Choosing a partner
What to look for in your next marketing agency.
If your last agency didn't work out, the next choice matters more. Here's a weighted scorecard, the questions worth asking, a lean way to run the search and the contract terms that protect you, with notes for Canadian brands.
Choosing a new agency after a bad experience is tricky. The temptation is to pick the opposite of the last one: bigger if they were small, cheaper if they were expensive, more creative if they were too analytical. That fixes the symptom you noticed, not necessarily the cause.
Start by being clear on why the last relationship ended. Our piece on why brands leave their marketing agency covers the common reasons and how to tell whether the problem was the agency, the brief or the strategy. Then use the framework below.
What do clients value most in an agency?
Setup's 2025 Marketing Relationship Survey, published in January 2026, asked clients what matters when selecting an agency. The highest-rated factors were "agency challenges me" (93%), chemistry (87%) and specialized capabilities (87%). Cost was rated by only 20%. Clients also leaned toward specialists: 70% disagreed that one generalist agency beats several specialists.
The challenge gap is real. Research from the IPA, the UK advertising industry body, reported by Financial Promoter in July 2026, found 85% of senior marketers highly value agencies that challenge briefs and assumptions, but only 37% believe their agencies deliver it. The same research found 90% of clients see AI capability as critical or very important when evaluating agencies.
Seniority matters too. In an older Agency Sparks survey reported by The Drum in 2018, 63% of senior marketers said team seniority was important when choosing an agency, but only 26% said their agency never put junior talent on their account.
A weighted agency evaluation scorecard
Score each shortlisted agency from 1 to 5 on every criterion, multiply by the weight and add up the total. The weights below suit a growing brand that wants a strategic partner; adjust them to your situation, but agree them before you meet anyone.
| Criterion | Weight | What good looks like |
|---|---|---|
| Understanding of your business | 20% | They can explain your customer, margins and competitive position back to you, and ask questions you hadn't considered |
| Strategic thinking and challenge | 20% | They push back on the brief with reasons, not just ideas |
| The actual team | 15% | You've met the people who will do the work, and senior time is written into the proposal |
| Relevant capability and evidence | 15% | Specific, checkable work in your channels and category, with references you can call |
| Measurement and reporting | 10% | Success defined in business terms such as revenue, pipeline or margin, not only platform metrics |
| Chemistry and communication | 10% | Honest, clear and easy to work with; bad news is shared early |
| Commercial transparency | 10% | Clear fees, disclosed markups, fair terms, and you own your accounts and data |
Notice that price isn't its own line. Compare cost only between agencies that clear a minimum score, so the cheapest option doesn't win by default.
Questions to ask a marketing agency
- Who will work on our account each week, how senior are they, and how much of their time will we get?
- What would you challenge in our brief, and why?
- How would you measure success after 90 days and after a year, in business terms?
- How do you charge? Do you take markups, commissions or rebates on media or tools?
- Who owns our ad accounts, analytics, data and creative files if we part ways?
- Tell us about a client relationship that ended. What happened, and what did you learn?
- Can we speak to a current client and a former one?
For a fuller list of red flags, see our guide on how to choose a digital marketing agency in Toronto.
How to run a lean agency selection process
Traditional reviews are heavy. The 4As and ANA's 2023 Cost of the Pitch study, based on 329 brand and agency executives, found brands spent an average of US$408,500 on a review without an incumbent, selecting a new agency took more than three months, and 25% of marketers reported delayed campaign or product launches. Setup's 2025 survey found 96% of clients consider more than one agency and 78% find selection time-consuming.
The ANA and 4As have since published joint pitch principles. As summarized by ID Comms in May 2026, they include sharing the business problem and a budget range upfront, narrowing to three or four finalists, sticking to a timeline, making room for chemistry, and paying for pitch work. Most growing brands can go lighter still.
1. Write a one-page brief
Cover the business goal, the marketing problem, budget range, what didn't work before, decision makers and timeline. If you can't write this page, you may need strategy work before an agency; our piece on digital strategy vs. digital marketing explains the difference.
2. Shortlist three
Use referrals, work you admire and a short request for information. Three is enough to compare without turning the search into a second job.
3. Chemistry session plus a paid diagnostic
Meet the actual team in a working session on your real problem. Then pay your top one or two a modest fee for a short diagnostic, such as an audit of your current channels or a 90-day plan. You see how they think, they're paid for their time, and you own the output either way.
4. Decide, then debrief everyone
Score against your scorecard, check references and give every agency honest feedback. When you're ready to move, our guide on how to switch marketing agencies without losing momentum covers the handover.
Contract terms to insist on
- Ownership. Ad accounts, analytics, tag managers, CRM data and paid-for creative belong to you and sit in accounts you control, with the agency given access.
