The report, Media2020: Preparing for a very different media ecosystem, found that marketers see data analytics and insight ( 67%), content development ( 50%) and omni-channel planning ( 43%) as the disciplines critical to success over the next five years

Marketers are looking for deeper and broader internal capabilities to manage customer relationships, and the corresponding data. More than half of those surveyed ( 54%) said they expect to bring a number of functions previously outsourced to agencies, in-house by 2020.

The changes to organisational structures within client companies, and the desire to exert tighter control over certain capabilities, means that marketers’ requirements of agencies will change. Fifty-eight percent agreed that the number of agencies they work with will likely decline over the next five years but there was little consensus on the right agency model.

While nine out of 10 respondents are comfortable that media agencies will remain the go-to people for paid media, 73% of marketers said they will increasingly contract directly with media owners and technology companies by 2020. 

MediaSense, in association with ISBA and Ipsos Connect, conducted a series of in-depth interviews and surveyed 200 senior marketing and media decision makers between March and July 2015.  Participants covered a broad range of industry sectors, including food, media, technology, insurance, retail banking, travel, pharma, toys transport, drinks and confectionery and represent well over £1 billion in advertising investment.

Graham Brown, director and founder of global media advisory firm, MediaSense, said: “To be ready for 2020, marketers should exercise much greater control over their ecosystem but this is not the reality for vast majority of companies, who are and will continue to be overly dependent on their agencies for the foreseeable future.”