Next in Media: Charles Manning on Why Measurement Is the Secret Weapon in the Age of Agentic AI

Host: Mike Shields
Guest: Charles Manning, Founder & CEO of Kochava
Date: February 17, 2026
Location: Kochava Summit, Sandpoint, Idaho

Episode Overview

In this episode, Mike Shields sits down with Charles Manning to explore how AI—specifically agentic AI—is not just transforming workflows in media, marketing, and advertising, but fundamentally reshaping the industry's structure and skills. The conversation dives deep into why measurement will be a competitive battleground, the unfolding disruption across agencies and brands, and how television and CTV are evolving. The discussion is practical, far-reaching, and dotted with industry analogies and personal anecdotes that demystify the high-velocity changes underway.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Coming Wave of Disruption

• Acceleration of Industry Change: Manning predicts an "unbelievable" transformation over the next 16 months. The pace is akin to "Elon taking Twitter private combined with a crapload of roll ups," emphasizing that disruption will arrive much faster than prior shifts, like programmatic advertising.
  • Quote: “Tremendously, like, breathtakingly faster.” (03:28, Manning)
• Agentic AI’s Role: AI won't just optimize, it will uproot workflows, restructure job functions, and collapse the supply chain by automating tasks currently performed by agencies, DSPs, and SSPs.

2. From Digitizing Signals to Digitizing Workflows

• Paradigm Shift: The last decade focused on digitizing media signals (data on impressions, clicks, etc.), but the next will center on digitizing the actual processes—turning complex workflows into automated, real-time AI-driven decisions.

  • Quote: “The next decade is about the digitization of the workflows… and it's probably not a decade, it's probably 16 months.” (02:14, Manning)

• APIs and Model Context Protocol: Existing advertising APIs are now being overlaid with Model Context Protocols, which allow LLMs to trigger and automate tool use in marketing and advertising—enabling a leap in process automation.

3. Optimizing for Outcomes, Not Just Reach

• Machine Learning Evolution: Advertising optimization is shifting from "reach and frequency" to "business outcomes," driven by C-suite pressure for accountable results.

  • Quote: “In the early days that optimization was really around reach and frequency. Increasingly it's now about business outcomes because CFOs want to establish what's the net impact of these dollars spent.” (05:21, Manning)

• Speed and Automation: What used to be multi-step, manual, data-heavy reports—post-campaign reviews, spending analysis—will now be condensed into continuous, near real-time feedback loops, freeing human talent for strategic work.

  • Quote: “That workflow can happen daily...the processes are going to be close to real time along with the signal, which is kind of remarkable.” (06:48, Manning)

4. The Data Power Divide & Leveling the Field

• Big Tech vs. Rest: Meta, Google, and a few giants have leveraged closed ecosystems and huge datasets to optimize results in ways most agencies and brands simply can't match.

• The Proprietary Data Imperative: Brands must protect and use their data as their biggest asset—“their proprietary differentiator”—rather than feeding tech platforms' optimization engines.

  • Quote: “They need to use it and leverage it to their benefit, not to another company's benefit.” (08:22, Manning)

• Workflow as Competitive Advantage: The 'how' matters as much as the 'what'—unique, compliant, vertically-tailored workflows powered by AI will be a source of lasting advantage over generic solutions.

5. Talent, Skills, and the Future of Work

• From Data Science to Communication: The in-demand skill is shifting away from technical data science toward the ability to articulate needs and strategic goals to AI.

  • Quote: “The skill that is most useful when engaging with a model is the ability to articulate your desire...It is not data science and programming.” (14:05, Manning)

• Strategic Roles Rise: As AI takes over repetitive, data-crunching, and reporting tasks, human talent will focus more on strategy, unique inventory, and gaining proprietary data access.

6. The Agentic Future: Autonomous Buys, Guardrails, and Organizational Change

• Agentic Execution: AI agents will do more than assist—they’ll autonomously execute and optimize buying with established budget and compliance guardrails, much like human traders in finance.

  • Quote: “There's going to be layers of an onion...agent managers that are observing the behaviors of those trader agents that then have guardrails.” (16:29, Manning)

• Team Transformation: The process will be evolutionary, with humans and agents collaborating, observed, and gradually shifting tasks from people to agents.

7. Connected TV (CTV) and the App Economy

• From Mobile Origins to CTV Leadership: Kochava’s focus shifted when they recognized CTV was becoming "an 80-inch mobile device in the living room," bringing a new app-centric paradigm.

  • Quote: “We immediately had flashbacks to our origin where it was like, this is an 80 inch mobile device in the living room on the wall...” (20:00, Manning)

• Unique Measurement Challenges: With CTV, outcomes are a blend of "view and do": immersive experiences on the TV and actions on a handheld device. Measurement must track across devices and platforms.

  • Quote: “The view and do combo is you have an immersive experience on the TV where you're viewing and then where you're doing is on your mobile device.” (23:37, Manning)

• OEM Wisdom: TV manufacturers (OEMs) learned from mobile and now demand clean, privacy-compliant, and publisher-controlled environments to avoid ceding too much audience data to third parties.

