Agency Core is built on a mission to understand and empower marketing agencies by fostering data-driven insights. Central to this mission is a commitment to listening directly to agency professionals to ensure that the topics we explore truly resonate with agency leaders.

Here, we’ll dive into how Agency Core collaborates with agency communities to identify key research topics and deliver findings that help shape the industry’s future.

Every year, Agency Core will embark on extensive surveys, like the Agency Core Study of 2024, to gather input from agency owners and leaders. These surveys will focus on current industry challenges, trends, and the evolving needs of agency professionals​​. By listening directly to the voices of those leading small to midsized agencies, Agency Core ensures that each study reflects the unique priorities and challenges faced by agencies today.

Agency leaders across various sectors—marketing, digital, PR, and advertising—are invited to contribute through anonymous surveys. This approach empowers participants to provide honest insights, knowing their responses contribute to a resource designed for agency leaders, by agency leaders.

Agency Core partners with a network of respected organizations in the agency ecosystem to enhance reach and engagement. These partners, including Audience Audit™ and White Label IQ™, distribute the surveys across their networks, maximizing the diversity and representativeness of respondents​.

Each partner’s unique perspective contributes to shaping the questions, ensuring they are relevant and reflective of current industry nuances. This collaboration with distribution partners does more than just expand reach; it strengthens the research by incorporating viewpoints from different areas within the agency community. It also ensures that the results reflect a broad range of insights, from niche agency specialties to broader industry-wide challenges.

Agency Core’s surveys don’t just capture quantitative data—they delve into the qualitative experiences of agency leaders. Some of the key areas explored include:

• Agency Operations and Staffing Challenges

  Talent acquisition and retention consistently rank among the top concerns for agency leaders. The 2024 survey, for instance, explores staffing difficulties and retention strategies, capturing a pulse on how agencies navigate hiring challenges and support existing staff​​.

• Client Relationships and Retention

  Another critical focus area is client management, especially as agencies work to balance strategy and tactical execution in response to evolving client needs. Agency Core’s surveys assess how agencies approach client loyalty, the impact of client defection, and the strategies used to secure long-term relationships.

• Agency Marketing and Differentiation

  Many agency leaders face difficulty prioritizing their own marketing efforts. Topics such as establishing a niche, building thought leadership, and distinguishing the agency in a crowded market emerge as areas of interest across surveys, addressing a significant need for clarity and competitive differentiation.

After collecting and analyzing survey responses, Agency Core openly shares findings in reports, visualizations, and webinars accessible to the entire agency community. The commitment to transparency ensures that every agency, regardless of size, can benefit from the data and insights gathered​.

For distribution partners, early access to the results provides additional benefits. Partners receive interactive visualizations and customized insights, enabling them to see how responses from their networks align with or diverge from the broader data. This level of customization helps partners enhance their community’s understanding of shared challenges and uncover potential areas for growth.

• Benchmarking and Strategic Planning

  Agency leaders can use Agency Core’s insights to benchmark their challenges and performance against industry standards. This comparison can reveal gaps in current practices and inspire innovative solutions based on the strategies of similarly sized agencies.

• Informed Decision-making on Partnerships and Client Retention

  Insights into agency strategies for client retention, partnership engagement, and competitive differentiation equip agency leaders to make more informed decisions in areas critical to their growth.

• Developing Thought Leadership and Market Positioning

  Agencies looking to refine their niche and thought leadership can leverage survey findings to understand what top-performing agencies are doing differently. This understanding helps inform targeted marketing and positioning efforts that resonate with potential clients.

Agency Core’s research is only as strong as the participation and engagement of agencies within the industry. We invite agency leaders to contribute to future surveys and share their experiences. By doing so, you play a direct role in shaping the topics and insights that will empower the agency community.