Marketing Procurement no longer needs to make the case for a strategic role. In many leading organisations, it already helps shape agency ecosystems, operating models, technology investment and the commercial frameworks behind marketing performance. The challenge now is how to use that influence to create greater value, without losing the speed, flexibility and creativity that marketing depends on.

The profession's own milestones show how far it has come. Twenty years after CIPS, ISBA and the IPA published the original Magic & Logic report, the three bodies reconvened in September 2026 to celebrate the progress made and define what comes next, describing Marketing Procurement as a discipline that has matured into a global strategic function. The inaugural Marketing Procurement Awards in 2026 recognised, amongst others, Beiersdorf's team for designing a new global marketing operating model, eBay's strategic alliance that replaced the traditional pitch, and an industry-first digital media contractual framework at Haleon. 

Four years ago, an Association of National Advertisers (ANA) research study exposed a significant perception gap: 55% of procurement professionals said they understood the economic value of successful marketing, while only 5% of agencies agreed. The conversation has moved on. Leading Marketing Procurement teams are now redesigning agency ecosystems, shaping AI commercial models and contributing directly to marketing effectiveness and growth.

That progress is not yet universal. CASME benchmarking of digital marketing services shows that most Procurement teams add value through contracts and remuneration (86%), benchmarking agency fees (76%) and running RFPs (62%). Far fewer provide market intelligence (24%) or facilitate collaboration across the business (10%). Commercial control has been won in many organisations. Converting it into strategic influence is the next step, and the gap between the leading functions and the rest is where the opportunity lies.

Why the Agenda Has Shifted

AI is no longer a separate topic for Marketing Procurement. It runs through every commercial decision in the category.

The World Federation of Advertisers (WFA) latest benchmark of Marketing Procurement leaders found that seven in ten say AI has changed their conversations with agencies, with productivity an increasingly common theme. 34% have already begun adapting agency remuneration models and a further 57% plan to. Yet three in four still lack KPIs to monitor AI's impact.

AI affects agency scope, remuneration, production, technology, intellectual property, governance, benchmarking, staffing and measurement. When the economics of agency work shift this quickly, the organisations that benefit most will be those where Procurement helps design the commercial architecture around marketing, rather than negotiating each piece of it in isolation.

Industry events reflect this. ProcureCon Marketing describes Marketing Procurement professionals as the strategic orchestrators of the marketing ecosystem, guiding investment decisions and building partnerships with agencies.

Five priorities stand out for Marketing Procurement leaders who want to turn influence into measurable impact.
 

1. Move From Managing Marketing Spend to Shaping Marketing Investment

The strongest contribution starts with where Marketing is investing and why, not with the sourcing process.

Marketing Procurement adds most value when it helps Marketing and Finance decide what commercial architecture will maximise return on a planned investment. That means understanding the growth objectives behind the budget, testing which capabilities should sit in-house, with agencies or with specialists, and bringing market insight into the decision before briefs and budgets are fixed.

Ownership of the category is still shared. In CASME's study of digital marketing services, Marketing was primarily responsible for buying in 42% of participating organisations, with Procurement and cross-functional teams each leading in 29%. Where ownership is shared, influence depends on the insight Procurement brings, not on formal control of the budget.

The best commercial outcome is not always achieved by negotiating harder. It often comes from reducing unnecessary demand in the first place: improving the quality of briefs, removing duplicated work across markets and putting processes in place before work reaches an agency. These are investment decisions, and they deliver value that no rate card negotiation can match.

2. Design the Marketing Ecosystem, Not Just the Supplier Roster

The question is no longer which agencies to appoint, but how the whole system fits together.

A modern marketing ecosystem spans creative and media agencies, production, marketing technology, AI platforms, data, creators and influencers, retail media and in-house capability. Marketing Procurement is increasingly helping to shape how those parts connect, where they overlap and how commercial responsibilities are allocated.

Several structural shifts make this more complex:

• Agency consolidation is changing holding-company structures, service models and the risks attached to roster concentration.
• Creator and influencer spend already accounts for a growing share of marketing and media budgets. The WFA's December 2025 benchmark found most organisations now manage it through rosters of preferred partners, raising familiar questions about ownership, remuneration and performance measurement.
• Marketing technology and SaaS blur the line between Marketing and IT categories, prompting debate about whether integrated or agile procurement models serve the business better.
• Retail media and media transparency make supply chain costs and delivery harder to track as AI-led buying tools become more common.

The options range from a lead agency model to rotating panels, tiered preferred supplier lists or decoupling creative and production. The right answer depends on spend profile, geographic coverage and how much control the business wants to retain. Ecosystem design also determines whether AI creates efficiency or complexity. In a fragmented model, disconnected AI pilots multiply duplicated assets and rights risk rather than reducing them.

