The UK adtech market is famously crowded, competitive and difficult to crack. Hundreds of vendors compete for attention from time-poor agencies and brands, while international companies continue to eye the UK as a critical expansion market.
Against that backdrop, consultancy The Advisory Collective has partnered with Bluestripe Group to launch AdVantage, a new combined proposition designed to help companies both enter and grow within the UK market.
The collaboration brings together go-to-market advisory with marketing and PR capabilities, aiming to offer a more complete route for vendors seeking cut-through via a comprehensive market realignment program.
Speaking to New Digital Age, TAC co-founders Lisa Menaldo and Ellie Edwards-Scott and Bluestripe’s Lydia Oakes explain why the new model is needed and what they believe many companies get wrong when entering the UK.
A more complete go-to-market approach
What is AdVantage and what problem does it solve?
“It’s essentially an enhanced go-to-market strategy for companies looking to land, launch and scale in the UK market,” says Edwards-Scott. “For the last nine years we’ve been helping companies understand the market, look under the hood of their product and work out whether there is actually a need for it here.”
That process typically involves analysing the product, the competitive landscape and potential demand among agencies and publishers. “Everybody tells you they’ve got the best tech or the best product,” she says. “But what we really want to understand is whether there is a genuine niche for it in the UK market.”
The Advisory Collective has built a reputation for its market insight and relationships across the industry, but Edwards-Scott says one element has historically been missing. “We’ve always recommended that companies invest in marketing and communications, because in the UK you have to make noise. It’s an incredibly crowded market and buyers are very time poor.”
This is where the partnership with Bluestripe comes in. “By combining our advisory work with their marketing and PR expertise, we can now offer a true end-to-end proposition,” she says. “It means companies not only understand the market, but also know how to tell their story once they’re in it.”
Helping companies already in the market
Is this just about companies entering the UK, or those already operating here too?
While the original focus for AdVantage was on international market entrants, Menaldo says the opportunity with companies already in the UK may be just as significant.
“There are lots of businesses that have been here for years,” she says. “They might be hitting their targets or close to them, but they’ve plateaued.”
Often the issue is not the product but the perception of it in the market. “They may have relationships with three or four trading groups, but they’re not progressing beyond that,” Menaldo explains. “And the question is why.”
Because The Advisory Collective speaks regularly with agencies and buyers, it can gather honest feedback on how companies are perceived. “We act as a neutral party,” Edwards-Scott says. “People will give us very candid feedback that they might not give directly to a vendor.”
She adds: “Brits are very polite. Nobody is going to say to your face that your baby’s ugly. But they will tell us what they really think.”
That insight allows the consultancy to identify gaps in positioning or messaging. “We can go back to a company and say, ‘This is where you’re strong, and this is where you could be better,’” Edwards-Scott says.
Bluestripe’s Lydia Oakes explains how their AI capabilities will enhance this process. “ Using our AI platform, we can see how messaging is landing or not, as the case may be. We can track competitors to see how they are getting ahead of you and cutting through”
Why the UK market has become tougher
What has changed in the market that makes launching in the UK harder today?
According to Menaldo, the biggest shift is how agencies evaluate new technology.
“Programmatic isn’t new anymore,” she says. “Buyers have spent years being approached by platforms that promise to do things differently.”
As a result, incremental innovation is no longer enough. “Agencies won’t adopt a solution simply because it offers another feature or a slightly different approach,” she explains. “They want to understand how it fits within their existing technology stack, whether it integrates seamlessly with the tools they already use and, ultimately, whether it solves a meaningful commercial problem.”
Operational simplicity has become just as important as functionality. “Buyers are asking how many platforms their teams need to manage, whether workflows become more efficient and if the technology integrates with the rest of their ecosystem,” says Menaldo. “The easier it is to adopt, the greater the chance of success.”
Timing is another critical factor. “We’ve seen companies enter the UK too early, when buyers weren’t ready for the solution, and others arrive too late with an offering that’s no longer differentiated,” she says. “Success isn’t just about having great technology; it’s about entering the market with a proposition that is both relevant and commercially compelling at exactly the right moment.”
