I'll conduct research to understand how Topsort fundamentally differs from Particular Audience. This will include an analysis of their business models, core technologies, product offerings, and market positioning. I'll provide a comprehensive comparison highlighting the key distinctions.

I'll get back to you with the findings soon.

Topsort vs. Particular Audience: A Comparative Analysis

Business Model and Revenue Streams

• Topsort: Topsort operates as a B2B SaaS platform that empowers online marketplaces and retailers to launch their own advertising businesses. It provides API-driven retail media infrastructure so clients can monetize their sites with sponsored product listings, banner ads, and other ad formats (Topsort introduction | Topsort Documentation). In essence, Topsort offers “Amazon ads democratized in an API,” allowing marketplaces to emulate Amazon’s advertising model without building it from scratch (#572: Online marketplace advertising with Regina Ye, Topsort - The Agile Brand Guide). Revenue for Topsort comes from providing this technology (likely via licensing or usage fees), and it even facilitates a unified ad network where brands can buy ads across multiple partner marketplaces through one platform (Ad Network). This network approach not only creates value for advertisers, it also suggests Topsort can share in ad spend as an additional revenue stream (beyond SaaS fees) by connecting advertisers to its client marketplaces.
• Particular Audience: Particular Audience (PA) is also a B2B software provider, but its model extends beyond ads into broader e-commerce personalization. It offers a no-code AI platform (branded “Discovery OS”) that retailers deploy to personalize the shopping experience and monetize via retail media (Particular Audience — OneVentures). In practice, PA’s platform helps retailers increase sales through product recommendations, search, dynamic bundles, etc., and generate ad revenue by enabling sponsored product placements on their sites (Particular Audience — OneVentures). The company positions this as unlocking new high-margin income for retailers — for example, PA advertises that its Retail Media product can grow supplier ad revenue by 4–5× for merchants (About Us). Like Topsort, PA likely earns revenue through software licensing/subscription and possibly a share of advertising outcomes, but its core business model is providing the AI-driven tech that merges merchandising and advertising. Notably, PA also operates a retail media marketplace that connects brands (“suppliers”) with ad inventory across multiple retail clients (About Us), indicating an additional channel where PA can facilitate ad spend (and derive fees) by acting as an intermediary. In summary, PA’s business model is about delivering an all-in-one personalization and retail media solution to enterprise retailers, helping them drive more sales and ad income, with PA earning fees for enabling these capabilities.

