Three Decades of Digital Advertising: What the Bibliometrics Say and How AI Came into Play

The article offers a comprehensive view of the field of ‘digital advertising’, tracing its evolution from the occurrence of the first banner ad in 1994. The objective of the study is to trace systematically how the digital advertising industry has transitioned from being the traditional one-way communication model to its current ‘intelligent’ state. This study offers profound insights into the dynamic and continually evolving domain of digital advertising. More specifically, it traces the evolutionary stages, major themes, influential articles and citation networks from 1993 to 2023. The articles have been thoroughly examined in three phases, each covering a period of 10 years from 1993 to 2023. The first two decades saw significant growth in the subject domain of ‘digital advertising’; however, the maximum number of articles contributing to the subject from 2013 to 2023 focused mainly on ad-personalization using ICT tools and incorporating artificial intelligence (AI). The key findings indicate that the third decade witnessed a remarkable rise in the number of articles pertaining to AI-driven ad personalization, thus portraying further focus by the researchers on how best to leverage technology in driving advertising effectiveness. AI became one such pivotal innovation, changing the very concept of digital advertising with its capability, to automatically target precisely and develop personalized promotions to engage consumers. The work is unique for the contribution it can make to already existing works regarding digital advertising by coming to one synthesized view of its evolution and its function in its totality regarding AI. The article sets a common platform for future research efforts and innovations within this domain, therefore offering valuable insights both for industry practitioners and future scholars.