A new study by WARC and LIONS Advisory, in partnership with TikTok, has found that brands are achieving stronger creative outcomes by combining the capabilities of artificial intelligence (AI) with real-time community insights, rather than relying solely on traditional demographic data.
The report, The New Creative Advantage: How Community Signals Are Reshaping Creative Success in the Age of AI, argues that while generative AI has become an essential marketing tool, its effectiveness depends largely on the quality of the data and insights used to guide it.
The research found that 90% of marketers now consider AI part of their creative toolkit, while 88% said generative AI had increased creative output. However, only 45% believed it had significantly improved the quality of creative work.
Despite growing concerns about the limitations of demographic targeting, the study revealed that 67% of marketers still rely primarily on demographic data when briefing AI tools, even though 59% agree that traditional demographic segmentation is no longer effective. Only 17% consistently incorporate broader community or audience insights into their generative AI workflows.
The findings suggest that marketers are increasingly recognising the value of real-time audience behaviour, with 86% believing that community signals will play a greater role in shaping creative development over the next three years.
According to the report, brands that combine AI with community participation are building what it describes as an "intelligence loop" - a continuous cycle in which audience engagement generates cultural insights that improve creative development, leading to more relevant campaigns and stronger audience participation.
Lexi Wolf, Head of Thought Leadership at LIONS Advisory, said: “WARC’s Marketer’s Toolkit 2026 found that belief in the effectiveness of demographic segmentation is waning. Yet this study with TikTok found that demographics were still the number one input marketers used to brief AI. Meanwhile, participatory media environments are giving us something far richer: real-time signals from people who search, comment, share, remix, create and buy.
“The opportunity isn't to make the existing system faster. It's to build a better one: one that helps brands learn from people more continuously, respond with greater speed and relevance, and turn efficiency into effectiveness over time.”
Andy Yang, Global Head of Creative & Brand Ads at TikTok, said: “The brands winning today are not the ones using AI to generate the most content. They are the ones learning the fastest from the people they serve. We call it cultural intelligence, and it is fast becoming advertisers’ most durable competitive advantage.
“Yet the research for this report shows that most brands are briefing powerful AI creative tools with weak inputs: static demographics and legacy assumptions, resulting in creative that scales efficiently but fails to connect. The future belongs to brands that close the loop by creating alongside culture, not behind it.”
The research also highlights the importance of behavioural data in improving AI-driven marketing. Marcos Angelides, Managing Director of L’Oréal Lab and Head of AI Operations at Publicis Media, said: “Where the advantage comes is the data that you use to train those models, because AI is only as good as the data it’s trained on. You’ve got to have behavioral data. You’ve got to know what people actually do, not just what they say they do.”
The report introduces the concept of the Intelligence Loop, a four-stage process through which brands transform community participation into stronger creative performance. It begins with audience participation generating cultural and behavioural signals, followed by those signals identifying emerging consumer demand. These insights are then integrated into AI creative briefs, enabling more relevant campaigns that, in turn, generate fresh audience engagement and further insights.
To help marketers put these findings into practice, the study also introduces the S.C.A.L.E. framework, a five-step approach designed to strengthen AI-powered creativity. The framework encourages brands to Select the right audience signals before briefing AI, Connect with creators as sources of intelligence, Anchor AI outputs with distinctive brand assets, Lead through strong governance and transparency around AI use, and Evolve by treating every campaign as a continuous learning process.
The research is based on a survey of 400 marketers across the United Kingdom, the United States, Australia and Brazil, conducted in May 2026. All respondents were directly involved in decisions relating to marketing content and creative production. The study also incorporates interviews with senior marketing leaders and industry experts, alongside analysis of global data and case studies from WARC and TikTok.
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