Core Technologies and Infrastructure

• Topsort: Topsort’s platform is built around an auction-based advertising engine designed for scalability and privacy. At its core is an automated auction system that decides which ads to display based on real-time bidding and predefined relevance criteria (Topsort introduction | Topsort Documentation). This infrastructure is offered via flexible integration options – clients can use low-code SDKs or full APIs – making it relatively quick to embed into existing marketplace platforms (Topsort introduction | Topsort Documentation). A key aspect of Topsort’s technology is its privacy-first design: it touts a “clean advertising” approach that avoids third-party cookies and instead uses encrypted clean-room data for targeting (Topsort Raises $20M in Series A Funding). In terms of AI, Topsort has evolved by integrating machine learning to optimize ad delivery. In mid-2024, it formed a strategic partnership with Moloco, a specialist in operational ML, making Moloco the exclusive engine for Topsort’s ML-driven personalization (Moloco Forms Strategic Partnership to be the Exclusive Machine Learning Engine that Powers Topsort’s Retail Media Infrastructure). Through this partnership, Topsort combines Moloco’s sophisticated deep learning (e.g. transformer models predicting user behavior) with Topsort’s own auction algorithms (Moloco Forms Strategic Partnership to be the Exclusive Machine Learning Engine that Powers Topsort’s Retail Media Infrastructure). This means the infrastructure now leverages advanced ML for ad ranking and targeting, on top of Topsort’s auction logic. The result is a cloud-based ad platform with a simple user interface but powerful back-end: fast API performance, real-time bidding, integrated event tracking for attribution, and an ML-enhanced engine focused on maximizing relevance and ROI. Overall, Topsort’s tech stack is specialized for running retail media auctions efficiently and optimizing them with AI, all while respecting user privacy.
• Particular Audience: Technology is at the heart of Particular Audience’s value proposition – it describes itself as “not just another retail media platform—it’s an AI company at its core” (Particular Audience Announces Largest Ever Product Release—Reinforcing Market Leadership in Advanced AI-Powered Retail Media, Search & Personalization | Business Wire). PA’s infrastructure (Discovery OS) is an end-to-end AI-driven personalization engine that handles both organic content and ads in one system. It employs modern machine learning techniques like transformer-based natural language processing and computer vision to understand products and shopper behavior (Retail Media Overview | Particular Audience Docs). For example, PA’s platform ingests a retailer’s first-party (cookieless) data – product catalogs, user events, etc. – and its Relevancy AI analyzes this data to power search results, recommendations, and ad targeting (Retail Media Overview | Particular Audience Docs) (Particular Audience — OneVentures). The use of NLP means the search function goes beyond simple keyword matching, understanding context and synonyms, while computer vision allows features like visual search or “see similar” recommendations. All of this runs in real time to personalize what each shopper sees. Importantly, PA’s architecture is modular and cloud-based. Retailers can integrate via APIs (for product feed, events, recommendations, etc.) and configure their on-site placements through PA’s dashboard, without needing to develop their own algorithms (Retail Media Overview | Particular Audience Docs) (Retail Media Overview | Particular Audience Docs). The platform emphasizes privacy compliance as well: it does not rely on third-party cookies or any PII exchange – instead it uses first-party behavioral data and even offers built-in “clean room” capabilities for data sharing if needed (Particular Audience Announces Largest Ever Product Release—Reinforcing Market Leadership in Advanced AI-Powered Retail Media, Search & Personalization | Business Wire). In summary, Particular Audience’s core tech is a sophisticated AI infrastructure for commerce – blending search, recommendation, and advertising algorithms – delivered as a no-code or low-code SaaS that easily plugs into a retailer’s existing website/app and elevates it with Amazon-like AI capabilities. This unified approach to technology (one system handling both personalization and monetization) is a fundamental trait of PA’s platform.

