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Boston Consulting Group's Lauren Wiener says the next wave of retail media involves more strategic partnerships around business intelligence. She dined with Kerry this month for our "1 big meal" interview series.

Why it matters: Wiener joined BCG in 2019 as a managing director and partner. She leads the retail media and data monetization team globally and is part of the North America leadership team in marketing. She previously was CEO of Tremor Video.

🏢 Why we chose the restaurant: Cecconi's in Dumbo. BCG's Brooklyn office is in the building. Wiener says the firm viewed this location as a great place to attract digital and creative talent and loves the restaurant for its "amazing menu and creative flair."

🇮🇹 What we ate: She ate the branzino and drank iced tea. I ate the orecchiette and drank water.

This interview was edited for clarity, style and length.

What tangible impacts of genAI are you seeing?

"[In our recent] survey ... three-fifths of the CMOs said that they were driving genAI in their organization. ... The first sets of use cases have really been around efficiency, things like improving the speed and pace of content creation."

"What people are hoping for is the effectiveness part of it, and in particular, we're looking forward to greater impact on personalization when genAI is combined with predictive AI."

At Cannes, there was a lot of conversation about partnerships with retailers and content companies? Do you expect more?

"The next wave of growth to get [retail media] to $100 billion is contingent on retailers being able to access brand dollars ... which have traditionally gone to TV, to some extent, to print and radio."

"What needs to happen for retail media is for it to truly become media and to be able to have the kinds of engaging content formats that allow CMOs to tell the stories that connect and drive awareness of new products at scale."

"It's [also] about those strategic partnerships between retailers and brands where they can give them data on their customers ... not just data that your advertising worked ... but data about their market share versus other brands, data that helps them inform what new products to develop."

What's the impact of Google's decision on third-party cookies?

"Google has about 65% of the browser share, but the other browsers, Firefox and Apple, previously made the decision to deprecate cookies. Already, what marketers were facing has been a decline in the effectiveness."

"For a while now, we've been advising our clients a couple of things. One of them is to develop their own first-party capabilities for targeting. A second one is to also look at what we call zero-party data and second-party data. Zero-party data is around preferences. ... Second-party data is partnerships."

🖼️ 1 fun fact: Wiener says she loves to collect modern art, which stemmed from her daughter's passion for painting. Her favorite Brooklyn artists are Landon Metz and Julia Chang.

Boston Consulting Group's Lauren Wiener chats genAI and retail media

GenAI has brought efficiency. CMOs want effectiveness.

Photo illustration of Lauren Wiener in front of a picnic table print background.

Lauren Wiener. Photo illustration: Axios Visuals. Photo: Courtesy of Boston Consulting Group

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Boston Consulting Group&#x27;s Lauren Wiener says the next wave of retail media involves more strategic partnerships around business intelligence. She dined with Kerry this month for our <a class="gtmContentClick" data-vars-link-text="&quot;1 big meal&quot; interview series" data-vars-click-url="https://www.axios.com/pro/media-deals/2024/07/03/ceros-ceo-alison-lange-engel-ai" data-vars-content-id="6c8150f0-2846-4e96-9657-90e2a69f21c8" data-vars-headline="Boston Consulting Group&#x27;s Lauren Wiener chats genAI and retail media" data-vars-event-category="story" data-vars-sub-category="story" data-vars-item="in_content_link" href="https://www.axios.com/pro/media-deals/2024/07/03/ceros-ceo-alison-lange-engel-ai" target="_self">&quot;1 big meal&quot; interview series</a>.Why it matters: <a class="gtmContentClick" data-vars-link-text="Wiener joined BCG" data-vars-click-url="https://www.bcg.com/about/people/experts/lauren-wiener" data-vars-content-id="6c8150f0-2846-4e96-9657-90e2a69f21c8" data-vars-headline="Boston Consulting Group&#x27;s Lauren Wiener chats genAI and retail media" data-vars-event-category="story" data-vars-sub-category="story" data-vars-item="in_content_link" href="https://www.bcg.com/about/people/experts/lauren-wiener" target="_blank">Wiener joined BCG</a> in 2019 as a managing director and partner. She leads the retail media and data monetization team globally and is part of the North America leadership team in marketing. She previously was CEO of Tremor Video.

Boston Consulting Group's Lauren Wiener chats genAI and retail media

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