Overwhelmed, Underperforming? Agile Media Execution Is the Way Forward
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Pathlabs Marketing |
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August 1, 2025 |
Media buyers in 2025 are under more pressure than ever. More platforms to manage, tighter deadlines to hit, and sky-high performance expectations to meet. Sure, the tech has evolved. But the job? It’s only gotten harder.
Today’s media buyers have access to advanced tools: AI-powered DSPs, real-time cross-channel dashboards, and robust marketing automation. And yet, the job isn’t getting any easier.
Programmatic continues to dominate the landscape. In fact, by 2026, nearly 90% of global ad spend is expected to flow through automated channels.
Still, 64% of U.S. ad buyers say they’ll be dedicating more resources to cross-platform measurement this year, and 60% report struggling to align their campaign strategy with business objectives.
So, why are media buyers struggling, even as technology improves?
In this blog, we’ll unpack the biggest challenges facing media buyers today, explore the deeper issues those challenges point to, and share how agency leaders can better support their teams to drive growth in a rapidly changing advertising landscape.
Why Media Buyer Burnout Is So High in 2025
If you're leading an independent agency, you know that media buying has evolved into an uphill battle. Yet, there’s no time for media buyers to catch their breath. Consider that:
Approximately 20,000 new advertisers are projected to join CTV in 2025.
Retail media networks are projected to grow 22% year-over-year in 2025.
Marketers are projected to spend $138.7 billion on paid search in 2025, the highest investment among digital advertising channels.
In addition to the surge in digital advertising demand, media buyers are struggling to stay afloat due to the following stresses.
More Channels, Less Control
Advertisers are investing across more digital channels than ever, over 20 channels on average, so it’s no surprise that media buyers are overwhelmed.
Every moment spent trying to coordinate across different vendors, platforms, and internal teams is one less moment spent optimizing performance. At the same time, media buyers are expected to move quickly, optimize in real time, and demonstrate results faster than ever before. When every budget shift or optimization requires multiple approvals and manual steps, agility becomes an unattainable goal.
These delays can be the difference between winning and losing.
This constant juggling act leads to slower turnarounds, missed opportunities, and a significant strain on agency resources.
Results Are Hard to Prove
Media buyers must show tangible results that demonstrate performance and growth. However, fragmentation is a major roadblock to proving their value.
Fragmented reporting across platforms forces media buyers into manual reporting gymnastics, wasting time and making it harder to prove campaign ROI.
This lack of efficiency forces media buyers to focus on logistics rather than strategy. They end up spending so much time managing campaigns that they struggle to optimize in real-time, test new approaches, or adjust for emerging trends.
The result? Burnout.
Speed Kills Strategy. Strategy Slows Speed.
As digital channels constantly evolve, campaigns must launch quickly to reach their audience where they are, but that can be a moving target. Moving too fast means sacrificing critical steps, such as audience segmentation, targeting, and forecasting. This leads to a greater need for optimization, which, as we’ve shown above, results in more delays and inefficiencies. The result is wasted budgets, missed opportunities, and underperformance.
But moving too slowly can be just as costly. The industry moves quickly, and even a brief delay can result in missing an opportunity created by external factors such as seasonality, economic shifts, or platform algorithm changes. So, what’s the answer? How can media buyers move fast without sacrificing precision? The answer isn’t more tools. It’s a smarter media execution model built for agility from the ground up.
Meet Your Next Agile Media Solution: Pulse by Pathlabs
Agility isn’t a buzzword; it’s a survival strategy. Pulse by Pathlabs is built to deliver it at scale.
Pulse empowers media buyers to focus on what matters through a single point of entry model, providing them with:
On-demand scalability.
Real-time optimization.
Single point of entry for omnichannel execution.
Test-and-scale methodology.
Access to expert media talent & AI-powered tools.
The Power Shift In Media Buying Has Already Begun
Ad spend is shifting away from giant holding companies and toward tech-savvy agencies that can navigate the complexity of modern media execution. After peaking at roughly 40% in 2015, the “big six” holding groups now control just 30% of the U.S. ad agency market, proof that clients are increasingly rewarding agility over scale.
To seize this moment, independent agency media buyers need modern tools and streamlined workflows that let them launch, optimize, and scale campaigns without the usual burnout. Agencies that arm their teams with real-time budget controls, rapid test capabilities, and unified reporting won’t just survive; they’ll outpace the competition with faster pivots, bolder experiments, and clear, measurable growth.
Discover How Agile Execution Can Transform Your Media Buying
Media buyer burnout doesn’t have to be the status quo.
By embracing agile execution and adopting the right tools, media buyers can stay ahead of the competition and deliver higher performance for their advertisers more quickly. That means less channel chaos, easier reporting, and the perfect balance of campaign speed and strategy.
It’s all possible with Pulse by Pathlabs.
Pulse empowers your media team to reclaim control, launch smarter, and optimize faster, without the complexity. Ready to move beyond burnout?
