How M&S and Incubeta are powering growth through demand-led Search

There’s a lot of change happening in marketing, and much of it is really exciting. Consumer behaviour is shifting significantly. On platforms like Search, queries are becoming longer and multimodal, with more people searching using images or voice. That can require a different approach.

At the same time, marketing operations are evolving. AI-powered campaign types, such as Performance Max and other AI-driven formats, can help marketers be more responsive to consumers and support capturing demand across changing query types.

Customer behaviour is totally different now. There are trend moments that seem to emerge out of nowhere, and viral products no one predicts. We need to be reactive to what customers want so we can be present in the moments they’re searching and shopping.

Consumers aren’t predictable, so even our best-laid plans can miss opportunities. Unknown moments are becoming more frequent as behaviour changes. A demand-led approach can help give us greater confidence that we’re investing at the right times with the right audiences.

At M&S it wasn’t about tools, skills or resources – we already had those. It was about culture change within the business.

Like many retailers, we worked week to week with targets we needed to hit. Historically, we’d reach the end of the week and reset. We needed to think longer term while also being far more reactive. Instead of focusing solely on weekly targets and adjusting to hit them, we needed to react in the moment while understanding the longer-term impact of spend.

Day to day, this meant a process change across teams. Everyone needed to be aligned. We now have monthly planning sessions where we discuss budgets, objectives, growth opportunities and what we want to achieve. Everyone starts the month on the same page.

Planning upfront has been crucial. We’ve always been open about what we’re trying to achieve. M&S has a clear view of where we want to go over the next year and even the next five years. We update Incubeta as soon as we can, so we’re aligned.

With that information, we can build a response together and create the strategies that support those goals. Being reactive to what the business needs, and staying aligned as early as possible, has been key.

Beyond clear alignment on objectives and broader strategy, bringing in teams and stakeholders beyond marketing has also been key. As part of this journey, we’ve worked closely with finance, analytics and data stakeholders. That level of access has been critical from an agency perspective.

AI is only as good as the information you feed into it. Our data consistently shows that creative is often the single biggest factor influencing performance, so our focus is on making creative as relevant as possible.

With M&S, that means rolling out AI Max at scale to dynamically tailor messaging to emerging intent. Alongside this, we’re using platforms such as OutCreate to bring data, insight and production together, ensuring creative remains both highly relevant and high quality.

Historically, marketing would develop ideas and finance would act as an approval point. We wanted to bring finance on the journey with us, and that shift has been critical.

Finance teams bring incredibly valuable data and a detailed understanding of costs, which helps us set clear ROAS targets and shape strategy around wider business needs, whether that’s selling through stock or driving incremental growth.

When presenting to senior leadership, coming with a joint marketing-finance recommendation builds immediate confidence and credibility. We’re not spending because we think it’s right, but because it aligns with broader business priorities.

Yes, this happened recently. When Martin Lewis recommended our Beauty Advent Calendar on his ITV show, we saw an immediate surge in both traffic and sales.

Historically, it would have taken us longer to respond, but this time we were able to quickly flex our spend to capture demand while interest was at its peak. Martin moves on fast, so being able to capitalise on that moment was essential.

At Incubeta, we place agility at the heart of our culture through a mindset we call ‘dare to lead,’ which puts test-and-learn at the centre of everything we do.

We start with a clear hypothesis, build a proof of concept, and test it on a small scale to generate early insight before rolling out anything larger.

Crucially, we encourage teams to see failure as just as valuable as success. Every test is treated as a learning opportunity, helping us understand what works, what doesn’t, and how to continuously improve.

Be clear with the business on why you’re doing it. Start with a problem people can rally behind, then work together to define the solution.

It’s also crucial to bring people on the journey as early as possible. Finance is key, but so are the teams who will use the tools and benefit day to day, such as trade teams. When everyone is aligned from the start, change becomes far easier to embed. It’s a significant shift, particularly for finance, so early involvement is invaluable.

There was a moment in our process where we had everyone in the room: Google partners, the Incubeta team, the M&S marketing team and wider stakeholders including finance. That shared alignment allowed us to clearly articulate the value of what we were recommending and move forward with confidence together.

We’re still early in our demand-led journey, and there’s so much more we can do. One exciting frontier is integrating richer intelligence, such as stock and profit signals, to evolve this into a truly supply-and-demand-led approach.

There’s also a significant opportunity in applying a deeper customer lens, from distinguishing between new and returning customers to tailoring strategies for different segments. Together, that opens up an incredibly exciting next phase for us as a combined team.

I agree. For a long time, one-to-one customer engagement has been an ambition we all talked about, but without a clear route to achieve it at scale. Now, we finally have the tools, data and AI capability to move meaningfully closer to that goal.

This is just the beginning. Today, it’s in one channel, but the next step is applying these learnings across channels, so we can reach the right customer, at the right time, in the right place. As Damien said, it’s about connecting growth strategies across the business into every channel, which is what makes this such an exciting moment for marketing.