Why advertisers are quietly returning to news-driven media channels
By Kimeko McCoy • October 9, 2025 •
Ivy Liu
Brand safety was never just about steering clear of violence, nudity or hate speech. It was always about brand suitability — and that threshold isn’t fixed. It’s only gotten worse as phrases like diversity, equity and inclusion have taken new meaning under President Donald Trump’s administration.
Marketers have conceded that the news cycle is moving quickly, changing their standards for what makes an emotionally charged moment, and what could sway the suitability of an ad spend. In response, three buyers say the precarious time has led them to the channels the industry has long held in the crosshairs of brand suitability: news, for fear of missing out on inventory.
DoubleVerify started to address this phenomenon late last year, revealing data that showed advertising on news sites drives nearly 10% more engagement than non-news content. Around the same time, DV launched its News Accelerator program as an educational resource for advertisers to make the case for brand presence in news media. DV also released a host of new ad tools, including refining keyword lists for greater flexibility and scale and AI-powered keyword optimization.
Marketers respond
In a year without a presidential election, improved brand safety tools and an increasingly politicized cultural zeitgeist, advertisers accepted that they can’t afford to leave eyeballs on the table. In some cases, clients are currently putting 10-30% of their budget toward news publishers, roughly an increase from between 8-15% last year, according to Kim Harrison, group media director of connections strategy at Fitzco ad agency. It helps that there’s no election this year, Harrison added.
Getting ads in front of shoppers trumps brand safety. Companies are facing tariffs and rising ad costs across the board all while cognizant of investor pressure to maximize profits. That makes it hard to leave media channels on the table, according to two agency execs Digiday spoke with for this piece.
And while some marketers are embracing levity and universal appeal to sidestep the cultural minefield, others are reentering previously off-limits territory — such as Fox News, CNN, even Reddit — betting that message and context can coexist, if handled appropriately.
“It’s more about being present with our audience,” said Ashley Karim-Kincey, svp of media and partnerships at Dagger ad agency. “The consumer trumps brand safety right now because content, as a whole, is questionable. And you cannot control that.”
Audience over avoidance
Take Whisker, for example, the pet care product brand is “willing to test anything,” Joe Ciccarelli, Whisker’s head of creative, told Digiday. That includes running ads for its latest campaign across the likes of Fox, CNN, C-Span and Bloomberg with flight dates from August that’ll run “until it doesn’t work anymore,” he said.
Since joining in January, Ciccarelli has made it a point to not avoid channels that other advertisers have, such as Fox or CNN. “We try not to discriminate to where we’re reaching them [shoppers],” Ciccarelli said. He added, ”We haven’t leaned away from being in those places where there are political conversations going on, mainly because we think we have something [a pet product] that most people can agree on.” (Ciccarelli did not provide financial details of the ad spots.)
And the dollars are there to back it up. Whisker is investing approximately 60% more ad spend in more news-driven channels year-over-year, per the pet brand. Its “Moment of Relief” campaign marks the first time Whisker focused strategy specifically on those channels, the brand told Digiday.
“We are not completely avoiding it because then we’re losing inventory,” said Karim-Kincey said. “We’re losing those impressions of eyeballs that are so important to our business.”
According to Karim-Kincey, brand clients have surrendered to the idea that politics and culture are inseparable. Dagger’s quick service restaurant and automotive brand clients’ spend on news-driven channels started increasing at the end of last year, she added. (Karim-Kincey did not specify spend figures.)
It’s a similar story at Fitzco, where Harrison said clients are buying ad spots with what could be called a bi-partisan approach. For example, if there’s a CNN media buy, there’s a Fox News media buy to strike a balance and avoid alienating either audience.
In Disney’s recent fallout with late night talk show host Jimmy Kimmel most advertisers responded with non-responses. When Sinclair Broadcast Group, which syndicates the show, preempted Jimmy Kimmel Live! and people threatened to boycott, one media buyer said no clients planned to pull ad spend in response — suggesting a higher risk tolerance from brands who were once looking to avoid controversy at all costs.
“Ultimately, the responsibility and the commitment lies in getting the best programming to achieve the objectives that we need to achieve for our clients,” said the media buyer, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.
