WPP Media's Oxford-Style Debate on Creative Versus Paid Media

When AI sits between a brand and its shopper, does the sale get won by media placement or by what the brand says? At Retail Media Pioneers 2026, WPP Media put that argument to a formal vote. The session ran as an Oxford-style debate, complete with a motion, and an audience poll taken before and after. Naomi Boonin, VP Commerce UK at WPP Media, chaired the debate. Deni Petrova, VP Commerce at WPP Media, argued for the motion; Marco Bezerra, Executive Creative Director at WPP, argued against it.

The question echoed elsewhere at the event. In an earlier panel forecasting retail media in 2028, Zalando’s Jan Schmitz argued that the industry’s silo between brand and performance was capping its growth. This debate picked up the same fault line from a different angle. Does that silo reflect two disciplines competing for the same job, or two disciplines doing entirely different jobs that both matter?

An AI shortlist has room for only a few brands

Petrova opened by ruling out a straw man, since she was not arguing that AI changes everything marketers already know. Her evidence: How Humans Decide study reviewed more than a million purchase journeys. It found that 84% of purchases go to a brand the customer was already buying. Loyalty, she said, is still doing most of the work.

What changes, in her view, is the environment that loyalty gets tested in. She illustrated the point with a specific ask: a three-seater sofa, two kids, absolutely no beige. An AI assistant answers that kind of question with a short list. The list is built from a few concrete signals: structured product data, a strong digital footprint, and mentions across forums and social media. Somewhere on that list sits a labelled sponsored placement. “Unless there is a sponsored placement there,” she said, “this brand will never end up in my consideration.”

The next fight is for a share of the solution

Petrova’s sharper argument came later, when she pushed the example further. Ask an AI system how to make a small living room more functional, rather than asking for a product. The answer might not involve buying anything: move the furniture around, add shelving, clear the clutter. In that scenario, brands are not competing only with rivals in the same category. They are competing with every alternative way of solving the customer’s problem, most of which involve no purchase at all.

“The biggest challenge for brands going forward will not be how do I place my sponsor in the most relevant environment,” she said, “but how do I earn my share of solution.”

Creativity, Bezerra argues, decides what happens before the search starts

Bezerra opened by defining terms. Creativity, he argued, is not only messaging. It combines innovation, which creates differentiation, and storytelling, which creates meaning, and both happen long before anyone opens an AI assistant.

He made his case with a personal story. Shopping for a new family car, he fed an AI agent his full brief: reliability, budget, a car that would not break down. The system built a shortlist and recommended a Toyota Corolla Touring Sports, a practical, well-reviewed hatchback. Bezerra bought a Honda HR-V instead, at a higher price and with a smaller boot. The reason: his daughter told him the Corolla, in her words, was not a very beautiful car.

The AI had done the research and produced a rational shortlist, exactly as it was supposed to. What decided the purchase was an emotional response the system never accounted for. “When the price is the same,” he said, “I think brand and creativity will win 100% of the time.”

A debate that ended where it started

The room never fully picked a side. An audience poll taken before the debate and again after it showed the vote still split down the middle. Petrova and Bezerra spent as much time agreeing as arguing. Both accepted that AI narrows the list a shopper sees, and both accepted that something beyond the algorithm decides which brand gets chosen from that list.

The same split showed up a day later, from a different angle. Zalando’s Jan Schmitz had argued that retail media’s growth depends on breaking down the wall between brand and performance budgets. This debate suggested a reason the wall persists. Paid media and creative operate in different parts of the funnel, yet they are still contesting credit for the same eventual sale.