Advertising agencies are facing mounting pressure from all directions.
Economic volatility and decreased consumer spending are pushing marketers to make their budgets go further. Signal loss and privacy regulations are complicating the task of effectively reaching and engaging audiences. And, brand safety concerns are skyrocketing, driven by content moderation rollbacks on social media platforms, the proliferation of AI-generated mis- and disinformation, and low-quality content like made-for-advertising sites (MFAs) increasing across the open web. Clients are demanding greater transparency in everything from reporting to fees, putting additional strain on agency-client relationships. On top of it all, the digital media landscape is increasingly fragmented, and tech stack sprawl and siloed systems are making it harder to work in a connected, streamlined way.
In this context, it’s no wonder a growing majority of agency professionals agree that digital advertising has gotten harder over the last two years.
Though the challenges facing agencies are varied, inefficiency is a common thread either driving or aggravating many of them—indeed, agency leaders rank inefficient processes as the most pressing issue facing their businesses today. As such, by working to improve efficiency, agency leaders can make significant progress towards alleviating some of their biggest problems. Specifically, unifying data and embracing automation will allow agencies to work faster, drive better performance, and strengthen their relationships with clients.
Tech sprawl is at the heart of agencies’ efficiency problem. More than half of agency professionals say they now rely on eight or more tools to manage client campaigns, and 40% are juggling 10 or more. Teams are increasingly weighed down by fragmented systems and inefficient workflows, forcing marketers to operate in silos or waste valuable hours reconciling data manually.
The issue is further compounded by the fact that media fragmentation is at an all-time high. In fact, agency leaders rank siloed and disconnected systems as the second-most pressing challenge facing their organizations today. Without a unified view of performance, real-time optimization becomes inefficient and difficult, limiting agencies’ abilities to drive meaningful results.
Adding to the challenge, half of marketers agree that martech is complicated and difficult to use, and 63% of martech leaders say marketing teams lack the technical skills to successfully implement and use their tech stacks. These inefficiencies create operational bottlenecks that ultimately impact both agency performance and client satisfaction.
Finally, AI in advertising adds a new and often complicated layer to agency operations. While AI presents powerful opportunities to drive revenue, adding new AI tools to a tech stack can also increase the complexity of workflows. Without thoughtful implementation, proper training, and quality data, AI can contribute to inefficiencies rather than resolve them.
Unifying data and having a single source of truth should be a key priority for agency leaders in 2025. Centralizing data enables teams to deliver strategic recommendations that drive performance and craft compelling performance narratives for clients, rather than spending time pulling data from many different sources and attempting to unify it manually, which inevitably leads to errors.
Unifying data doesn’t necessarily mean overhauling entire tech stacks or tossing existing tools out the window, but rather finding solutions that bring existing systems together to ensure visibility, efficiency, and smarter decision making. With such solutions, teams can access real-time insights in a centralized dashboard—rather than spending hours pulling reports and reconciling data—allowing them to make faster, data-driven decisions. Unified reporting also empowers agencies to tell powerful performance stories with greater confidence, reinforcing their value and strengthening client relationships in an increasingly competitive landscape.
Additionally, a strong data foundation can help agencies to better harness AI. Right now, 58% of ad industry professionals say data quality or accessibility issues are a challenge for adopting AI in their media campaigns. Agency leaders that prioritize unifying their company’s data now will be better positioned to integrate AI-driven efficiencies and maintain a competitive edge in the evolving media landscape.
Even with a strong data foundation, agencies can lose valuable time to inefficient processes. Many teams still rely on manual reporting, campaign management, and optimization—practices that not only waste time but also increase the risk of errors. Media fragmentation compounds the issue, forcing teams to toggle between multiple platforms to pull performance insights, manually adjust bids across different channels, and use spreadsheets to reconcile data from various sources to create client reports.
Automation software addresses such inefficiencies by streamlining workflows and eliminating redundant tasks across the campaign life cycle. In reducing operational inefficiencies, automation frees up agency teams to focus on higher-value strategic work, which in turn drives stronger performance and strengthens client relationships. It makes sense, then, that 77.8% of agency professionals say their organization has plans to invest in tech to automate or streamline processes, and over a third of marketing decision-makers say the type of martech they plan to invest in the most over the next 12 months is marketing automation technology.
In an increasingly fragmented and complex digital landscape, agency leaders that focus on reducing inefficiencies by unifying their data and streamlining their operations will maintain a competitive edge. By embracing these strategies, agencies can ensure ad dollars are maximized and operations run smoothly. In turn, this will allow agencies to deliver stronger results, strengthen client relationships, and drive revenue in today’s ever-evolving digital advertising ecosystem.
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Want to learn more about how advertising agencies are navigating today’s complex digital media landscape? We surveyed professionals from agencies across the US to gather their insights on agency performance, industry trends, key challenges and opportunities, the impact of AI, and the future of agencies. Dive into the full findings in our 2025 Advertising Agency Report.
