Laptop on marble table with Marketing Procurement benchmarking being explored

Why Marketing Procurement Benchmarking?

Procurement is looking beyond cost cutting and savings towards influence, value and longevity. And that’s where Marketing Procurement Benchmarking comes in…

Marketing procurement has evolved over the years to something beyond just numbers. Central to ensuring that marketing spend and agency selection are aligned with the business objectives and budgets, marketing procurement is now both a strategic ally and a performance optimiser.

How? Through effective benchmarking. 

With  Marketing Procurement benchmarking accurate insights, percentages, metrics and numbers can be relied upon to save the business significant sums of money without compromising on agency performance, output or quality. In fact, with the right focus, Marketing Procurement can access more marketing for the same, or less spend.

The benefits of marketing procurement benchmarking

In our experience marketing procurement benchmarking can save companies on average 20% on every dollar of marketing spend. That’s a significant amount of money that is otherwise left on the table.  Money can be reinvested back into the business and into more marketing campaigns to create additional value.

There are other benefits to adding marketing procurement benchmarking tools to your toolbox…

1. Quality control with Marketing Procurement Benchmarking

In addition to adding solid savings, marketing procurement benchmarking provides teams with added insight into the quality of an agency’s performance and capabilities when compared with others. It allows the marketing procurement team to review the quality of an agency’s performance within very specific markets, regions and industries. 

Marketing Procurement benchmarking adds immense value to marketing and the business as a whole, providing visibility into performance that can refine spend and create foundations for building long-term relationships. 

2. Marketing Procurement Benchmarking Reduces the risk of over-reliance on competitive resourcing

This is an important shift, as companies gain visibility into agency behaviour, quality and performance through accurate marketing procurement benchmarking, they also gain a more balanced view of the relationship and are less likely to choose cheap over value. 

Choosing an agency based on price alone can be immensely risky in terms of quality and reliability. Cost savings don’t necessarily result in maintained performance, in fact it often means the opposite, which can end up being counterintuitive.

Marketing Procurement benchmarking encourages open conversation about why an agency might be 15% above benchmark, giving you the information as the brand to then explain why you’re comfortable investing extra for that specific agency. With all the information at hand you can make better informed decisions.

3. Marketing Procurement Benchmarking supports Compliance and service

When agency selection is supported by benchmarking analyses, it ensures that contracts and agreements are built on transparent and achievable foundations. Companies can curate agencies based on proven metrics across multiple key performance indicators (KPIs), and ensure that these KPIs form part of contract negotiations.

The value is in the shift Marketing Procurement benchmarking creates from simply procuring an agency based on budget to intelligent marketing procurement that leverages relevant data, insights and metrics.

4. Data-driven decision making with Marketing Procurement Benchmarking

While arguably every benefit listed here is centred around the premise of data-driven decision making, it’s more than simple metrics, savings and performance. With the right data, Marketing Procurement can ensure that agency and brand are aligned when it comes to filling the gaps on each side. Data and metrics are a two-way street, brands need to be clear on what their expectations are, what metrics they’ll be assessing and communicate this with their agency.

Quality analysis of data and insight through Marketing Procurement benchmarking means that there is a clear picture painted of how each cog fits into the marketing wheel and the value that each one offers. It ensures that every party has the visibility and insights needed to ensure that they are aligned, that they can deliver best practice performance, and that they are on the same track to success.

What tools can be leveraged to fulfil Marketing Procurement benchmarking?

Technology has become an invaluable asset. It helps enhance marketing procurement benchmarking, set new standards in best practices, and streamline manual processes, offer increased accuracy, reduce human error and improve visibility.

The right technology can make it far easier for marketing procurement teams to engage in highly relevant and accurate benchmarking processes that actually deliver the percentage savings they want, and need.

RightSpend provides robust marketing procurement benchmarking capabilities that offer visibility into marketing agency data to help refine cost expectations and spend. 

Refined and designed specifically for marketing procurement, the RightSpend platform provides information that allows for teams to enjoy all the benefits of data-driven decision making within clearly defined metrics and KPIs. The data is rigorously vetted and customer-driven and has assessed more than $10 billion in agency fees each year across multiple agency types, deliverable items and global markets. With RightSpend, your marketing procurement team gains intense visibility and control while ensuring that procurement, agency relationships and contracts are fair and sustainable.


Bright coloured background with Book a Demo in bold lettersg