Newer, More Nimble Agencies Challenge Madison Avenue

A story at MarketingVOX yesterday doesn’t bode well for the big shops on Madison Avenue. According to a survey by Forrester Research only 21 percent of clients say they would refer their large lead agencies to others. One of the biggest reasons cited for this dissatisfaction was that over three-quarters of marketers get no or vague ROI data back from their agencies. The survey also pointed out that clients felt many of the large agencies were slow to adopt emerging digital technologies that could improve marketing and advertising effectiveness.

There is also a good story at Advertising Age referencing the same study. That article makes a point that advertisers are looking for agencies that can integrate both offline and online opportunities with expertise and adeptness. The report refers to a “vague disenchantment” that many clients feel with regard to their large agency relationships. This disenchantment apparently applies to Michigan Avenue as well as Madison Avenue as we saw recently when Career Builder put its account up for review after Chicago agency Cramer-Krasselt’s Super Bowl commercials failed to garner a high enough rating in the USA Today Super Bowl Ad Meter (check out the blog post on this situation from AdAge’s Bob Garfield).

The big agencies still control a considerable portion of the marketing dollars in this country, but if the Forrester report is correct, they will face increasing pressure from smaller, more aggressive firms that aren’t compromised by size, history, bias and outmoded paradigms.