Product Offerings and Key Features

• Topsort: Topsort’s product offering is a complete retail media monetization suite focused on advertising features. Its key offerings center on various ad formats and the tools to manage them. For on-site ads, Topsort supports Sponsored Product Listings (native ads that appear alongside organic products in search results or category pages) (Product Overview), Banner Ads (graphical placements for brand or product promotion) (Product Overview), and even Video Ads for richer shopper engagement. All these ad formats are customizable to fit the look and feel of the client’s site, and come with full attribution tracking (so retailers and advertisers can see clicks, sales, and ROI for each ad) (Product Overview). A standout feature of Topsort is its BidLess™ bidding automation. Instead of requiring advertisers to constantly set and adjust bids for cost-per-click, Topsort’s platform can automatically optimize bids to hit a target return on ad spend (ROAS) (Product Overview). This means the system dynamically finds the right CPC for a given campaign to maximize outcomes, simplifying ad management for sellers. (Notably, manual bidding is still supported, but BidLess allows a more hands-off approach to achieve performance goals (Product Overview).) In addition, Topsort provides an analytics dashboard and controls for retailers to manage their ad inventory (which products or pages can show ads, what placements are available, etc.), ensuring that the advertising doesn’t disrupt the shopping experience. Beyond on-site ads, Topsort also introduced a unified ad network feature that is fairly unique: it lets brands and agencies run campaigns across multiple independent retailers through one interface (Ad Network). With a “one-click” campaign setup, an advertiser can choose products and a bid strategy, and Topsort will serve those ads on all participating marketplaces in its network (Ad Network). This network comes with auto-bidding across retailers (optimizing spend per site) (Ad Network) and consolidated reporting, making it easier for advertisers to expand reach while each marketplace gains additional ad demand. In summary, Topsort’s product is all about providing the tools to launch and scale a retail media program: ad serving technology (with formats like sponsored listings, banners, video), automated bidding for performance, and multi-platform campaign capabilities – all aimed at maximizing ad revenue and efficiency for marketplaces.
• Particular Audience: Particular Audience’s product portfolio is broader, covering both shopping personalization and retail media within one platform. On the organic side, PA offers advanced onsite search and discovery tools – for example, an Adaptive Transformer Search (ATS) engine that uses AI to improve search relevance (drastically reducing “no results” occurrences) and to interpret shopper queries beyond exact keyword matches (U.S. Retail Media Veteran Joins Particular Audience to Accelerate U.S. and European Growth—and Build Retail Media the Way It Was Meant to Be | Business Wire) (Particular Audience Announces Largest Ever Product Release—Reinforcing Market Leadership in Advanced AI-Powered Retail Media, Search & Personalization | Business Wire). It also provides product recommendations (e.g. “You May Also Like” carousels, personalized rankings of products), automated product bundling suggestions (to increase basket size), and even dynamic category pages or collections that update based on trends (About Us) (Particular Audience Announces Largest Ever Product Release—Reinforcing Market Leadership in Advanced AI-Powered Retail Media, Search & Personalization | Business Wire). These features aim to boost conversion and average order value through personalization. On the sponsored content side, PA’s platform includes a full retail media solution for on-site ads that natively integrate with that personalized shopping journey. Retailers can designate certain slots in search results or category pages for sponsored products, and PA’s system will fill them with relevant ads from brands/suppliers (Particular Audience Announces Largest Ever Product Release ...). PA supports various ad formats such as sponsored product listings (blended into the product grid) and display ads like banners; recent product releases introduced richer media formats including video and interactive ads within the site (Particular Audience Announces Largest Ever Product Release—Reinforcing Market Leadership in Advanced AI-Powered Retail Media, Search & Personalization | Business Wire) (Particular Audience Announces Largest Ever Product Release—Reinforcing Market Leadership in Advanced AI-Powered Retail Media, Search & Personalization | Business Wire). A key feature is that PA’s same AI engine powers both organic and sponsored placements – meaning, for instance, the system can predict the best sponsored product to show a user based on context and behavior (not just based on a keyword bid). This AI-first approach allows hyper-personalized ads (the CEO says “every ad and recommendation should be hyper-personalized in real time” (Particular Audience Announces Largest Ever Product Release—Reinforcing Market Leadership in Advanced AI-Powered Retail Media, Search & Personalization | Business Wire)). Additionally, PA provides robust tools for retailers and advertisers to manage campaigns: a self-serve interface for brands to upload creatives and set targeting, an AdOps console with approval workflows (retailers can approve ads before they go live) (Particular Audience Announces Largest Ever Product Release—Reinforcing Market Leadership in Advanced AI-Powered Retail Media, Search & Personalization | Business Wire), audience segmentation tools to target ads using first-party data (all zero-PII to remain privacy-safe) (Particular Audience Announces Largest Ever Product Release—Reinforcing Market Leadership in Advanced AI-Powered Retail Media, Search & Personalization | Business Wire), and support for multiple bidding models (CPC and CPM, and recently added CPA – Cost per Acquisition – as a new option for performance-based ads (Particular Audience Announces Largest Ever Product Release—Reinforcing Market Leadership in Advanced AI-Powered Retail Media, Search & Personalization | Business Wire)). PA even introduced a fixed tenancy feature, allowing retailers to sell premium ad placements for a flat fee/time (e.g. a brand buys the top slot for a week) with automated scheduling (Particular Audience Announces Largest Ever Product Release—Reinforcing Market Leadership in Advanced AI-Powered Retail Media, Search & Personalization | Business Wire). All these features are part of PA’s unified “DiscoveryOS” platform, which means retailers can control merchandising rules and media placements together in one system. The key benefit of this integrated product set is that ads and organic content can be optimized in tandem – for example, PA’s engine can decide when to show a sponsored product or a recommendation in a given slot to maximize revenue without hurting user experience. In short, Particular Audience’s offering spans the full spectrum of product discovery: from smart search and personalization that increase conversion, to a built-in retail media platform that turns traffic into ad dollars. This one-stop solution with rich AI-driven features is what defines PA’s product suite.

