impact.com’s annual partnership event relocated to The Science Museum for the biggest iPX yet. Daisy-Blue Malden, RVP Channel Partnerships, EMEA, at impact.com, reports on the topics that made waves on the day.
Each year, impact.com’s iPX industry event gives the digital advertising world an opportunity to catch up on developments in the partnership economy. This year, the event was held at London’s iconic Science Museum, with attendees descending on South Kensington’s Exhibition Road to learn, share, connect and innovate over the course of a day packed with partnership panels and presentations.
Advertisers must move with the times
The promise of partnerships is more relevant than ever, as brands wrestle with an increasingly fractured consumer journey and spiraling customer acquisition costs (up 200% over the last decade). Consumers have moved with the times, and advertising needs to do the same.
The old playbook – flooding audiences with interruptive ads – no longer works in a world where consumers are sceptical, socially conscious, and savvier than ever. Yet, partnerships offer an alternative to traditional advertising methods and are delivering significant results.
Trust, empathy, and the power of community
This year’s iPX keynote speaker was best-selling author and renowned lecturer Nathalie Nahai, an expert in tech and marketing psychology. She demonstrated how much marketing has changed in recent times, and how brands need to “demonstrate their values by aligning with the right partners”.
The global cost of living crisis has transformed people’s spending habits, Nathalie reminded us. “88% of consumers feel like brand messages aren’t meeting them where they are,” she told delegates. Trust in social media has started to drop off, and audiences now spend money more deliberately and scrutinise purchases harder.
Nathalie suggested that marketers need to embrace trust, empathy and community to resonate with today’s consumers; marketing strategies that focus on transparency and authenticity have the greatest chance of success when financial times are hard.
She also noted that AI homogenisation is an increasing presence in digital advertising, but that advertisers who lean too heavily on the technology risk losing trust with consumers who are engaged by authenticity. “Traditional… messaging doesn’t work the same anymore, now there’s an emphasis on trust, value and resilience.”
Also Read: impact.com announces 2025 UK Partnerships Experience event, iPX London 2025
Attribution, incrementality and the path beyond last-click
These are currently the hottest topics in performance marketing, and they infused many of the panels and sessions across the day. The discussions covered everything from how different metrics will define incrementality for different brands, via the inherent impossibility of A/B testing for incrementality in the affiliate space.
Moving away from last-click measurement is a significant challenge the industry is facing, and that is especially tough in a sector where the consumer journey is increasingly fractured. Nedra Lim (Head of Product & Data Enablement, Affiliate & B2B Partnerships, Skyscanner) pointed out in one panel that rather than focusing on which marketing channel or partner delivered the best performance in any given campaign, it’s about studying “patterns of influence” across your entire partnership mix, and allocating budget there.
Build creator relations for the long-term
Elena Rodríguez (Influencer Marketing Manager at language learning platform Preply) emphasised the value of long-term creator relationships. Elena shared her opinion that these work well for everyone involved. “As a brand, it’s not so easy to find influencers who really resonate with our product, so once we find them, it’s smart to continue working with them,” she said. “For the creator, they can develop a much deeper relationship with the brand, and get a better understanding of the product. And it’s also very beneficial for the audience, because the content the creator shares is much more relevant and interesting.”
Trust is the new ‘performance metric’
A major theme throughout the event was the decline of consumer trust in traditional advertising, and how partnerships can help rebuild it. Whether through influencers, creators, or brand advocates, audiences are increasingly turning to real people for product advice.
Trust isn’t just a nice-to-have; it’s a business driver. As shared in the sessions, Edelman research shows that 53% of consumers buy from brands they trust (compared to just 25% for non-trusted brands), and 51% recommend trusted brands to others.
Retail media: affiliate marketing’s billion-dollar opportunity
The explosive growth of retail media, projected to become a $256 billion market, was an ever-present topic on the day. As brands invest heavily in owned media channels and shopper marketing, affiliate marketers are uniquely positioned to bridge the gap between media and commerce.
The event explored how affiliate models can plug into retail media strategies, delivering scalable performance while preserving brand authenticity. For those able to strike the right balance of automation and human connection, the opportunity is massive.
The human advantage in an age of AI
Perhaps predictably, AI’s presence loomed large over iPX 2025, but not without scepticism. As generative tools flood the market, there’s growing concern around what many are calling “AI slop” – generic, overproduced content that misses the mark.
Yet AI also holds enormous promise when used thoughtfully. From automating partner discovery to building dynamic contracts and even campaign execution, AI can reduce friction and amplify human creativity, rather than replace it. The message from iPX: AI should enhance, not erase, the human touch.
A raft of enhancements supercharges the impact.com platform
Finally, the event gave delegates an early opportunity to learn more about the depth and scale of enhancements made to the impact.com platform over the last 12 months, and those due in the next six. The platform has had a full UI/UX overhaul that loads 160% faster and also includes an improved mobile experience – whether through the app or mobile web. ask impact is an embedded AI chatbot that turns dashboards into plain-language insights and will soon automate partner recruiting and rate-setting. Creator Experience 2.0 offers live social listening, sentiment benchmarking and influencer storefronts. There’s also a host of retail media features, including supplier-funded Product Boosts and the expansion of SPOT (impact.com‘s contextual aware native ad units) for retailer pages, as well as a one-click Amazon Seller beta that pipes ASIN (Amazon Standard Identification Number) and attribution data straight into the platform.
Together, these enhancements make impact.com leaner, more intuitive and AI-assisted, exactly the levers businesses need as trust and efficiency move to the top of the agenda.
Collaboration, trust, and connection
If one thing became clear throughout the event, it was that the era of transactional marketing is giving way to one of collaboration, trust, and connection. As the customer journey becomes more complex, partnerships offer a smart, scalable, and sustainable way to engage real people through real relationships. Brands that prioritise authenticity, lean into community, and smartly integrate technology are poised to thrive in this new age.
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