In the words of the Notorious B.I.G., “Mo Money, Mo Problems.” In a way, that explains the measurement moment we’re seeing in adtech and advertising: As more dollars are spent, there’s more pressure to measure what those dollars actually deliver.
With that in mind, Circana has announced that it’s adding Google’s open-source Meridian MMM framework to its Liquid Mix measurement platform. The integration combines Meridian with Circana’s consumer and transaction data to give advertisers another way to measure marketing performance and optimize spending.
Liquid Mix is Circana’s own MMM platform, giving customers a continuous view of the incremental impact of different marketing channels and allowing them to model potential budget changes.
Why This Matters:
Marketing mix modeling (“MMM”) is certainly having a moment. As advertising has become more fragmented, marketers face growing pressure to prove what their spending actually delivers. To that end, MMM has re-emerged as an important measurement tool because it can look across channels and tie marketing investments to business outcomes.
And marketers are putting money behind it. Roughly half (47%) of brand and agencies in the U.S. planned to invest in MMM over the following year, according to a 2025 EMARKETER and TransUnion survey. More marketers also named MMM (28%) as the most reliable measurement methodology versus MTA/multitouch attribution (19%) or so-called “unified measurement solutions” (19%).
The Circana-Meridian integration fits squarely into the broader shift. The goal is to make MMM more accessible, transparent and useful for ongoing decisions — not just something marketers turn to for an occasional measurement study.
Experts React:
Around the time Google made Meridian broadly available in early 2025, Forrester analyst Brad Haag argued that open-source MMM could broaden the market, but cautioned that Meridian wasn’t a “one size fits all” solution. Using it effectively on their own, he wrote in a blog post, requires brands to have strong data engineering, data science and visualization resources.
That context helps explain the opportunity for companies like Circana: Meridian provides the open-source modeling framework, while Circana adds its own data, technology and measurement expertise on top.
Our Take:
Taking a big step back, 2026 is shaping up to be a landmark year for measurement, right?
Between the resurgence of MMM, a wave of M&A, and new measurement products and partnerships, the space is seeing a level of investment and activity that reflects just how important — and complicated — proving advertising performance has become.
It’s still early, but it’ll be interesting to see where all this activity takes measurement in 2027.