3. Redesign Commercial Models for an AI-Enabled World

As AI compresses production time for some tasks, relying solely on time-based remuneration becomes increasingly difficult to justify.

AI can significantly reduce the time and resources needed to deliver much of the work agencies do, particularly production-intensive work. That matters because agency pricing is built largely on people: The Smart Cube's September 2025 EMEA marketing procurement report estimates labour at around half of overall costs in EU advertising services. The same report notes that Zalando cut imagery production costs by 90% using generative AI. When the main cost input changes this significantly, commercial models need to change with it. Many are already being redesigned, raising questions Marketing Procurement is well placed to answer:

• Where does time and materials still make sense, and where should it be complemented or replaced?
• Who captures the productivity gains, and how should they be shared between client and agency?
• How should scopes change when output volumes rise and production time falls?
• Does this accelerate the move towards outcome-based, hybrid or SaaS-style commercial models?
• What should remain distinctly human, particularly strategic and creative thinking, and how should that be valued?

Contracts need to keep pace. Intellectual property, data ownership, licensing, usage rights and AI governance are now central commercial issues rather than legal small print. In CASME's digital marketing study, only 24% of participants listed clearly defined IP rights as a key commercial consideration when negotiating with agencies, and 38% cited robust data ownership, security and privacy clauses. In an AI-enabled supply chain, those are the areas where contracts most need revisiting.

Leading teams are already moving. Haleon's industry-first digital media contractual framework won the Best Use of Technology category at the 2026 Marketing Procurement Awards, showing how commercial frameworks can themselves become a source of competitive advantage.

4. Make Effectiveness and Growth Part of the Commercial Remit

If savings are the headline measure, Marketing Procurement risks being judged primarily as a cost function.

Marketing performance was traditionally measured through cost per unit bought, benchmarking and audit. Advertisers now want to see actual business uplift, and AI is accelerating the shift towards better measurement. That puts Marketing Procurement in a position to help evaluate whether partners can provide accurate results measurement, and to connect commercial terms to business outcomes.

Many organisations are not there yet. CASME benchmarking of marketing services contracts found that KPIs covering service delivery and account management were widely mandated, while those measuring overall programme value, such as ROI and cost per lead, were more often applied by choice, and a sizeable proportion of organisations did not use them at all. 

• In the digital marketing study, only 29% of participants said Procurement manages agency performance against SLAs and KPIs.
• Stronger frameworks link agency performance to effectiveness and growth, including:
• Contribution to brand and business outcomes, not just delivery against scope
• Speed to market and the ability to scale content efficiently
• Innovation brought to the relationship, including the productive use of AI
• Risk reduction across brand safety, IP and data
• Long-term commercial contribution and sustainability performance.
   

5. Become the Architect of Better Marketing-Agency Relationships

Procurement's role does not end with the pitch or the contract.

The original Magic & Logic principle still holds: agencies, marketers and Procurement create better outcomes when they work with shared purpose, transparency and mutual respect. What has changed is the role Procurement plays in making that happen. The aim is not to police agencies or protect creativity from Procurement, but to design scopes, incentives, governance, data and ways of working so that Marketing, agencies and Procurement succeed together.

Agencies are asking for the same thing. Research published in 2025 found that 95% of agencies wanted Procurement to respect them as partners, and 90% wanted Procurement to recognise that agency services are not commodities. More than two-thirds (69%) said Procurement needed to learn their business. Those expectations align closely with how leading Marketing Procurement teams already operate, and they show where others can build stronger relationships. 

That makes agency management a continuous process rather than a periodic event. Strategic relationships need to be managed actively, performance reviewed regularly and innovation encouraged throughout the contract. Two-way reviews help agencies raise issues with how the client works, such as late briefs, excessive revisions or unclear approvals, which are often hidden drivers of cost.

The pitch model is changing too. Continuous governance and longer-term strategic alliances are replacing some traditional competitive pitches, as eBay's highly commended entry at the Marketing Procurement Awards.
 

What This Means for Marketing Procurement Leaders

The leading Marketing Procurement functions have already moved from influence to impact. For others, the path forward is clear: use the commercial control already won to shape investment, design the ecosystem, lead the redesign of commercial models for AI, and take shared ownership of effectiveness and growth.

For more perspectives, listen to CASME's podcast with Daniel Ebert of Beiersdorf, Marketing Procurement: From Category Driven to Business First.
 

Compare Marketing Procurement Approaches With Peers

Every organisation's marketing model is different, and learning how peers are redesigning agency ecosystems, commercial models and performance frameworks is one of the fastest ways to sharpen your approach.

Explore CASME Procurement Events to compare strategic Marketing Procurement approaches with experienced peers, and enquire about attending a relevant session as a guest. CASME members can access our Marketing Procurement and Media Agencies ToolKit for a deeper view of sourcing models, pricing structures and the skills Marketing Procurement teams will need over the next two to three years.