Market Positioning and Target Customers

• Topsort: Topsort positions itself as a solution for marketplaces and online retailers who need to rapidly set up an ad monetization program. Founded in 2021 and based in San Francisco, it explicitly targeted marketplaces as its initial niche – the platform is “designed specifically for marketplaces looking to develop and scale their own auction-based advertising platforms” (Topsort introduction | Topsort Documentation). This includes a wide range of e-commerce operators: from multi-vendor marketplaces and classifieds platforms to retail chains with an e-commerce presence, and even B2B marketplaces (for example, AB InBev’s BEES beverage distribution marketplace is a client) (Ad Network). Topsort markets itself as an “AI-first ad infrastructure” provider and emphasizes speed and simplicity, which is appealing to companies that lack a large internal ad-tech team. Essentially, it sells the promise that a marketplace can add a new revenue stream (like Amazon’s Advertising) quickly by plugging into Topsort. Many of Topsort’s early adopters have been mid-size and growing marketplaces, including those in emerging markets – for instance, Latin American retailers (Falabella/Sodimac, Cencosud) and specialty marketplaces (fashion marketplace Garmentory, grocery delivery app Weee!) have used Topsort to launch their retail media offerings (Ad Network) (Ad Network). By delivering technology that is API-first and developer-friendly, Topsort appeals to product/tech teams who want control and flexibility. At the same time, it offers business teams a quick go-to-market for ads. The company often describes its mission as democratizing the kind of ad business Amazon has: “we like to say we’re Amazon ads democratized in an API” (#572: Online marketplace advertising with Regina Ye, Topsort - The Agile Brand Guide). This positioning resonates with marketplaces that see Amazon and other giants (MercadoLibre, Walmart, etc.) as benchmarks – Topsort essentially promises them a competitive ad platform without the years of R&D. In summary, Topsort’s target customers are online marketplaces and retailers (of all sizes) seeking to monetize via onsite ads, and its positioning is that of a nimble, AI-powered infrastructure provider that can turn them into “Amazon-like” ad platforms quickly. It has a global outlook (claiming clients in 40+ countries) and often highlights how it enables retail partners to unlock new revenue in a privacy-compliant, modern way (Topsort Raises $20M in Series A Funding).
• Particular Audience: Particular Audience targets a slightly broader segment of the retail market, positioning itself as a partner for ambitious, innovation-driven retailers (whether they operate as marketplaces or traditional e-commerce). PA’s messaging is all about enabling any retailer to match Amazon’s level of personalization and monetization. In fact, the company explicitly frames the market challenge as “every retailer and vendor is fighting to close the technical gap with Amazon and Walmart”, and pitches Particular Audience as the solution to do exactly that (U.S. Retail Media Veteran Joins Particular Audience to Accelerate U.S. and European Growth—and Build Retail Media the Way It Was Meant to Be | Business Wire). Its ideal customers are medium to large multi-brand retailers, online marketplaces, and even non-retail commerce platforms that want state-of-the-art AI to improve shopper experience and generate advertising income. PA has made inroads with some high-profile retail names – they report working with “the world’s most ambitious retailers including Target, Petbarn, and Hamleys” (Particular Audience Announces Largest Ever Product Release—Reinforcing Market Leadership in Advanced AI-Powered Retail Media, Search & Personalization | Business Wire). (For context, Target is a major big-box retailer, Hamleys is a large UK toy retailer, and Petbarn is a leading pet supply chain in Australia, indicating PA has attracted enterprise clients in the US, UK, and Australian markets respectively.) This suggests PA is positioned to serve enterprise-scale deployments, often as a replacement for either legacy search/recommendation systems or outdated ad platforms. PA also highlights its applicability across verticals: their solutions are showcased for fashion, grocery, electronics, and even sectors like travel, banking, or classifieds listings (About Us). That indicates PA sees its platform as a horizontal technology for any online business that needs to personalize content and monetize an audience (e.g. a travel site showing personalized deals or a finance site with tailored offers could use PA’s AI). However, the core focus remains retail/e-commerce, where the need to blend product discovery with sponsored placements is strongest. In terms of market positioning, PA portrays itself as the “first high-tech retail media platform” that can handle both organic and sponsored content with advanced AI (Particular Audience Announces Largest Ever Product Release ...). This contrasts with point solutions (like standalone recommendation engines or ad servers); PA is selling a unified solution. It often calls its platform “cutting-edge” and emphasizes democratizing AI – “the technology that makes Amazon great, for the rest of retail” (About Us). Geographically, PA started in Australia and expanded internationally (now with operations across North America, Europe, and APAC (Particular Audience Announces Largest Ever Product Release—Reinforcing Market Leadership in Advanced AI-Powered Retail Media, Search & Personalization | Business Wire)), likely targeting retailers in those markets that are looking to modernize their e-commerce stack. In summary, Particular Audience’s target customers are retailers and commerce platforms seeking a state-of-the-art AI personalization and retail media solution, especially those who want an integrated approach to boost shopper engagement and unlock new ad revenues. PA positions itself as a leader in this space, appealing to retailers that aspire to be on the cutting edge of e-commerce tech.

