Publishers: see how Brand Agents can future-proof your business

Brand Agents, Firsthand’s AI-powered brand representatives embedded where consumers spend their time online, turn publisher pages into tailored, helpful, monetizable experiences. They keep readers engaged, generate richer insights, and open up new demand from advertisers. When publishers sell Agents, not ads, they get the opportunity to continue building firsthand relationships with audiences and integrate themselves into an agentic internet future.

Read on to learn more about how publishers can use Brand Agents to future-proof their advertising business and retain control over their relationships with consumers. 

Why publishers should care about Brand Agents

Brand Agents bring publishers a new revenue line, but they also expand what your pages can do. By embedding adaptive, interactive experiences directly into content, they give you fresh ways to monetize, engage, and compete.

Here are some key benefits: 

• Create premium inventory: Agents aren’t static rectangles. They’re dynamic, branded experiences that command higher value.
• Increase value per visit: One article can become a multi-path journey where readers discover, compare, and even convert.
• Unlock new signals: Agents capture in-the-moment intent, without relying on cookies or personal identifiers.
• Stay ahead of the curve: Early adopters will own the shift toward agentic experiences, and the revenue streams that follow.

Recent campaigns show that Brand Agents are driving 3-5x engagement vs. benchmarks, and seeing double-digit click-through rates. 

Core publisher use cases

1. Agents replace ads

Instead of running banners, publishers can offer advertisers adaptive, high-performance inventory.

Advertisers buy Brand Agents because they are:

• Brand-safe, context-aware, and grounded in pre-approved content. This ensures every interaction is accurate, aligned with brand voice, and protects both the advertiser’s and publisher’s IP. 
• Proven to drive discovery, consideration, and conversion across verticals. Campaigns already running with Brand Agents are outperforming display ad benchmarks. They are designed to adapt to different categories, helping users explore, compare, and act in ways traditional ads can’t. 
• Designed to capture rich insights into key customer segments. Every interaction reveals what audiences are asking, which products and ad creatives resonate, and how different groups move through the funnel.

For example, imagine a reader opening a style article about dressing for work in your 30s. Instead of seeing another static banner unit, she encounters a Brand Agent that merchandises collections differently for classic dressers vs. trend-driven shoppers. The interaction feels genuinely useful and natural for the consumer — and it drives action and measurable insights. These insights are extremely granular, revealing not only what CTA worked, but also what tone of voice, which product or persona, or even which sentence structure moved the needle. 

Publishers that sell Agents will benefit from higher-value inventory, superior user experience, and stronger demand from top advertisers.

2. Agents help publishers engage their own audiences

Brand Agents are unique in how they help publishers strengthen direct relationships with readers and keep audiences engaged on-site. Unlike AI content summarization tools, Brand Agents drive consumers to action, and enable advertisers to layer in reader interests via personas for heightened specificity in targeting. 

Why it matters:

• Brand Agents turn static pages into spaces where readers interact in the moment, instead of bouncing off to external sites. 
• Every prompt engaged with and every path taken through a Brand Agent reveals what audiences care about most, without relying on cookies or personally identifiable information.

For example, imagine a reader deep into a travel feature on your site. Instead of clicking away to search for more relevant information, they interact with a publisher’s Brand Agent right there in the article. The Agent can reroute the reader to different pages on your site based on what they are interested in: Paris hotel reviews, sample itineraries, or best travel destinations for families on a budget. The reader stays engaged on your property, and you capture valuable signals about what your audience is actually looking for.

Publishers that use Agents this way cultivate first-hand relationships with their audiences. Early adopters gain a competitive edge in the agentic future of the internet, where brands pay a premium for immersive experiences instead of ad slots.​​

What makes Brand Agents unique

Brand Agents turn display advertising on its head. They’re built for context, adaptability, and user experience. Here’s how:

In-moment relevance, not contextual targeting

Most digital ads still rely on identity, third-party data, or pre-determined targeting. Brand Agents don’t. They adapt to the content on the page and the intent a reader shows in the moment, which means publishers can monetize without cookies and still deliver relevance that advertisers actually value.

AI-driven dynamic experiences, not flat creatives

A banner or video slot serves the same creative to everyone until the next campaign swap. A Brand Agent adjusts its responses in real time, surfacing different information for different readers based on their questions and interests. That makes every interaction unique, and thus more likely to move a consumer forward.

Immersive, not distracting 

Ads are designed to pull attention away from the content on the page. Agents are designed to stay within it. They complement the content experience instead of competing with it, keeping readers engaged while creating a natural entry point for brands.

How to start selling Agents, not ads

Some of the world’s largest publishers are adopting Brand Agents. Read about how to start selling Agents (it’s easier than you think), and contact us today for a demo.