From Solomon Partners
The Growing Value of Real-World Attention
Why Out of Home Media Is More Valuable in the AI Era
Out of home (OOH) media, including billboards, transit media, digital displays and place-based advertising, is becoming increasingly valuable as artificial intelligence reshapes how consumers discover products, evaluate brands and make purchasing decisions. The power of OOH is that it is a highly-trusted form of advertising that reaches consumers in the physical world, where advertisements cannot be scrolled past, skipped or blocked. As AI reduces website visits and increases the volume of digital content, OOH provides brands with a way to earn attention, build recognition and shape the brand preferences that influence both consumers and AI-powered purchasing agents.
Key Takeaways
- AI is changing digital discovery. Consumers may increasingly receive answers and purchasing assistance without visiting brand websites.
- Brand preferences will remain important. AI can execute a transaction, but consumers still shape which brands enter the consideration set.
- Human attention is becoming scarcer. AI is increasing the supply of digital content without increasing the amount of attention available.
- OOH offers a differentiated channel. It provides brands with physical visibility that cannot be skipped or blocked and can help build recognition before a purchase decision occurs.
How Is AI Changing Advertising and Consumer Behavior?
AI is putting pressure on nearly every advertising channel built around a screen. Search, social, display, digital video and connected TV are becoming more fragmented, more automated and more crowded with machine-generated content. OOH media is different. It lives in the physical world, where people will always commute, travel and gather—and where a brand can make an impression that cannot simply be scrolled past or blocked.
The pressure will only build as AI becomes a gateway to commerce. Transition Technologies Managed Search forecasts that AI-powered assistants will handle more than half of global search queries by 2030. According to Gartner, brands could see organic search traffic fall by 50% or more by 2028 as consumers increasingly rely on AI-generated answers rather than visiting websites. The shift is already visible: Pew Research Center found that users clicked a traditional search result on only 8% of visits when an AI summary appeared, compared with 15% without one. Just 1% clicked a source link within the AI summary, and users ended their browsing sessions on 26% of pages with a summary versus 16% on traditional-results pages.
That could hollow out the digital advertising model. If an AI agent can search, compare options and complete a purchase, the consumer may never see the paid search placement, display ad or brand webpage meant to influence the decision. A review of 12 studies by IDEAVA Insights found that AI Overviews reduced click-through rates by 15% to 89%. In one case study, organic click-through rates declined 61% when AI Overviews appeared and paid click-through rates fell 68%; even queries without AI Overviews saw organic click-through rates decline 41% year over year. The places where brands can build awareness and trust are shrinking just as AI makes digital content—and digital clutter—virtually infinite.
Chegg offers a concrete example of what this disruption can mean for a digital business. In its first-quarter 2025 earnings report, Chegg said Google’s expansion of AI Overviews was keeping traffic within Google’s search experience and shifting search toward Gemini. The company reported that total net revenue and subscription services revenue were each down 30% year over year, while subscribers declined 31%. Chegg sued Google in February 2025 over the impact of AI Overviews; a federal judge dismissed the antitrust case on September 30, 2026.
Why Does Brand Preference Still Matter in AI-Powered Commerce?
Brand preference still matters because consumers continue to influence which brands they ask AI agents to find, evaluate or purchase. AI agents may execute more purchases, but people will still decide what they want—and what they ask for by name. That is the critical distinction. A brand does not want someone telling an agent: “buy me running shoes.” It wants that person asking for its brand.
AI can complete the transaction, but it cannot replace the awareness, preference and desire that create demand. Agentic shopping, where AI agents help consumers discover, evaluate and purchase products, will become more prevalent and that means brand building will become even more important, not less.
Why Is Human Attention Becoming More Valuable?
Human attention is becoming more valuable because AI is increasing the supply of content without increasing the amount of attention available. In the first four months of 2026, 68% of US Google searches ended without a click, according to Similarweb clickstream data. At the same time, an IAB study found that 83% of advertising executives said their companies had deployed AI in the creative process, while 73% reported using AI for display advertising.
The result is more content chasing fewer clicks and the same finite supply of attention. As AI makes ads faster and cheaper to produce, digital channels risk filling with messages that look and sound alike. In a world flooded with content, anything that stands out, earns trust and captures attention becomes more valuable. That is an excellent setup for the OOH industry.
Consumers are already turning off and tuning out. Gartner reports that 81% of US consumers try to ignore ads, and more than half actively limit their exposure through ad blockers, VPNs or paid ad-free content. Intrusive, repetitive and low value ads increasingly create frustration rather than engagement. Brands can no longer assume they have consumers’ attention. They must earn it.
Why Is Out of Home Media Effective in the AI Era?
Out of home media is effective in the AI era because it reaches consumers in the physical world, where attention is less fragmented and advertising cannot simply be skipped or filtered out.
OOH is well-positioned because it brings brands into the world people actually inhabit. No matter how AI changes online behavior, people will still commute, shop, travel and gather in public places. A billboard along a commute or a display in a shopping district is not another impression fighting for room in a feed. It is a visible part of daily life. In an environment where AI-generated content is becoming ubiquitous, real-world visibility reinforces a brand’s credibility and trustworthiness.
The potential reallocation is meaningful. Solomon Partners’ analysis shows that shifting just 1% of digital advertising spend to OOH could have a significant impact, generating approximately $11.51 billion in incremental spending globally and $4.3 billion in the U.S., equivalent to roughly 45% and 42% market growth, respectively.
That physical presence provides OOH with a powerful mix of visibility, trust and impact. It cannot be hidden behind an ad blocker, and its scale can make a brand feel tangible in a way a fleeting digital impression cannot. To prove that point, an Ocean Outdoor and Lumen Research study found that premium large-format Digital Out of Home (DOOH) advertising attracts five times more attention than online digital formats. When trusted attention is scarce, OOH provides brands with a chance to build recognition, shape preference and become the name consumers—and their AI agents—choose.
How Can AI Make Out of Home Media More Effective?
AI can make out of home media more effective by helping advertisers analyze audiences and locations, adapt creative for different settings, streamline media planning and buying, and assess campaign performance. These capabilities can improve how OOH is selected, delivered and measured, but the real-world experience that provides OOH with its value will remain.
That is why OOH should be one of the biggest beneficiaries of the AI advertising era. While AI can improve the intelligence behind a campaign, OOH earns attention in the real world, builds the brand preference that shapes demand and helps determine what consumers ultimately ask their agents to buy.
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