Real-time behavior prediction - the missing piece in retail media

Over the past year, retail media has become one of the fastest-growing opportunities in digital advertising. In Europe alone, it’s growing nearly four times faster than other digital advertising channels, with projections to reach €31 billion by 2028.

While the concept itself isn’t new, the scale and ambition behind recent retail media strategies are rewriting the rulebook. Since 2023, major retailers including Tesco, Boots, Currys, Selfridges, and most recently, Quin AI customer, Kingfisher Group, have rolled out new propositions designed to transform their online stores into high-performing media channels. These household names are not the only ones to move into this space. 52% of retailers globally have already adopted retail media, with 20% of all digital ad spend in 2024 coming through this channel.

Tesco has gone as far as to say they believe retail media will be “bigger than TV” in terms of advertising spend by the end of 2025. Kingfisher’s latest announcement revealed that they expect 3% of their group online revenue to come from advertisers in the near future.

The scale of the opportunity is becoming increasingly clear.

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As first-party data becomes ever more valuable, retailers are uniquely positioned to help advertisers reach high-intent audiences closer to the point of purchase. And with the right tech stack, this isn’t just a new revenue stream - it’s a strategic edge.

This is where real-time behavior prediction comes in. With predictive AI, retailers can turn retail media into a premium, performance-driven channel. Below, we explore three key ways that  Kingfisher Group and other retailers can win by combining retail media with behavioral intelligence.

What is retail media? (and why is it exploding now?)

But what exactly is retail media?

At its simplest, retail media refers to brands paying to advertise on a retailer’s owned digital and physical properties. That could include sponsored product placements on an e-commerce website, display banners in a mobile app, or dynamic ads shown on in-store screens. Think of a power tool brand running a targeted promotion on B&Q’s homepage, or Persil featuring its latest collection via screens in Tesco’s stores.

The appeal lies in the quality of the audience. Retailers attract high-intent traffic - shoppers who are already browsing, comparing, or preparing to buy. This makes retail media far more valuable than traditional awareness-based advertising. Brands can reach consumers closer to the point of purchase, using retailer-owned first-party data to deliver more precise targeting. And because these campaigns run in closed ecosystems, advertisers get full visibility into what’s working - including direct links between ads, engagement, and conversions.

At the same time, the world of digital advertising is shifting fast. Third-party cookies are disappearing. Customer acquisition costs are rising. And traditional performance channels like paid search and social are showing signs of diminishing returns.

In this environment, retail media offers a fresh opportunity: one that’s measurable, privacy-resilient, and built on trust between retailer, brand, and shopper.

As retail media grows, it’s also becoming a more strategic part of the broader retail tech and adtech stack. From CDPs and CRMs to personalization engines and predictive AI, retailers are increasingly looking to future-proof their media offerings with tools that help them better understand and act on shopper behavior in real time.

How real-time behavior prediction changes the game

The demand from brands for effective retail media is also clear. 67% of brands are shifting performance budgets into retail media, and the greatest wins will be for brands that react fastest.

Retail media is already a powerful channel - but it becomes even more valuable when it’s powered by real-time behavioral intelligence. By predicting what customers are likely to do next, retailers can deliver smarter targeting, better results for advertisers, and a more personalized experience for every shopper.

Here are three ways that behavior prediction is the missing piece in retail.

1. Supercharge on-site targeting with predictive intelligence

For retailers like Kingfisher, building a high-performance retail media business means being able to offer more than just ad space. The real value comes from helping advertisers reach the right person at exactly the right moment. That’s where real-time behavior prediction becomes a game-changer.

By partnering with Quin AI, retailers can offer a premium media experience by applying predictive intelligence to every on-site interaction. Our technology identifies high-value audiences in real time - including high-value buyers, bargain hunters, casual browsers, payment-hesitant users, and more - even if they’ve never visited the site before.

This allows retailers to instantly adapt the experience for each visitor, from which sponsored products they see to the offers and messages that are most likely to drive conversion.

Predictive Interests generated from Quin AI’s Audience Engine go a step further, surfacing hidden patterns in behavior and predicting which products or categories a user is likely to care about next. For example:

• Current product, content, and category interests
• Observed price sensitivity
• Purchase intent scoring
• Suggested next best actions

Instead of waiting for customers to take action, advertisers can proactively guide them with relevant content that performs.

Pro tip: Savvy retailers could even offer a premium offering with a higher CPC for more targetted ads or higher value customers like our Predictive Audience ‘High-value product buyers’.

Kingfisher has already reported a return on ad spend (ROAS) of over 600% for its retail media proposition. With predictive targeting, there’s potential to push this even higher - not by increasing volume, but by increasing precision.

2. Enrich CDP and CRM platforms with real-time behavioral data

The impact of real-time behavior prediction doesn’t stop at the website. For retailers developing a robust retail media ecosystem. Quin AI also enhances customer intelligence by enriching CDP and CRM platforms with live audience predictive data.

Our Predictive Audiences and Predictive Interests integrations allow retailers to supercharge their data platforms with individual-level intent signals from the very first session - no login or purchase history required.

By enriching first-party profiles with behavioral context, retailers can offer advertisers more sophisticated segmentation and better targeting across channels. Whether it's refining campaign audiences, optimizing creative, or identifying untapped customer segments, this level of intelligence unlocks new value from existing data infrastructure.

For brands looking to take a privacy-first approach, this gives retailers the ability to deliver personalization without reliance on third-party cookies - while creating a more responsive and efficient retail media business.

3. Unlock smarter retargeting with marketing platform enrichment

Retail media doesn’t end when a shopper leaves the site. With Quin AI, retailers can offer advertisers advanced retargeting capabilities by enriching external marketing platforms with real-time audience segments.

Our Marketing Platform Enrichment feature connects directly with tools like Google Ads and Meta, pushing Preditive Audience segments into advertisers’ existing workflows. This allows brands to run high-performing, personalized retargeting campaigns based on live behavioral data - not just static events like cart abandonment.

For example, a brand promoting a new product line could automatically retarget high-value shoppers who showed strong interest in a related category or displayed high purchase intent but didn’t convert. These signals are updated in real time, making it possible to reach the right customers with the right message, even after they’ve left the retailer’s site.

By offering this level of intelligence, retailers can position their media propositions as more than just inventory - they become a full-funnel, insight-driven channel that drives measurable results for advertisers.

A new era of retail media, powered by behavioral gen-AI

Retail media is evolving - fast. As retailers like Kingfisher invest in transforming their digital platforms into revenue-generating ad ecosystems, the real differentiator will be real-time behavior prediction. Advertisers want more than impressions - they want precision, relevance, and measurable impact.

Real-time behavior prediction unlocks all three.

It turns every shopper interaction into an opportunity for smarter targeting, better customer understanding, and higher performance across the board. Whether it’s powering on-site personalization, enriching your CDP and CRM, or enabling intelligent retargeting off-site, predictive AI helps retailers create a retail media offering that stands out.

At Quin AI, we believe the future of retail media isn’t just about where ads are placed - it’s about who sees them, when, and why. And with the right behavioral intelligence in place, that future is already here.