldwide (surveyed from 25 May to 21 July 2026) as well as 23.452 consumers in 33 markets, including Germany (3 July to 10 September). The figures used here are international; the press release does not report a separate German result.
AI assistants: 75 percent want to invest, 23 percent trust recommendations
According to Kantar, net 75 percent of marketing leaders plan higher investment in visibility in AI assistants, including advertising, for 2027. 62 percent expect generative AI to play an important role in brand recommendations. However, only 32 percent of consumers use AI assistants to research brands or products, and 23 percent trust their recommendations.
These different reference groups must not be directly offset against each other as advertising effect. Moreover, the intention to spend more money is not proof of ROI. Separate tests for organic discoverability in AI answers, paid formats and actual brand impact make sense. Our assessment of AI search budgets and agency forecasts also highlights this measurement gap.
Ad acceptance is not the same as reach
Kantar links ad acceptance to media usage (“Ad Equity”). Among consumers worldwide, Google, Amazon, YouTube, Instagram and Netflix lead; among marketing leaders, YouTube, Instagram, Google, TikTok and Netflix.
This does neither produce a German reach ranking nor a ROAS table. The ranking suggests considering ad environment, audience fit and ad acceptance separately – rather than equating your own platform preferences with consumer interest.
Smaller creators: What 66 and 61 percent mean
As future investment areas, 66 percent name micro-creators and 61 percent nano-creators; for macro-influencers it is 48 percent, for mega-influencers 42 percent. 66 percent does not mean a 66 percent budget increase, but a share of surveyed marketing leaders with investment intent.
Kantar also refers to its Creator Game Plan study from June 2026: platform engagement and brand-building potential matched in only about a third of the cases examined. Reach and likes alone are therefore not a sufficient basis for selection. What can be measured in creator marketing and where standards are missing is explained separately by Srocket.
The consequence for campaigns 2027
Before shifting budget, companies should record goal, measurement method and experiment: brand lift for brand building, qualified leads for B2B campaigns and incremental sales for sales targets. Cross-channel effects deserve particular attention. According to Kantar's own LIFT+ analyses, 2020–2025 43 percent of campaign effect came from the interplay of several channels, compared with 18 percent before 2014. This is a modelled result, not a figure that applies to every brand.
How cautiously individual metrics need to be interpreted is shown by our article on Heineken's measurement of attention and brand lift. The finding is not "put everything on AI and small creators", but test new media in a controlled way and prioritise impact over dashboard abundance.
Article image: official study motif "Media Reactions 2026". Image: Kantar.
Sources: Kantar Germany, Media Reactions 2026; Kantar, study page; Marketing Dive, 19.10.2026.