Brands are pouring more money into their marketing campaigns but seeing less impact in return—and that gap between spend and impact is widening.
According to Shutterstock’s 2025 Creative Impact Report, released today, marketing spending jumped 33% between 2023 and 2024. Yet the effect on purchase intent rose only 17%, resulting in a 12% “impact gap” that continues to grow. Through the first eight months of 2025, the report found, overall impact has fallen another 8%, creating a cumulative 20% gap since 2023.
“The issue here is that most brands are not keeping pace with the behavioral changes in their customer base,” said Cal Roberts, director of creative strategy and insights at Shutterstock. “More fundamentally, they don’t know who their audience is anymore, so they’re placing their bets in areas where they’re not seeing that return on investment.”
Shutterstock partnered with WPP’s marketing analytics tools to evaluate more than three years of campaign, social, and purchase intent data from over two dozen brands. The findings point to a larger crisis in marketing effectiveness, as creative strategies fail to evolve amid a noisy, fragmented media landscape and growing consumer ad fatigue.
“Our data is showing that emotional connection and cultural relevance are two of the biggest things that help drive creative impact for brands today,” said Allison Sitzman, vice-president of brand strategy at Shutterstock.
The report is designed to help brands understand how creativity contributes to measurable ROI.
It comes as the stock image giant repositions itself as a broader creative partner. In January, Shutterstock agreed to merge with rival Getty Images, and in June, it rebranded as a creative company that can also help brands produce ads and AI-generated content.
Shutterstock noted that just a few years ago — from 2022 through 2023 — the gap between marketing spend and impact was essentially flat. But volume-based strategies no longer deliver results in an era of AI-generated content and a volatile media environment.
Know what you stand for
In this volatile environment, nearly two-thirds of businesses have faced boycotts linked to social movements, according to the report. Roberts said brands that understand their audiences — and what they stand for — can better navigate this volatility and avoid reactive decisions.
AI has made it easier than ever to flood the market with content, but Roberts urged brands to prioritize quality over quantity. While 58% of creatives surveyed said AI helped them create content faster, 56% said the tech, if used correctly, could make their work more emotionally relevant.
The coming year could intensify the challenge, with the U.S. midterm elections and global events like the Winter Olympics expected to further crowd the media landscape. Brands that rely on outdated, “set-it-and-forget-it” marketing approaches may struggle to keep up.