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New platform combines creative, audience and media intelligence across the open web, CTV and social in a self-serve workflow
Kargo has announced the general availability of Karlo, a self-serve agentic media buying platform designed to give smaller businesses and marketing teams access to cross-platform campaign planning, activation and optimization capabilities.
The platform combines Kargo’s Creative Science® technology, based on its cross-platform performance data, with Media Intelligence, which incorporates audience data and contextual signals.
Karlo allows advertisers to plan, create and activate campaigns across the open web, connected TV (CTV) and social through a single platform, without requiring separate buying teams or enterprise-scale media operations.
Bringing Creative Into Media Optimization
Kargo said Karlo differs from many agentic advertising tools by incorporating creative performance into campaign decision-making alongside targeting and bidding.
The platform evaluates how creative performs during a campaign and uses those signals to inform ongoing adjustments. This allows smaller teams to manage campaign optimization without relying on a dedicated analyst to continuously monitor performance.
“Most of the agentic tools launching right now are built around bidding and targeting, functions that were already pretty well-automated,” said Harry Kargman, founder and CEO of Kargo. “Creative usually sits outside that loop, untouched, even though it’s the biggest lever on performance.”
One Workflow Across CTV, Social and the Open Web
Karlo brings CTV, social and open-web advertising into a single campaign workflow built around a unified audience target.
Rather than setting up separate media buys across individual platforms, advertisers can manage campaigns through one system while monitoring media and creative performance together.
The platform also uses contextual signals to determine where and when advertisements should appear based on the content and experiences audiences are engaging with. Kargo said this approach adds another layer of targeting beyond traditional audience segments.
Natural-Language Campaign Setup
Karlo is designed to reduce the operational requirements associated with managing multiple media buying platforms.
Advertisers can begin with existing marketing or campaign briefing documents or use natural-language prompts to define campaign objectives, build audiences and manage campaigns.
The self-serve workflow is intended to allow smaller teams to launch campaigns within minutes, make adjustments during execution and access reporting through a centralized interface.
Ad Council Campaign Demonstrates Early Results
Kargo used Karlo in a campaign with the Ad Council for its “Love, Your Mind” mental health initiative.
The campaign targeted adults who tend to disengage from traditional mental health messaging. According to Kargo, the campaign generated a 21% lift in ad recall and a 10% lift in aided awareness.
“Karlo gave us an innovative way to meaningfully engage an audience that can truly benefit from mental health messaging and resources,” said DJ Perera, chief media officer at the Ad Council.
The campaign provides an early example of how Kargo is applying its combined creative, contextual and media capabilities to audiences that may be difficult to reach through conventional campaign approaches.
Expanding Access to Connected Media Buying
Kargo said Karlo extends technologies developed for its larger enterprise clients to advertisers with smaller budgets and teams.
By bringing campaign planning, creative evaluation, audience targeting, activation and optimization into one self-serve environment, the platform is positioned to simplify cross-platform media buying for businesses that may not have dedicated media operations.
