Customer engagement platform Braze (Nasdaq: BRZE) has released two new research studies from Forrester Consulting and Cowry that highlight fundamental shifts in how brands must approach customer engagement in the age of AI.
Together, the findings show that while AI adoption is nearly universal, most organisations are still struggling to translate that investment into meaningful business impact. The research points to a growing divide between brands that are operationalizing AI to drive outcomes and those still producing disconnected, low-impact experiences at scale.
The reports are being released at Braze’s City x City London event, where global brands and marketing leaders will gather to explore how AI, real-time data, and creativity are reshaping customer engagement.
The April 2026 Forrester Total Economic Impact™ study* found that organizations using the Braze platform achieved a 457% return on investment over three years, with a net present value of $23.5 million and payback in less than six months. The study examined the combined business impact of the Braze platform and BrazeAI Decisioning Studio™ on a composite organization representative of interviewed customers.
At the same time, broader industry data shows a stark contrast. While the vast majority of brands are investing in AI, only a small percentage are realizing measurable returns. This gap underscores a core challenge facing marketing leaders today: moving from experimentation to execution.
The joint report with Cowry highlights the scale of the challenge. Consumers are now exposed to as many as 10,000 commercial messages per day, creating an environment where volume alone no longer drives engagement. Instead, effectiveness depends on relevance, timing, and the ability to respond to real-time customer signals. This shift requires a move away from static campaigns toward systems that can interpret data, make decisions, and deliver experiences that adapt in the moment.
According to Astha Malik, Chief Business Officer of Braze, the role of marketing technology is evolving rapidly.
“While AI-generated content is potentially infinite, customer attention is finite and loyalty is fragile. Every piece of ‘AI slop’ that reaches a customer simply trains them to tune out,” said Malik. “The research we’re releasing today highlights a widening gap between brands using AI just to increase output and those focused on driving outcomes like conversion, retention, and revenue. At Braze, we are shifting the conversation from productivity to performance. Our community of ambitious marketers chooses a premium platform not just to build faster, but to deliver outsized business impact.”
New capabilities
Braze has also recently delivered a new set of AI capabilities that aim to deliver engaging and relevant experiences for their customers. From reaching new audiences to driving conversion and long-term loyalty, the integrated platform offers marketers a unified way to manage the full customer lifecycle.
BrazeAI Operator™ and BrazeAI Agent Console™ bring decisioning, content generation, and execution directly into the marketer’s workflow. By embedding AI into the core platform, teams can act on data in real time and turn strategy into live customer experiences faster.
The Braze Creative Studio connects creative production with campaign execution, giving teams a single place to manage assets and launch experiences. With direct integrations to Figma and Canva, it removes friction between design and delivery.
In addition, BrazeAI Decisioning Studio™ can now be hosted in Europe on Google Cloud, giving brands more control over how and where their data is managed. This expansion supports decisioning while also meeting regional data requirements.
“The world’s largest and most sophisticated brands are choosing Braze to drive their AI transformation during this period of rapidly evolving disruption and opportunity. But for AI to matter, it has to be more than a promise. It has to work, at scale, and be enterprise-ready,” said Bill Magnuson, Cofounder and CEO of Braze.
“Braze is putting powerful, production-ready AI and creative tools directly into the hands of marketers to amplify their impact and define their competitive edge. Our new tools are live, the technology is proven, and the brands that seize this moment will build the businesses that customers remember.”
These updates were unveiled at City x City London, Braze’s flagship EMEA event focused on the craft of customer engagement, at Olympia in London. The event brings together Europe’s leading marketers, product leaders, and customer experience teams to explore how brands are applying AI, real-time data, and creativity to drive more effective engagement.