Unique Selling Points (USPs) and Competitive Advantages

• Topsort: Topsort’s USPs revolve around simplicity, ROI-focus, and infrastructure flexibility. A major selling point is how quickly and easily a client can deploy the platform – Topsort offers low-code integration and pre-built modules, so a marketplace can get an ad system running with minimal development effort (Topsort introduction | Topsort Documentation). This speed to implement is a competitive advantage when compared to building in-house or using heavier enterprise software. Another USP is Topsort’s emphasis on automated optimization for revenue. Its proprietary BidLess™ algorithm stands out by automatically tuning bids to maximize return on ad spend (Product Overview). By offloading the manual work of bid management, Topsort appeals to both retailers (who want their advertisers to succeed and spend more) and to the advertisers on those marketplaces (who get better performance with less effort). In effect, Topsort bakes in advertising best practices and AI-driven bid optimization, which smaller marketplaces might not have internally. Additionally, Topsort is privacy-forward, branding itself as a “clean” ad platform with no creepy tracking (Topsort Raises $20M in Series A Funding) (Topsort Raises $20M in Series A Funding). In an era of tightening privacy regulations, this is a noteworthy advantage – it can reassure clients that adopting Topsort won’t create compliance headaches (important if a competitor relies on third-party data). On the technology side, having Moloco’s deep learning integrated became a differentiator in 2024: it means Topsort can claim world-class machine learning capabilities in prediction and personalization, bolstered by Moloco’s proven algorithms (Moloco Forms Strategic Partnership to be the Exclusive Machine Learning Engine that Powers Topsort’s Retail Media Infrastructure) (Moloco Forms Strategic Partnership to be the Exclusive Machine Learning Engine that Powers Topsort’s Retail Media Infrastructure). This partnership essentially leveled up Topsort’s AI strengths and became a unique point (few pure retail media startups have an exclusive ML engine provided by a larger AI company). Topsort also differentiates with its unified ad network, which is uncommon among retail media platforms – by aggregating ad inventory from many marketplaces, Topsort offers advertisers scale and ease that a single-retailer platform cannot (Ad Network). This network effect can attract more advertiser spend, benefitting all participating retailers (and making Topsort’s offering more attractive to them in turn). Finally, Topsort’s roots in auction theory (one co-founder is a renowned economist) and focus on transparency could be seen as competitive advantages: it provides clear ROI metrics and control to clients (e.g. one-click ROAS control for sponsored listings (Topsort Raises $20M in Series A Funding)). In summary, Topsort’s unique advantages are the quick integration, auction expertise with automated bid optimization, a privacy-centric design, and a growing ecosystem (network) that boosts ad demand. These collectively give it an edge in serving marketplaces that need an easy, effective way to monetize through advertising.
• Particular Audience: Particular Audience’s USP is its holistic AI-powered approach to retail media and personalization. The platform’s biggest differentiator is that it unifies functions that are often separate – in PA, the same AI engine drives product discovery for shoppers and monetization for retailers. This means PA can do things like show highly relevant sponsored products without compromising the customer experience, something it argues legacy systems struggle with (U.S. Retail Media Veteran Joins Particular Audience to Accelerate U.S. and European Growth—and Build Retail Media the Way It Was Meant to Be | Business Wire). Competitors might offer just an ad serving tool or just a recommendation engine, but PA’s end-to-end system covers search, recommendations, audience segmentation, and ad serving in one package (U.S. Retail Media Veteran Joins Particular Audience to Accelerate U.S. and European Growth—and Build Retail Media the Way It Was Meant to Be | Business Wire). This all-in-one approach is a strong USP for retailers who want a seamless solution rather than stitching together multiple vendors. Another key selling point is advanced personalization through AI. PA claims to have the “most advanced AI-powered retail media platform on the market” (U.S. Retail Media Veteran Joins Particular Audience to Accelerate U.S. and European Growth—and Build Retail Media the Way It Was Meant to Be | Business Wire), with algorithms that understand shopper intent at a deep level. Concretely, PA replaces simplistic keyword targeting with intent predictions and contextual relevance. The benefit of this is seen in performance – for example, after one implementation, PA noted that by switching from a legacy keyword-based ad system to PA’s Adaptive AI Search, the fill-rate of sponsored product slots more than doubled (Particular Audience Announces Largest Ever Product Release—Reinforcing Market Leadership in Advanced AI-Powered Retail Media, Search & Personalization | Business Wire). That kind of uplift underscores a competitive advantage: PA’s tech makes better use of available ad inventory (showing an ad where others might fail to match one) and drives higher engagement by showing more relevant content. Automation and ease of use are also core to PA’s USP. It heavily advertises that retailers can achieve more revenue with far less manual effort (Particular Audience Launches AI-Driven Retail Media Platform to ...). Campaign optimization, audience segmentation, A/B testing of algorithms – these are handled or greatly simplified by PA’s platform, which is appealing to resource-strapped teams. PA provides a lot of out-of-the-box intelligence (the phrase “AI engine out of the box, ready to slot into any retail media tech stack” was used by an industry veteran about PA (U.S. Retail Media Veteran Joins Particular Audience to Accelerate U.S. and European Growth—and Build Retail Media the Way It Was Meant to Be | Business Wire)). This means faster time to value, which is a competitive edge. Another advantage PA pushes is flexibility: retailers can use the full platform or choose modular components as needed (U.S. Retail Media Veteran Joins Particular Audience to Accelerate U.S. and European Growth—and Build Retail Media the Way It Was Meant to Be | Business Wire). This can be attractive if a retailer wants to, say, keep their own search engine but use PA for recommendations and sponsored ads, or vice versa. Lastly, PA often cites its results and improvements as proof of its edge – e.g. clients achieving 3x higher engagement and 4–10x growth in ad revenue using the platform (U.S. Retail Media Veteran Joins Particular Audience to Accelerate U.S. and European Growth—and Build Retail Media the Way It Was Meant to Be | Business Wire). Those are significant outcomes that highlight PA’s ability to drive both top-line and bottom-line improvements. To sum up, Particular Audience’s USPs are its integrated AI-first platform (combining personalization and monetization in one), its cutting-edge algorithms that outperform legacy keyword-based approaches, and its delivery of substantial performance gains with minimal manual work. These strengths position PA as a leader for retailers who want a truly intelligent, turnkey solution to transform their e-commerce experience and ad business simultaneously, rather than piecemeal tools.

