Epsilon Retail Media: 8 development leaps that built a unified commerce engine

With more than 200 retail media networks now competing for advertiser attention, the retail media market has moved decisively beyond basic activation.

Winning today is about operating retail media with the same commercial discipline that brands expect from any mature advertising channel; maximising return for advertisers while building sustainable, high‑margin revenue for retailers.

Since acquiring CitrusAd in 2021, Epsilon Retail Media teams have focused squarely on that shift. The result is a set of platform upgrades designed to help retailers and brands operate at speed, extract more value from every impression, and demonstrate genuine business impact.

Here we dive into 8 of key strategic developments.

1. Auto-bidding: Maximising retail media conversion

Retail Media auctions move too fast for human optimisation to keep up. The result is conservative bids when demand is strong, wasted spend when demand slows, and teams spending time tweaking numbers instead of driving growth.

What Epsilon changed

Epsilon introduced real‑time auto‑bidding for retail media sponsored ads. The system evaluates every auction using both historical and live signals to predict conversion likelihood, adjusting bids dynamically rather than relying on manual inputs.

In practice, that meant

• Bids automatically increase when conversion probability is high and scale back when signals weaken.
• Efficiency and win rate are balanced in real time, enabling higher ROAS.

2. Campaign auto pacing: fixing the retail media underspend problem

When retail media budgets can move with real trading conditions rather than being locked to arbitrary daily caps, spend concentrates naturally around high‑traffic moments, delivery becomes more consistent across the month, and performance improves.

What Epsilon changed

Epsilon shifted campaign budgeting from fixed daily limits to fluid monthly orchestration. Retail Media spend now flexes automatically, accelerating on strong days and recovering underspend later in the month.

In practice, that meant

• Dynamic pacing that reallocates budget based on traffic and performance signals
• Flexible daily caps, allowing spend to scale up to 2x on peak demand days

3. In-store measurement with unified retail media reporting

Across the advertising landscape, what can easily be seen and optimised has come to dominate decision‑making. That has meant retail media performance has been judged largely through digital outcomes, while a significant share of retail sales still happens in-store.

What Epsilon changed

Epsilon extended its unified measurement to directly connect retail media activity with in‑store sales. Onsite and offsite media are also now measured together, deduplicated and attributed across touchpoints, eliminating any double counting.

In practice, that meant

• Direct in‑store sales attribution linked to media exposure
• Unified, deduplicated reporting across onsite and offsite channels with fractional attribution

4. Audiences as a revenue engine

The real opportunity in retail media is the depth and quality of retailer first‑party data. For brands, it has the power to transform how audiences are activated and measured, but that only happens when data is packaged properly and usable across channels.

What Epsilon changed

Epsilon moved audience targeting beyond basic segmentation and into intelligent audience monetisation. Retailer first‑party data is directly integrated, allowing audiences to be activated both onsite and offsite, with clear governance.

In practice, that meant

• Activation of transaction‑based retailer audiences across onsite and offsite media
• Team‑level controls that enable retailers to package, protect and sell premium audience segments

5. Monetisation control and brand bulk activation

Retail media only works as a serious commercial channel when two things are true: retailers must be able to protect and price their most valuable moments properly, and brands must be able to act at scale without getting buried in operational friction.

What Epsilon changed

Epsilon strengthened retailer-level pricing control, allowing set minimum bids at placement level, protecting high‑value inventory. In parallel, bulk campaign actions remove the operational drag that slows down large‑scale advertiser activation.

In practice, that meant

• Placement‑level minimum bids so homepage, checkout and promotional inventory delivers premium value
• Bulk actions that allow it’s possible to create 1,000 banner campaigns in a single action and managed in a single workflow

6. API evolution: built for scale and automation

For brands and agencies, retail media must play nicely among lots of different tools. APIs enable greater automation, system-to-system integration, secure access control and the ability to move large volumes of creative without human bottlenecks.

What Epsilon changed

Epsilon has deliberately engineered the Epsilon Retail Media platform to be programmable by default. The focus is on API depth, stability and control, so retail media can be integrated into broader ad tech and martech stacks rather than operated in isolation.

In practice, that meant

• Support for heavier creative workflows, including campaign file uploads up to 4GB and brand page creatives, with performance tracking and reconciliation via API
• Robust operational and security controls for bulk team management and environment-specific endpoints to separate testing from live activity

7. A rebuilt user experience

When tools feel more like spreadsheets than software, time is wasted, insights are missed and the most advanced capabilities go untouched. For brands, that slows decision‑making. For retailers, it caps adoption and limits growth.

What Epsilon changed

Epsilon overhauled the platform experience across campaign management and reporting. The focus was on clarity, speed and discoverability, so new and existing capabilities are easy to find, easy to use and easy to act on, without specialist training.

In practice, that meant

• Faster, more intuitive navigation across complex campaign portfolios and reports
• Streamlined workflows that reduce onboarding time and improve day‑to‑day adoption across brands and retailer teams

Epsilon Retail Media - a unified, retail growth engine

These retail media updates aren’t incidental; they reflect an ecosystem evolving to meet the needs of retailers and sophisticated brands.

Epsilon Retail Media enables:

• Retailers to maximise yield, monetise data and scale operations efficiently
• Brands to drive campaign performance, reach the right audiences and prove ROI

The direction is clear: Retail media is no longer just a channel; it’s a core growth engine. And Epsilon is building the infrastructure to optimise outcomes at scale with tools that drive revenue, not just efficiency. Epsilon powers scalable retail media growth for retailers and brands.

Discover more about Epsilon Retail Media capabilities