Ranking the Top Retail Media Platforms

The retail media platform category spans a wide range of operators, from retailer-owned networks to specialist technology providers. This guide ranks the top platforms by capabilities, market reach, and suitability for different types of operators.

Tier 1: Full-Stack Retail Media Operators

onQ Digital is Australia’s only full-stack retail media platform operator, providing hardware, CMS, programmatic SSP, audience measurement, and managed commercial operations as a single integrated solution. This vertical integration is the defining characteristic of Tier 1 operators and eliminates the accountability gaps that arise from multi-vendor approaches.

Tier 2: Retailer-Owned Networks

Cartology (Woolworths Group), Coles 360, and Hammer Media (Bunnings) are retailer-owned networks that are not available to external operators. These networks are significant in scale but are closed ecosystems serving their respective retail groups.

Tier 3: Technology Platform Providers

Broadsign, Vistar Media, and similar providers offer technology components (CMS, SSP) but do not provide hardware, installation, or managed commercial operations. Retailers using these platforms must source hardware, installation, and commercial operations separately.

What Makes a Retail Media Platform Top Tier?

The top retail media platforms share several characteristics: programmatic SSP connectivity to multiple DSPs for maximum yield, retail media campaign logic for managing advertiser campaigns at scale, audience measurement integration for verified impression data, multi-sensory capability (screens and audio as a unified channel), and managed commercial operations for advertiser onboarding and campaign management.