Notable Partnerships or Industry Impact

• Topsort: In its relatively short history, Topsort has forged meaningful partnerships and demonstrated impact through its client successes. One of the most notable developments was Topsort’s strategic partnership with Moloco announced in 2024. Moloco, a major player in machine learning and advertising, not only invested financially in Topsort but also became the exclusive provider of ML technology powering Topsort’s platform (Moloco Forms Strategic Partnership to be the Exclusive Machine Learning Engine that Powers Topsort’s Retail Media Infrastructure). This partnership signaled industry confidence in Topsort – effectively Moloco bet on Topsort’s vision, and the collaboration allows Topsort to offer algorithmic personalization on par with leading ad tech (via Moloco’s deep learning models) as part of its retail media infrastructure (Moloco Forms Strategic Partnership to be the Exclusive Machine Learning Engine that Powers Topsort’s Retail Media Infrastructure). It’s a unique alliance in the retail media space that strengthened Topsort’s product and credibility. Aside from that, Topsort’s impact is evidenced by its roster of clients and case studies. The platform has been adopted by a variety of retailers and marketplaces worldwide, and in many cases it’s opened up new advertising channels or revenue streams where none existed. For example, Topsort enabled Falabella (a large Latin American retailer) to move from fixed-price ads to an auction model, resulting in 5× ad revenue compared to their legacy provider (Ad Network). It also powered the first retail media implementations in certain regions – Farmatodo in Colombia’s first pharmacy retail media network, Cencosud’s digital ecosystem in LATAM, etc., showing it’s driving innovation in those markets (Ad Network). Topsort’s partnership with AB InBev’s BEES (a global B2B marketplace for retailers to order beverages) is another impactful example, as it brought a retail media capability into the wholesale/B2B sphere (Ad Network). On the brand side, Topsort’s network has attracted major advertisers: according to the company, brands like Unilever, Coca-Cola, L’Oréal, General Mills and others have run campaigns through Topsort (Topsort Raises $20M in Series A Funding). Having these Fortune 500 brands on the platform indicates that Topsort is facilitating connections between big ad buyers and its retail partners, a significant industry role. In summary, Topsort’s notable partnerships (like the Moloco deal) and its successful deployments (across North America, Latin America, Europe, and Asia) have made it an emerging infrastructure standard for retail media in many markets. Its impact is seen in helping retailers large and small stand up profitable ad businesses quickly, sometimes outperforming incumbent solutions, and in fostering a new network where global brands can extend their advertising reach beyond the largest e-commerce sites (Topsort Raises $20M in Series A Funding) (Topsort Raises $20M in Series A Funding). All of this underlines Topsort’s growing influence in the retail media industry as a catalyst for the “democratization” of ad tech.
• Particular Audience: Particular Audience has also made significant strides, marked by high-profile client engagements and thought leadership in the retail media space. One major indicator of PA’s industry impact is its work with top-tier retailers. Landing Target as a client is a strong validation of PA’s technology (Particular Audience Announces Largest Ever Product Release—Reinforcing Market Leadership in Advanced AI-Powered Retail Media, Search & Personalization | Business Wire). Additionally, partnerships with brands like Hamleys and Petbarn show PA’s ability to serve diverse markets (UK, Australia) and deliver results for different retail models (U.S. Retail Media Veteran Joins Particular Audience to Accelerate U.S. and European Growth—and Build Retail Media the Way It Was Meant to Be | Business Wire). The performance outcomes reported by these clients are notable – for instance, PA claims that retailers using its platform have achieved up to 4–10× growth in ad revenue and significantly higher shopper engagement (U.S. Retail Media Veteran Joins Particular Audience to Accelerate U.S. and European Growth—and Build Retail Media the Way It Was Meant to Be | Business Wire). Such results, if sustained, have industry-wide implications: they raise the bar for what retail media platforms should deliver. PA has