The importance of sustained investment
Can you give examples of companies that have entered the UK market successfully or unsuccessfully?
Menaldo points to a previous client as an example of how early success does not guarantee long-term impact.
“We brought them to market when brand safety on YouTube was a major issue,” she says. “There was a real need for technology that could classify videos and reassure brands about where their ads were appearing.”
The company initially gained strong visibility in the UK market. However, maintaining that presence requires continued investment. “They were everywhere at the start,” Menaldo says. “But then they dropped the ball.”
In the meantime, competitors moved in and effectively rode on the work that had already been done and have built a strong position in the market.”
For Menaldo, the lesson is simple. “Launching successfully is one thing, but you have to keep investing. Companies can innovate as much as they want, but if you stop talking about your product, someone else is talking louder about theirs.”
Why storytelling matters as much as the product
Why is it important to combine strategy with PR and marketing?
Both founders argue that product strength alone rarely guarantees success.
“You can have the best product in the market,” says Edwards-Scott. “But if you can’t articulate what it does and why it matters, it won’t cut through.”
Effective messaging requires an understanding of the specific market being targeted. “Many companies create messaging for their home market and simply reuse it elsewhere,” she says. “But if you’re speaking to UK buyers, you have to frame the story in a way that resonates with their challenges.”
Lydia Oakes, COO at Bluestripe, points that “PR has always been bigger than press coverage, but in a world shaped by LLMs and generative engine optimisation (GEO), that’s truer than ever. When people increasingly discover brands through AI-generated answers rather than a list of search links, visibility depends on being accurately understood and consistently represented across every channel: earned media, owned content, thought leadership, executive commentary and more. Large language models reward clarity, credibility and authority. That makes modern PR less about landing a single headline and more about building a coherent, credible presence across the whole ecosystem”
Menaldo believes localisation is one of the most overlooked aspects of entering the UK market.
“It sounds basic, but we still see presentations written entirely in American English when pitching UK buyers,” she says. “If you haven’t even localised the language and terminology, you’ve already created doubt. Buyers start wondering whether you’ve invested the same lack of effort in understanding their market, their challenges and how they work.”
“Many US companies see the UK as the obvious first step before expanding across EMEA, but that only makes getting it right even more important. The US may be one market, but the UK is not simply an extension of it. Success here comes from recognising the differences in buying behaviour, business culture and commercial expectations. Companies that invest in localisation from day one are far better positioned to build credibility, gain traction and use the UK as a genuine springboard into the wider EMEA region.”
A crowded market with blurred differentiation
Which sectors most need this kind of support?
“Adtech in general,” Menaldo says. “The landscape is incredibly crowded and points of difference have become very blurred.”
She gives the example of data companies. “You can sit through three presentations in one day and they all sound almost identical. By the end you’re asking yourself which one actually does what.”
Retail media is another fast-growing area where support may be needed. “Retailers are increasingly becoming media owners,” Edwards-Scott says. “But they’re entering a space they haven’t traditionally operated in.”
That means learning how agencies plan and buy media, and how to communicate with them effectively. “They’re used to speaking to agencies as clients,” she says. “Now they have to think like media owners and communicate with a completely different audience.”
The biggest mistake companies make
What do companies most often underestimate about the UK market?
For Edwards-Scott, the biggest misconception is how quickly results can be achieved. “Companies hugely underestimate the time it takes to build traction in the UK,” she says.
Many businesses attempt to launch with minimal resources. “You often see a single country manager hired to represent the business,” she explains. “They’re expected to be the salesperson, the strategist and the business development lead all at once.”
Without proper groundwork, the risks are significant. “We’ve seen companies come back to us two or three years later asking for help,” Edwards-Scott says. “By that point they’ve already burned their reputation in the market.”
Avoiding that scenario is exactly what the new partnership aims to achieve. “Our job is to help companies understand the market properly before they dive in,” she says. “Because once credibility is lost, rebuilding it is much harder than getting it right the first time.”
