Coming out of eTail West, retailers to focus on owned and unified marketing channels that connect with customers on a human level.

As eTail West 2025 concludes, several transformative trends that are reshaping retail and e-commerce marketing this year caught our attention. From AI advancements to channel integration strategies, here's what dominated this year's conversations at the conference.

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AI-powered marketing and personalization takes center stage

With over 20 sessions focused on personalization in retail and e-commerce, marketers were looking for tools and strategies to achieve personalization at scale. AI entered the chat and was a hot topic at this year's conference. During these sessions on personalization, it was shared that brands are increasingly leveraging AI technology to:

• Optimize ad spend: AI-driven predictive analytics tools like Polaris IQ are helping brands forecast campaign performance and optimize spend before launch
• Deliver hyper-personalization: Real-time personalization is transforming customer experiences through tailored recommendations and dynamic engagement
• Enhance post-purchase experiences: AI automation is improving customer loyalty while reducing return fraud and operational costs

AI is more than just a copy assistant these days. Yes, it does help with writing on-brand messages, but its potential is much greater. AI-powered marketing tools can also segment your audiences, send messages at the right time at the subscriber level, and provide more actionable insights on your marketing performance and customer data. 

Put it into practice: Attentive's comprehensive AI suite—including AI Pro and AI Journeys—enables brands to implement intelligent personalization at scale while maintaining brand standards. Neiman Marcus is just one customer seeing 80%+ more revenue per customer using AI Journeys. 

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Omnichannel marketing is no longer optional

Retailers unanimously agreed that channel silos are becoming a thing of the past. Consumers expect seamless experiences across e-commerce, in-store, and social touchpoints. At eTail West, retailers shared their strategies for creating a unified omnichannel experience, including: 

• Unified customer journeys: Brands delivering consistent experiences across channels are seeing higher customer lifetime value
• TikTok and Pinterest as full-funnel channels: These platforms have evolved beyond awareness to drive measurable conversions with significant "halo effects" on Amazon and other marketplaces
• First-party data strategy: Brands like Hanky Panky are reducing reliance on paid ads by leveraging their owned media channels like email, SMS, and loyalty programs

It’s one thing to talk the talk of integrating channels to create the perfect 1:1 customer experience, but it’s another to walk the walk. Put on your walking shoes and get on the same path as OLLY Vitamins, who's leading the charge in omnichannel orchestration.

A highlight session at eTail West featured Attentive's CMO Keri McGee and Jennifer Peters, Senior Manager of E-Commerce from OLLY Vitamins, discussing the challenges of creating unified customer experiences across channels. As a supplement brand with 80% of revenue coming from brick-and-mortar, OLLY faces unique challenges in tracking customer journeys between in-store and online purchases.

Peters revealed OLLY’s success comes from strategic channel orchestration rather than siloing communication methods. Abandoned cart reminders perform significantly better via SMS, while subscription shipping notifications work better via email. 

Every successful customer journey mixes SMS and email based on customer preferences and message type. When we orchestrate these channels instead of siloing them, we see dramatically stronger performance.
- Jennifer Peters, Senior Manager of E-Commerce at OLLY Vitamins

Despite operating in a highly regulated supplement industry, OLLY has implemented AI strategically for backend decision making and identity resolution while maintaining strict compliance standards. Their partnership with Attentive has yielded a remarkable 5x performance lift through AI Pro integration.

The four-year Attentive partnership has thrived thanks to strategic guidance, integration flexibility, and continuous platform evolution. 

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Put it into practice: Attentive's unified platform enables brands to orchestrate seamless customer journeys across SMS and email—the two highest-ROI owned channels. Our personalization engine connects subscriber, product catalog, and brand data to create the most comprehensive profile of a subscriber. This data can be leveraged across channels to deliver those 1:1 personalized experiences. 

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Video content reigns supreme

There’s the 7-second rule that says you have seven seconds to make a first impression. And given that people process visuals faster than text, it’s easy to see why brands are producing more video-based content in their marketing campaigns. Fabletics has even invested $400M into video tech, proving that video is going to be a key component in the e-commerce space in 2025 and beyond.  

Some key takeaways on incorporating more video content into campaigns include:

• Video-first strategy: Fabletics’ data shows honest video reviews significantly boost engagement and conversions, with 90% of product pages now featuring video content
• Micro-influencer leverage: Authentic reviews from micro-influencers are driving higher trust and conversion rates than traditional marketing
• Cross-channel video: Brands are embedding video across product pages, email, SMS, and social media

As Chris Berg, Senior Director at January Digital, noted, "Our recommendation for most brands is 80% video content, across every channel."

Put it into practice: Attentive's RCS messaging capabilities will enable brands to embed videos directly within messages, bringing the proven engagement power of video to mobile messaging. This next-generation messaging format combines the high open rates of SMS with the rich media capabilities of email, creating a powerful new channel for customer engagement.

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Retail media networks present measurement challenges

While brands are investing heavily in retail media networks (Amazon, Walmart, Instacart), proving ROI remains a significant challenge. Attribution can be complex, especially when measuring impact across multiple platforms. 

Retailers shared some ways marketers can optimize and track performance across networks or channels:

• Creative performance focus: With rising ad costs, brands are shifting attention to creative optimization
• AI-driven attribution models: Predictive modeling is becoming essential for tracking full-funnel impact

"It's not just about tracking what worked—it's about predicting what will work next, and proactively identifying opportunities for optimization," explained Sam Carter, CEO of Fospha.

Put it into practice: Consolidating on the Attentive platform removes the potential for duplicate attribution and allows a deeper understanding of a single subscriber and their preferences across channels. Read more about attribution when sending SMS and email from one platform in our blog, The Truth About Marketing Attribution: How SMS and Email Work Together. 

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The human touch remains essential

Despite technological advancements, customers still crave human connection. As consumer behavior becomes increasingly unpredictable due to economic uncertainty, brands that combine AI capabilities with personalized touchpoints will excel in 2025 and beyond.

McGhee shares this sentiment and when she was a guest on the Marketing Trends podcast, she said that, “We're humans—we want to feel connected, we want to have trust, and we want to believe that whoever we're working with has our best interest at heart. People make decisions based on relationships and emotion, trust and intuition. When you get it right, the customer doesn’t feel like they’re being talked to as one of many. They feel like one in a million.” 

Make your customers feel like one in a million by understanding their channel preferences, bringing your content to the big screen (or small screen as you send video content via mobile marketing), and personalizing touchpoints. It was great hearing these conversations and reassurances in the direction retail marketing is heading, especially around innovations in AI and RCS.