WPP Media: Brands now have two audiences, humans and machines

WPP Media Australia has released its Future of Media 2026 report, which finds that AI is changing how brands build influence by shaping discovery, recommendations, and purchase decisions.

The report cites WPP Media research showing that 83% of purchases are influenced before consumers reach the point of decision (How Humans Decide, 2025), that AI increasingly shapes those decisions behind the scenes (Hidden Pathway, 2026), and that more than half of internet activity is now non-human.

Presented to senior marketers and business leaders as part of WPP Media’s Futures Series, the report argues that influence is no longer a linear journey from awareness to purchase. Media, content, PR, search, commerce, and customer experience are blurring together, as AI draws on all of these signals to inform recommendations and buying decisions.

WPP Media calls this connected ecosystem the System of Influence: content influences machines, machines influence humans, and humans influence each other.

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The five shifts identified:

• Creators as the Main Event – Creators are evolving from paid talent into entertainment ecosystems spanning content, community, IP and commerce.

• Fandom in Motion – AI is enabling brands to move from sponsoring communities to participating in culture at the speed of fandom.

• Local Media’s New Leverage – In a world of AI-generated content and misinformation concerns, trusted local journalism and community voices are becoming increasingly valuable for humans and the machines that serve them.

• AI as Your PA – AI is moving from a better version of search to a personal assistant for Australians, with agents acting for consumers to make their lives easier.

• The Rise of AI Shoppers – As consumers increasingly delegate purchasing decisions to AI agents, brands will need to optimise not only for human persuasion but machine selection.

Matt Scotton, Chief Innovation Officer, WPP Media Australia, said: "For decades, marketers have focused on influencing people. The reality today is that we have two audiences: humans and machines. AI is rapidly becoming the layer that sits between consumers and brands, influencing what gets discovered, recommended and ultimately purchased.

“What remains vital is brand building, priming consumers to make sure the agents that act for them start with the brands we market. How brands get built now is changing, as Australians turn to creators, leaning into passions and look for local voices that shape their perspective. The future belongs to brands that build a system of influence, because every machine recommendation ultimately begins with human influence.”

Aimee Buchanan, CEO, WPP Media Australia & New Zealand, said: "Technology is changing how decisions are made, but it doesn't change what makes brands valuable. Trust, relevance, culture and community are still the foundations of growth.

"What's changing is that those signals now need to be visible not only to people, but also to the machines they increasingly rely on for advice, discovery and decision-making. The opportunity for marketers we’ve identified in our Future of Media report is to drive future growth by building both human and machine influence at the same time."