Only 36% of programmatic ad spend reaches consumers, ANA research finds

The revelation that nearly two-thirds of ad spend is lost to intermediaries suggests that the current programmatic ecosystem prioritizes automation over actual working media. For streaming and digital video buyers, this data shifts the focus from chasing low CPMs to auditing the incremental value of every tech layer in the stack. As the industry moves toward more curated marketplaces, the competitive advantage will shift to platforms that can prove direct supply paths and minimize fee leakage. Watch for a rise in private marketplace adoption as advertisers seek to bypass the open exchange inefficiencies identified by the Association of National Advertisers.

The Association of National Advertisers has spent years building a body of evidence around programmatic supply chain efficiency, and its latest 36% figure represents the most stark quantification yet of intermediary fee leakage. In March 2025, the ANA published a follow-up to its landmark 2023 programmatic transparency study, which found that 51% of advertiser spend reached publishers in the open exchange. The newer data suggests conditions have worsened as supply paths have grown more complex. The ANA's 2023 study recommended advertisers conduct supply-path optimization audits and demand greater transparency from demand-side platforms, a call that has since been echoed by major holding companies and independent agencies alike. The 36% figure intensifies pressure on DSPs and SSPs to justify their take rates. On the business side, the programmatic ecosystem is responding with consolidation and new transparency tools. In early 2026, Google updated its spam policies to explicitly prohibit attempts to manipulate generative AI responses in Search, signaling stricter enforcement that affects how programmatic inventory is classified and valued. Meanwhile, the IAB Tech Lab has continued pushing its ads.txt and sellers.json standards to give buyers visibility into the supply chain, though adoption remains uneven across exchanges. The ANA's findings arrive at a moment when advertisers are already reallocating budgets toward curated marketplaces and direct deals, partly in response to the same inefficiencies the study quantifies. Pharmaceutical marketers, who face additional compliance layers, are among the most affected by opaque supply paths because wasted spend compounds regulatory risk. Technical benchmarks from adjacent research reinforce the ANA's conclusions. Akamai reported a 300% annual increase in AI bot traffic and found that nearly 60% of searches now end without a click, trends that directly inflate invalid traffic rates and further erode the working media percentage in programmatic buys. When bots consume impressions that advertisers pay for, the effective reach drops even below what supply-path fees alone would suggest. The ANA's 36% figure likely understates the true consumer-reach problem when sophisticated invalid traffic is factored in. For streaming ad buyers specifically, the combination of intermediary fees and bot-driven impression inflation means that programmatic delivery rates on open exchanges may be significantly higher than reported CPMs imply, strengthening the case for private marketplace deals with verified human audiences.