Retail has always held a high bar for relevance. AI is raising it even further.

That is one of the clearest takeaways from our AI in Retail report, based on a survey of 225 senior retail marketers at the director level and above. Nearly every respondent sees AI playing a larger role in performance moving forward, and 98% believe AI will make owned channels more important than earned channels in driving results.

Retail teams are already testing AI across search, ads, websites, and messaging. The bigger question now is where it creates the most value.

More and more evidence points to owned channels. Email and mobile are where brands already have trust, customer data, and direct relationships. Those conditions make them ideal environments for AI to deliver stronger relevance and better long-term performance.

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Retail Didn’t Wait for AI

AI is moving quickly from experimentation into everyday marketing workflows.

It’s no longer just, hey, let’s use ChatGPT every once in a while. It’s actually part of your ongoing strategy now.

Kayla Brown

Director, Customer Lifecycle, Hibbett

Retailers are seeing the results of that shift. Forty-five percent of organizations say the value they receive from AI is growing. Most expect the impact on personalization and relevance to increase significantly over the next two to three years.

Paid media and AI-powered search have attracted a large share of early investment. That makes sense. These channels influence visibility and acquisition.

Owned channels operate differently. Email and mobile shape how a brand continues the relationship after the first interaction. They influence repeat purchases, loyalty, and lifetime value.

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Why Owned Channels Matter More Now

Retailers rely on digital ads and search because those channels show clear attribution to revenue.

Email and mobile are measured in a broader way. They influence engagement, experience quality, and the long-term relationship with customers. These channels also reach customers directly, which raises the expectation for relevance.

The real move is to stop running email and mobile like two separate programs and start treating them like one relationship, where the channel fits the moment and the message fits intent.

Aditya Vempaty

VP of Marketing, MoEngage

Owned channels also require precision. Messages arrive directly in a customer’s inbox or on their phone. Poor timing or irrelevant content is immediately visible.

That higher standard explains why adoption has been more measured. When AI performs well in these channels, the results tend to carry across the rest of the marketing mix.

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The Gap Comes Down to Execution

Retailers are enthusiastic about AI, though confidence in where it delivers the most value is still forming.

Many organizations began their experimentation in areas such as search, advertising, and social media. Those environments make it easier to run fast tests without risking customer relationships.

Email and mobile programs require stronger foundations. High-quality customer data, integrated systems, and clear governance all play a role.

The research reflects that reality:

• 43% cite privacy and compliance as the top barrier to AI adoption
  
  
• 32% struggle with integrating AI into existing systems
  
  
• 60% say high-quality customer data is the biggest enabler of success

The brands moving fastest on AI are the ones who stopped treating privacy as an obstacle and started treating it as a competitive advantage.

Erin Kelsh

VP of Messaging Solutions & Innovation, Merkle

Retailers that are seeing progress tend to start with focused use cases. They look for areas where customer benefit is clear and data foundations are strong.

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🛒 Real Examples of AI in Retail

Several retailers featured in the report have already demonstrated what that progress looks like in practice.

Hibbett: Relevance at Scale

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Hibbett faced a challenge familiar to many retail teams. Their email calendar was busy and highly manual. Messages relied on historical segmentation and marketer assumptions.

After implementing Movable Ink Da Vinci and Studio, the program shifted toward real-time personalization. AI determines which story each customer sees, while dynamic product grids surface relevant inventory automatically.

Here’s a look at the impact:

• 40% lift in conversions
  
  
• 46% lift in revenue per send
  
  
• 30% lift in click-through rate
  
  

AI is key to remaining relevant to the customer and personalizing experiences at scale. There is no way one person or one team can manually output a personalized journey for every single customer.

Kayla Brown

Director, Customer Lifecycle, Hibbett

The change also gave the team back time. Automation reduced manual production work, which created more space for testing and strategy.

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Ballard Designs: More Intentional Creative Decisions

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Ballard Designs already had strong creative assets and a loyal audience. Their team wanted deeper insight into which content actually influenced purchasing decisions.

During a living room promotion, every subscriber received the same offer, though the visual experience varied based on predicted preferences. Some customers saw rugs, others lighting or décor, depending on what the model expected them to engage with.

The results were dramatic:

• 11× increase in conversions
  
  
• 25× increase in revenue per send
  
  
• 2× increase in average order value
  
  

The findings also helped the team prioritize their creative investments more effectively.

We see it working now and believe it will only get better.

Melissa Metcalf

Senior Manager, CRM Marketing

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Currys: Stronger Performance with More Precise Targeting

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Currys wanted to improve the relevance of their email program while reducing the time required to produce campaigns.

Using Da Vinci, the team shifted toward AI-selected creative and more strategic targeting. Campaigns were distributed in stages over two weeks rather than delivered in a single broad send.

Performance improved across several metrics:

• 49% lift in click-through rate
  
  
• 30% lift in conversions
  
  
• 37% lift in revenue per send
  
  

Campaign production timelines also dropped from three weeks to two days.

What AI has done for our teams is it’s really galvanised them. It’s made their day to day more interesting.

Claire Chandler

Senior CRM Manager, Currys

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Where Humans Still Lead

One of the most consistent insights from the research and panel discussion is that AI works best when paired with human judgment. It’s Marketer AND Machine, after all.

AI helps analyze data, surface patterns, and automate repetitive tasks. Marketing teams still guide strategy, creative direction, and brand voice.

The survey reflects that balance. Strategic thinking, creative problem-solving, and AI proficiency ranked as the most important skills for marketers moving forward.

The future isn’t AI; the future is working with AI.

Madeleine Stroth

Senior Manager, Customer Strategy & Owned Media Activation, Walgreens

Retail marketing remains deeply human. Customer trust, storytelling, and brand identity continue to shape every successful campaign.

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The Biggest Opportunity for Retailers

• Start with focus, not just adoption
  AI is already in place. The next step is applying it intentionally.
  
  
• Prioritize owned channels first
  Email and mobile offer the richest data, strongest relationships, and best context for AI to drive impact.
  
  
• Use AI to enhance what already works
  Apply it where you already understand your customers and have proven engagement.