Retail Media IQ
First of Its Kind Book on Subject,“Retail Media Strategy, Execution and Optimization” Seeks to Fill Needed Information Gap on Fast Growing New Ad Medium
LOS ANGELES , CA, UNITED STATES, April 30, 2026 /EINPresswire.com/ — Retail media advertising has become one of the fastest-growing line items in consumer marketing budgets, now attracting more U.S. ad spend than broadcast television. Yet despite its scale and generally “good” reported returns, most brands are failing to unlock the channel’s full potential. New research indicates that up to half of retail media searches generate zero revenue, while nearly 90% are either overpriced or underperforming.
This disconnect between strong topline performance and hidden inefficiency is the focus of a new book by Mateusz Drela, Founder and CEO of Retail Media IQ. Along with serving as a tactical how-to guide, the book introduces a practical framework that changes how brand leaders may think about retail media performance — and why achieving better than “good enough” results is far harder than it appears.
“Retail media works,” said Drela. “That’s precisely the problem. When overall returns look acceptable, it masks how much value is being left behind. In our experience, most brands are capturing only about half of their rightful upside.” According to Drela, the core issue is not a lack of effort or sophistication among brand teams, but a structural challenge. Retail media evolved from trade marketing and co-op advertising, yet now sits at the intersection of marketing, sales, and commerce — often without clear ownership, consistent performance standards, or real-time decision frameworks. As a result, teams optimize defensively, prioritizing stability over growth, and accept average outcomes because pushing beyond them is operationally complex and risky.
Internal platform analysis across large retail media networks shows that approximately 30% of searches deliver no revenue at all, while the majority of remaining spend is diluted by mispricing and broad optimization approaches. Strong ROAS at the aggregate level further obscures these inefficiencies, creating a false sense of performance health. The newly published book, “Retail Media Strategy, Execution and Optimization: A Practical Framework for Brand Managers and CMOs”, addresses this gap by shifting the conversation away from tactics and toward decision-making structure. It explores why traditional success metrics fail to reveal where value is lost, how “average performance” becomes the silent killer of growth, and why retail media outcomes are ultimately won or lost at the SKU and search level — not at the campaign level.
The framework is designed for CMOs, brand managers, and retail media operators responsible for managing complex portfolios across multiple retail networks. Rather than prescribing tools or shortcuts, it provides a way to diagnose where performance plateaus originate and how brands can move from defensive optimization to offensive growth without increasing spend. The book includes twenty chapters covering topics such as the outsized influence of platforms like Instacart, the limitations of ROAS as a standalone metric, and why organizational design often prevents teams from acting on insights even when data is available.
High praise has come in from across the spectrum including academia, leading marketing associations, and industry leaders. Professor Russell Zwanka, the Director of Food Marketing at Western Michigan University writes: ” This book is one of the clearest and most honest takes on retail media I’ve come across. The writing breaks down complex ideas in a way that works whether you’ve been in the industry for years or you’re just getting up to speed” And Steve Frenda, former Managing Director at the Path to Purchase Institute exclaims: “I strongly encourage all industry professionals to undertake a rigorous study of Mat Drela’s comprehensive work on the subject; it serves as an essential cornerstone for mastering this rapidly evolving landscape.”.
The book is priced at $19.95 and is available via Amazon and RMIQ.net.
Mat Drela is the Founder and CEO of Retail Media IQ, an Ai driven retail media speciality advertising partner for lean teams, headquartered in Warsaw with offices in Michigan, Delaware and the greater Los Angeles area. RMIQ is recognized as a fast-growing retail media technology platform focused on performance optimization across major retail networks. Mat Drela is a graduate of the London School of Economics and a former co-founding executive of an ad-tech company that reached nine-figure revenue. He was named a 2025 Path to Purchase Institute Top Forty Global Commerce Leader Under 40.
For more information, visit www.rmiq.net or contact ralph@rmiq.net.
Ralph Fascitelli
Atlantic Partners
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