also been active in expanding its team with industry veterans, which can be seen as a form of partnership/impact. In early 2025, PA brought on Matt Romano – a retail media veteran who helped build Home Depot’s and Walmart’s ad networks – as a senior executive (U.S. Retail Media Veteran Joins Particular Audience to Accelerate U.S. and European Growth—and Build Retail Media the Way It Was Meant to Be | Business Wire) (U.S. Retail Media Veteran Joins Particular Audience to Accelerate U.S. and European Growth—and Build Retail Media the Way It Was Meant to Be | Business Wire). His decision to join PA (after leading roles at Triad/Walmart, Rakuten, etc.) was covered in the press and was viewed as a testament to PA’s technology and vision (U.S. Retail Media Veteran Joins Particular Audience to Accelerate U.S. and European Growth—and Build Retail Media the Way It Was Meant to Be | Business Wire) (U.S. Retail Media Veteran Joins Particular Audience to Accelerate U.S. and European Growth—and Build Retail Media the Way It Was Meant to Be | Business Wire). This move not only strengthens PA’s go-to-market in the U.S. and Europe, but also signals PA’s intent to shape “retail media the way it was meant to be” (as that press release put it). In terms of product innovation and thought leadership, Particular Audience frequently highlights how it is leading the transformation of retail media (Particular Audience Announces Largest Ever Product Release—Reinforcing Market Leadership in Advanced AI-Powered Retail Media, Search & Personalization | Business Wire). The company’s announcements – such as a major product release in 2025 – introduced features ahead of industry trends (e.g. accessibility-compliant ad formats anticipating new regulations (Particular Audience Announces Largest Ever Product Release—Reinforcing Market Leadership in Advanced AI-Powered Retail Media, Search & Personalization | Business Wire) (Particular Audience Announces Largest Ever Product Release—Reinforcing Market Leadership in Advanced AI-Powered Retail Media, Search & Personalization | Business Wire), and a unified Promotion Hub that manages organic and sponsored placement in one engine (Particular Audience Announces Largest Ever Product Release—Reinforcing Market Leadership in Advanced AI-Powered Retail Media, Search & Personalization | Business Wire)). By proactively addressing things like the European Accessibility Act compliance in ads, PA has an impact on industry best practices (pushing competitors to follow suit on inclusivity and compliance). Furthermore, Particular Audience has been vocal about the shift away from outdated methods: it often points out the limitations of legacy keyword-based ad targeting and champions AI-driven intent targeting (U.S. Retail Media Veteran Joins Particular Audience to Accelerate U.S. and European Growth—and Build Retail Media the Way It Was Meant to Be | Business Wire) (U.S. Retail Media Veteran Joins Particular Audience to Accelerate U.S. and European Growth—and Build Retail Media the Way It Was Meant to Be | Business Wire). This narrative is influencing how retailers think about the future of their media – PA is essentially advocating for the next generation of retail media powered by smarter automation. Lastly, PA’s partnership with investors and global expansion has an industry ripple effect. It has raised capital (e.g. a Series A led by big VCs in Australia and Europe) to fuel growth and even utilized innovative financing like venture debt to scale (OneVentures' growth credit funds with Particular Audience), showing a robust business that can invest in R&D. With operations now across the U.S., U.K., Canada, and Australia (Particular Audience Announces Largest Ever Product Release—Reinforcing Market Leadership in Advanced AI-Powered Retail Media, Search & Personalization | Business Wire), PA is making advanced retail media technology accessible in multiple major markets, and partnering with retailers there to elevate their e-commerce experiences. In summary, Particular Audience’s impact is seen through its elite client base and their success, its role in pushing the industry toward AI-first, integrated retail media solutions, and strategic hires and expansions that underscore its reputation as a pioneer in retail media and personalization. Together, these factors highlight how PA is fundamentally shaping expectations and capabilities in the retail media landscape, in a way that is distinct from Topsort’s infrastructure-focused influence.

