The majority of chief executives believe advertising and media agencies have lost their way, according to a report by the Fournaise Marketing Group. 78% of the 1,200 CEOs polled believe that effective, measurable campaigns with return-on-investment (ROI) has been sacrificed - and agencies can't be trusted.

The 2013 Global Marketing Effectiveness Program surveyed 1,200 CEOs from across North America, Europe, Asia and Australia, with the vast majority of executives revealing serious misgivings when working with media and advertising agencies.

  • 76 % believe agencies are “inward looking” and repeat the mantra of “creativity as the saviour” without showing a direct correlation of (financial of otherwise)impact to the business.
  •  74% suggest that agencies “giving time to creativity to see the impact” fails to appease board members and balance sheets
  • 72% say they quickly realised agencies were not “data- and science-driven”, and advertisers simply relied on “gut-feelings, hearsay, wrong methodologies and questionable information” rather than viable market research.

Jerome Fontaine, global chief executive and chief tracker of Fournaise, told Marketing Magazine: “CEOs have been telling us there are 2 types of ad and media Agencies: those who are truly performance-driven and can be trusted; and those who pretend they are performance-driven but in reality are not.

“There will be two different agency reactions to these CEO insights: the “pretenders” will attack these findings, will question their accuracy and will make their voice as loud as possible in the media and blogs; the “performers” will smile, nod and will continue doing what they’ve been doing best: constantly tracking their creative and media performance and delivering real and P&L-quantifiable business results for their clients, week in, week out.”