B to B Marketers Not Happy With Their Ad Agencies

Something's amiss with the business to business client/agency relationship claims a news study from GfK Custom Research. Among 209 C-level executive in B to B companies, only 11 percent plan to retain their current marketing firm without a review. Further 47 percent have planned a review and 42 percent will do so in the next six months. The key reasons for this, according to 42 percent of survey respondents, is that their agency "failed to demonstrate an understanding of their business."

One explanation for this dramatically negative view among C-level execs of their company's agency is the trend towards top management becoming less and less involved with the ad agency and delegating the management of the relationship to lower ranks. This has resulted in a disconnect between management and agency leading to "disenchantment" according to HSR Agency CEO Rick Segal.

Segal also says agencies don't do enough work to get inside their client's businesses and their client's customers. It's very easy to create an ad for a valve manufacturer and place it in Contractor Magazine. It's entirely another thing to craft a marketing communications plan that contains a closed-loop program which maintains contact and measures the involvement of the potential customer from first brand contact to final sale.