Sources:

• Topsort documentation and website (Topsort introduction | Topsort Documentation) (Ad Network) (Product Overview) (Product Overview)
• Topsort CEO interview and press releases (#572: Online marketplace advertising with Regina Ye, Topsort - The Agile Brand Guide) (Topsort Raises $20M in Series A Funding) (Topsort Raises $20M in Series A Funding) (Moloco Forms Strategic Partnership to be the Exclusive Machine Learning Engine that Powers Topsort’s Retail Media Infrastructure)
• Particular Audience website, press releases, and investor materials (Particular Audience — OneVentures) (U.S. Retail Media Veteran Joins Particular Audience to Accelerate U.S. and European Growth—and Build Retail Media the Way It Was Meant to Be | Business Wire) (U.S. Retail Media Veteran Joins Particular Audience to Accelerate U.S. and European Growth—and Build Retail Media the Way It Was Meant to Be | Business Wire) (Particular Audience Announces Largest Ever Product Release—Reinforcing Market Leadership in Advanced AI-Powered Retail Media, Search & Personalization | Business Wire)

AI/ML that powers all customer interactions. If you see it, search it, click it, or buy it – that's PA.

Right now, most retail media platforms still rely on manual keyword-based targeting, which is missing up to 80% of potential revenue—especially from shoppers who never use search.

We built AI-first retail media at Particular Audience—where ads are placed based on predicted intent, not just keywords. That’s why our partners see 4x better performance than traditional keyword-first platforms.

Advanced search and recommendation technology is the foundation of successful Retail Media.

Particular Audience will outperform any other platform for automation, performance and ease of implementation.

We prove it, with zero risk or effort from the retailer. Contact us to speak to someone today.