- Notice and handover. A reasonable notice period, often 30 to 90 days, with a written duty to hand over files, logins and documentation.
- KPIs and reviews. Agreed business measures and quarterly reviews. Our guide on how to measure your marketing agency's performance can help you set them.
- Named team. Key senior people listed, with notice if they change.
- Transparency. Disclosure of all fees, markups, rebates and third-party costs.
A note on reviews: the ANA and 4As reported in April 2025 that clients without mandatory review periods had relationships averaging 8.1 years, compared with as low as 3.8 years for those with frequent reviews. Build in regular performance checkpoints rather than an automatic re-pitch.
What Canadian brands should check
- CASL. Canada's Anti-Spam Legislation requires consent before sending commercial electronic messages. The Act sets maximum penalties of $1 million per violation for individuals and $10 million for businesses. Ask how the agency manages consent, unsubscribes and record keeping, and who is responsible if something goes wrong.
- French language and Quebec. If you sell into Quebec, your marketing needs to work in French, not just be translated. Quebec's 2022 Bill 96 tightened rules on French in advertising, trademarks and consumer contracts, as law firm Osler summarized in May 2022. Get legal advice for your specific case.
- Bilingual audiences. According to Statistics Canada's 2021 Census, 18.0% of Canadians can hold a conversation in English and French, rising to 46.4% in Quebec, and Ontario is home to 23.1% of the country's bilingual population. Ask whether the agency has native French-language talent in-house or relies on translation.
- Canadian media. Check the agency knows Canadian publishers, pricing and audience sizes, rather than scaling down a US plan.
A note on the evidence: most of the selection research above is US or UK based and skews toward larger advertisers, and Setup's 2025 sample was around 100 responses. Treat it as direction, not a precise benchmark for a Canadian mid-sized brand.
How Three Dots Brands approaches this
We're a strategy-first consultancy, so we often help brands get clear on what they need before they hire anyone, and we're open about when an agency, a specialist or a fractional CMO is the better fit. Using our Think, Plan, Execute approach, we can help shape the brief, the scorecard and the shortlist, or work with you directly. If you want a quick, honest starting point, try our marketing diagnostic.
Frequently asked questions
How long does it take to choose a new marketing agency?
Formal reviews at larger advertisers often take a full business quarter. The 4As and ANA found in 2023 that selecting a new agency took more than three months on average. A lean process for a mid-sized brand, with a clear brief, a shortlist of three and a paid diagnostic, can usually be done in six to eight weeks.
What questions should I ask a marketing agency before hiring them?
Ask who will work on your account day to day and how senior they are, how they would measure success in business terms, what they would challenge in your brief, how they charge and whether they take markups, who owns your ad accounts and data, and to speak with a client who has left them. The answers to the last two are often the most revealing.
Should I run a formal RFP to choose a marketing agency in Canada?
Most growing brands don't need a long RFP. A short written brief, a simple request for information and a shortlist of three agencies is usually enough. Public sector bodies may have procurement rules that require a formal RFP. Either way, make chemistry sessions and a small paid piece of work part of the process, rather than free speculative pitches.
What contract terms should I insist on with a new agency?
Insist that your company owns its ad accounts, analytics, data and the work you pay for; a clear notice period, often 30 to 90 days, with a handover obligation; agreed KPIs and review dates; named senior team members; full disclosure of fees, markups and rebates; and compliance with Canadian rules such as CASL and, if you sell into Quebec, the Charter of the French language.
Sources
- Setup, "The 2025 Marketing Relationship Survey Results: The relationship gap is a delivery gap", 2026
- Financial Promoter, "IPA: What do marketers value from agencies?", 2026
- The Drum, "Survey: Too many marketers are unlikely to recommend their agency" (Agency Sparks), 2018
- 4As, "Study: Average cost of agency review tops $1M" (ANA, 4As and Advertiser Perceptions), 2023
- ID Comms, "10 things every pitch gets wrong" (ANA and 4As pitch principles), 2026
- ANA, "New ANA and 4As report reveals client-agency relationship tenure has doubled since 2016", 2025
- Government of Canada, Justice Laws, Canada's Anti-Spam Legislation (S.C. 2010, c. 23), section 20
- Osler, "Quebec adopts changes to the Charter of the French language", 2022
- Statistics Canada, "English-French bilingualism in Canada: Recent trends after five decades of official bilingualism", 2022
Data limitations: Setup's 2025 survey had around 100 responses. The ANA and 4As studies focus mainly on larger US advertisers, the IPA figures are UK-based and taken from published coverage, and the Agency Sparks data is from 2018. The scorecard weights and the six-to-eight-week timeline are our own recommendations, not research findings. Legal points are general information, not legal advice. Figures are the most recent we could verify as of October 2026.