8. The Changing Media Mix & Media Mix Modeling (MMM)

• TV as a Performance Channel: The line between awareness and action ("all TV should be performance-based") is blurring. MMM and AI tools are required to link CTV spend to incremental outcomes, not just last click or impression.

  • Quote: “It's all about the mix...you need to look at the mix together.” (30:10, Manning)

• MMM’s Role: Only recently, with AI-enabled tooling, have most brands had the ability to do real media mix modeling with accuracy and speed—integrating data from CTV, mobile, and platforms like Facebook.

  • Quote: “You can’t do what that person was asking without media mix modeling. And I don't think many organizations were really well outfitted to do media mix modeling until really just this last year with some of the access to these AI tools...” (31:00, Manning)

9. Ad Tech’s Future: Collapsing Supply Chains and New Marketplaces

• Consolidation Ahead: Expect significant "collapsing" of the current daisy-chain between brand and media execution—DSPs, SSPs, and agencies thinned out as agentic systems facilitate direct execution.

  • Quote: “I think there's going to be an awful lot of collapsing.” (32:44, Manning)

• Lower Costs, New Opportunities: Middleware and 'ad tech tax' shrink, more dollars go to media. At the same time, publishers with special inventory (like sports betting) can command premium prices due to tighter measurement and targeting.

• Marketplaces Evolve: Auctions may move up from per-impression to insertion order (IO) level—“programmatic guaranteed at an IO level”—something only possible now because of AI-driven workflow automation.

  • Quote: “I think we're going to start to see auctions handled at the IO level...programmatic guaranteed at an IO level. And I think that's going to be possible because that's administratively impossible to do with people. Agentically very possible.” (36:37, Manning)

10. Industry Obstacles & Predictions

• Biggest Risk: The vast scale and velocity of change; public companies will struggle, leading to "a crap load of take privates...combined with a crapload of roll ups," with firms buying contracts and relationships, not technology, in preparation for a "bonanza" of public offerings two years out.
  • Quote: “What is facing us over the next 16 months is going to be so profound...being private over the next 16 months is going to be considered gold...” (37:11, Manning)

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On the acceleration of change:
  “The next decade is about the digitization of the workflows… and it's probably not a decade, it's probably 16 months.” (02:14, Manning)

• On the new required skillsets:
  “The skill that is most useful when engaging with a model is the ability to articulate your desire...It is not data science and programming.” (14:05, Manning)

• On the fate of ad tech intermediaries:
  “I think there's going to be an awful lot of collapsing.” (32:44, Manning)

• On measurement as a strategic advantage:
  “It's our position that measurement is the kernel of all of that feedback loop for learning and so that's what makes us competitively advantage.” (10:38, Manning)

• On the blurring lines of TV advertising:
  “The view and do combo is you have an immersive experience on the TV where you're viewing and then where you're doing is on your mobile device.” (23:37, Manning)

• On preparing for disruption:
  “Being private over the next 16 months is going to be considered gold to not have to go through all this change in a naked feeling.” (37:59, Manning)

Timestamps for Key Segments

• 00:00–03:10: Industry context, velocity of change, agentic advertising
• 03:10–07:07: Programmatic's evolution vs. agentic workflows, automation, APIs, outcome focus
• 07:07–10:06: Data power, concerns about platform dominance, the need for proprietary workflows
• 10:06–12:13: AI's vertical impact, why Kochava moved into workflow enablement
• 12:13–14:54: Measurement’s new role, shifting skills for the next wave of talent
• 14:54–16:29: AI agents executing buys, team transformation, Station One’s capabilities
• 19:25–22:56: Kochava’s app and CTV journey, OEMs' role in data and measurement
• 23:37–25:23: CTV's new measurement paradigms, commerce crossover
• 27:10–28:34: Media mix’s rapid transformation, AI’s role in shifting spend
• 28:36–32:03: MMM, multi-touch measurement, AI-enabled modeling
• 32:03–36:09: Ad tech chain collapse, premium inventory, future auction models
• 37:11–38:31: Risks, structural changes, industry predictions

Episode Tone & Style

• Language: Conversational, jargon-rich (but explained), direct, often analogical (racing, lego blocks, onion layers)
• Tone: Candid, energetic, forward-looking, a mix of seasoned wariness and optimism

For Listeners Who Missed the Episode

This episode painted a vivid, actionable picture of how AI is moving swiftly from the shadows of media measurement into the driver’s seat. If you’re part of the media, marketing, or advertising ecosystem, Manning’s insights warn that restructuring talent, workflows, and competitive strategies isn’t just coming—it’s arriving “breathtakingly faster” than any prior tech wave. Measurement, he argues, is now a secret weapon for competitive growth. The businesses that thrive will use their data wisely, develop vertical-specific AI-powered workflows, and upskill teams to be more strategic and communicative—not just technical. The CTV world, too, is poised for a shakeup, blurring lines with the app economy and opening new performance vistas. The race is already on.