Amid economic uncertainty, brands don’t have a dollar to waste. So, measuring the effectiveness of your marketing is more important than ever. For some brands, this uncertainty presents an opportunity for growth. For many, it emphasizes the need to protect the bottom line and double down on media efficiency. Either way, maximizing the outputs of your Media Mix Model (MMM) is tantamount to success.

Read on for our experts’ recommendations on how to get the most out of your MMM in today’s volatile business environment.

Tip #1: Don’t Abandon Long-Term Impact

When the industry is unpredictable, it’s tempting to solely focus on the here and now. While it’s important to protect short-term profitability, don’t abandon long-term impact to your revenue and customer file health. Your MMM can help balance and quantify the trade-offs of shifting long-term marketing initiatives, such as customer acquisition, for short-term gains.

So, what’s next? Align with your team or partners on priority media objectives­–like profitable efficiency or maximizing volume–and leverage your MMM outputs to create optimized budget allocations across media channels.

Tip #2: Pay Attention to External Factors

Obviously, it’s important to remain aware of the economic environment. But, it’s even more important to understand how economic indicators and category trend variables influence your model. Why? This information can help isolate the impact of volatility to your base business.

The more often you can refresh your MMM, the better. Frequent MMM refreshes can help identify optimizations and support media investment decisions when market conditions make it difficult to assess media’s impact.

So, what’s next? Dissatisfied with the frequency? EMRge by Ovative’s Modern MMM+ refreshes weekly.

Tip #3: Testing is a Winning Strategy

Don’t abandon testing during periods of instability. We get it, while it may seem as though testing is a nonessential expense, abandoning it may cost you in the long-run. Marketers should actively leverage hold-out testing to validate the incremental performance being read by their MMM. In fact, hold-out testing is a great way to reduce media spend if you are faced with budget cuts.

So, what’s next? Identify and prioritize a list of media channels you want to test into–and be ready to put those tests into market when the budget pressure comes!

Tip #4: Triangulate, Triangulate, Triangulate

Did we mention triangulation? Don’t rely solely on MMM outputs. Rather, triangulate marketing performance by leveraging additional metrics. MMMs are built on historical data and trends. So, in periods of volatility, even the most frequent models may not be reactive enough to major macroeconomic changes.

So, what’s next? Compare MMM output trends with platform, site, store, and base business analytics weekly to decompose where to spend your team’s time and efforts.

Win in Uncertainty

In today’s turbulent economy, guesswork is a luxury no brand can afford. To win, you need precision—and that starts with a high-performing MMM and expert technologists alongside it. The smartest marketers aren’t just surviving uncertainty; they’re using it as a catalyst to sharpen strategy, cut waste, and amplify impact. That means refusing to sacrifice long-term growth for short-term gains, demanding real-time insights from your model, validating performance through rigorous testing, and backing every decision with multiple data sources. Now’s the time to double down, get aggressive, and let your data lead.

Get started by connecting with our technology and measurement experts to help you cultivate a winning measurement strategy with EMRge by Ovative. Because marketers don’t just need more technology—they need solutions that drive real results. EMRge™ blends cutting-edge technology with human intelligence, constantly evolving to shape smarter strategies, provide real control, and deliver measurable business impact. Winning agencies don’t just use tech and AI—they shape it.