Q&A: Mateusz Drela of Retail Media IQ
Mateusz Drela
CEO
Retail Media IQ (RMIQ)
Responsiblity: Leading RMIQ in its mission to drive retail media adoption, helping brands and retailers optimize advertising strategies through AI-powered solutions.
Biggest challenge you're facing right now: From a technical standpoint, we're working to bring retail media up to 2025 standards. Right now, the ecosystem resembles online advertising in 2007-08 — highly fragmented, with each retailer operating its own siloed platform, often built with bespoke technology that lacks interoperability. This creates inefficiencies, making it difficult for brands to execute seamless, scalable campaigns across multiple networks.
Our challenge is to unify these disparate systems into a modern, programmatic buying platform that gives brands easy access to purchase-ready shoppers. This requires solving issues around data standardization, measurement consistency and cross-network attribution, ensuring that retail media operates as efficiently as other digital advertising channels.
More broadly, the industry needs to shift its perception of retail media from trade marketing to media marketing. Retail media networks should be treated as media buying platforms — just like social media, display, video or TV — where brands can optimize campaigns based on performance, rather than simply securing shelf space. Changing this mindset is key to unlocking the true potential of retail media.
Any solution you're trying, or recommend to others facing the same challenge: Anyone facing the challenge of fragmentation in retail media should consider using a solution such as ours — RMIQ. We're building a unified, AI-driven retail media buying platform that simplifies campaign execution across multiple retailer networks. Instead of navigating a patchwork of disconnected systems, brands can access a single, modern interface that integrates multiple platforms, making retail media as seamless and scalable as programmatic advertising.
Key solutions include:
- Cross-Network Standardization: Streamlining fragmented retail media platforms into a unified system that standardizes campaign management, reporting and attribution, eliminating the inefficiencies of working with multiple isolated tools.
- AI-Powered Optimization: Leveraging AI-driven budget allocation and predictive analytics to ensure that brands get the best return on ad spend (ROAS) by targeting high-intent shoppers across different retailers.
- Programmatic-Like Buying Efficiency: Retail media should be approached like any other media buy — not as a trade marketing tool. Apply programmatic principles, such as real-time bidding, audience segmentation and dynamic optimization to retail media, making it as effective and measurable as display, social or video advertising.
- Seamless Multi-Retailer Access: Instead of managing campaigns retailer by retailer, brands can execute one strategy across multiple networks, ensuring scale, efficiency and consistency in retail media buying.
Learn From Our Members
Mateusz Drela will moderate a virtual discussion on how to effectively manage ads across multiple retail media networks.
He'll be joined by Andrene Dos Anjos of Mars Pet Nutrition.
Date: April 24
Time: 2-3pm ET
For details, visit events.p2pi.com/meetups2025
New marketing tactic that you use: Marketing to the community has always been the most effective tool for me. Instead of broad, generic messaging, I focus on engaging directly with hands-on practitioners — the people who are actively dealing with the challenges we solve. By addressing their real-world pain points with solutions that deliver direct and measurable impact, we create a strong foundation of trust and advocacy.
The key advantage of this approach is that these early adopters become our best advocates. When they see the value firsthand, they don't just use the solution — they take it with them as they progress in their careers, introducing it to new companies and networks. This organic, peer-driven expansion creates long-term momentum, ensuring that our solutions remain relevant and widely adopted.
Best career advice you've received: "Just because everyone is doing something a certain way doesn't mean it's the right way to do it." This mindset has been critical throughout my career. Many industries operate on legacy assumptions that persist simply because "that's how it’s always been done." But challenging these conventions — whether in programmatic advertising, affiliate marketing or now retail media — is where real innovation happens.
Success often comes from questioning the status quo, identifying inefficiencies others accept as normal, and building better, more scalable solutions. Whether it was pioneering real-time bidding in performance marketing or now transforming retail media into a true programmatic ecosystem, this advice has always guided me toward creating, not just following.
Memorable aha moment in your career: Realizing that retail media in 2024 is at the same inflection point as programmatic advertising was in 2006-07 — full of potential but lacking the standardization, automation and efficiency needed for large-scale adoption.
Back then, programmatic advertising was still in its infancy. The industry had high intent buyers and valuable digital real estate, but transactions were manual, siloed and inefficient. It took the development of real-time bidding (RTB), demand-side platforms (DSPs) and standardized measurement frameworks to unlock its explosive growth.
Retail media today faces the exact same challenges:
- Fragmented networks that require brands to work with each retailer's unique platform.
- Manual, inefficient ad buying processes that resemble the pre-programmatic days of digital advertising.
- A perception problem, where retail media is still seen as an extension of trade marketing rather than a full-fledged media channel.
This realization reinforced my belief that the right technology, automation, and education can unlock massive growth opportunities in retail media — just like it did for programmatic advertising. By building the right infrastructure, we can help retailers and brands tap into retail media's full potential, making it as powerful and accessible as social, display or video advertising.
What you read: I like to read novels — stories that allow me to fully immerse myself, disconnect from work and engage with different perspectives. Fiction offers a refreshing reset, helping me return to business challenges with a fresh mind.
Summer plans: Fly fishing is my go-to summer activity. This year, as has become my tradition, I'm planning to spend time chasing trout and grayling in Slovenia. I enjoy the challenge and serenity of fishing in some of Europe's most beautiful rivers. It's the perfect way to disconnect, reset and appreciate the outdoors while still indulging my competitive side — just in a different way than business.
