Digiday Daily

January 20, 2026

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Just as marketers were beginning to sketch out playbooks for turning chatbots into brand building machines, OpenAI made it clear the honeymoon was over. The company confirmed that advertising will start rolling out in ChatGPT in the U.S. over the coming weeks.

TOP STORY

Marketing on Platforms

As OpenAI gears up to launch ChatGPT ads, marketers try to keep up

Marketers were just getting used to how to show up organically in the platform. Now they have to figure out the next phase: paid.

OTHER THINGS TO KNOW

While in-content targeting might place an ad for products relevant to the genre a viewer enjoys, weather targeting can add a crucial layer of physical and emotional context. Partner insights from The Weather Company.
Discounts are like empty calories — revenue without positive contribution. A unified incentives marketing strategy aligns internal teams around a shared strategy to build customer lifetime value and increase profits. Partner Insights from Talon.One.
Successful brands are pairing the flexibility of programmatic buying with the access to premium ad inventory and consumer data from publisher-direct buys to gain scale, efficiency and full-funnel impact across CTV. Partner insights from Tatari.

MARKETING & PLATFORMS

Not all creators are the same: How the creator economy breaks down by business model

Breaking down the creator economy by business model, from audience-owned media companies to micro creators with a niche.

AI Revenue Generation

The top AI platforms for publishers, ranked

Digiday’s Jessica Davies and Sara Guaglione joined the Digiday Podcast to handicap the more than a half-dozen AI platforms, from Amazon to OpenAI, that have begun doing business with publishers.

PARTNER INSIGHTS FROM META

How advertisers maximize conversions post-holiday rush

During Q5, CPMs decrease while cost-per-action reaches pre-Black Friday levels, according to internal data from Meta.

A MESSAGE FROM TDFOUNDATION

First can’t miss digital media event of 2026

Continue to ring in the New Year on Jan. 22 at the TDF Holiday Cocktails Gala, hosted by New York Athletic Club. Come celebrate the TD Foundation’s 2025 successes and discuss how they’ve helped the children and families of wounded warriors and fallen heroes. Tickets are $300 — $200 for young professionals under 30. Join the 20th annual event at 180 Central Park South, New York, NY 10019, and enjoy spectacular views of Central Park.

RSVP Now

Retail Media Rewritten

How brands like Vuori, Rothy’s and Away have adapted to the new DTC landscape

At NRF 2026, a panel of executives laid out the lessons learned from operating DTC brands over the past decade.

PARTNER INSIGHTS FROM EXPERIAN

How marketers are interpreting context in real time

Context takes many forms, often operating beneath the surface of consumer activity. Marketers are increasingly using technology to interpret these micro-signals, enhancing predictive accuracy and creative alignment.