The agency world hasn’t caught up to the pace of modern companies.

Static scopes, channel silos and layered processes don’t serve brands that need to move fast, prove ROI, and pivot when the data tells them to, writes Luke Bristow, CEO of media advisory firm MNC.

While legacy agencies still cater for the big players, challenger brands are disrupting categories and scaling faster than ever. However, they don’t just need a media plan, they need a whole new approach.

What’s required is sharp, efficient marketing that drives growth and builds brand equity, simultaneously. With leaner budgets there’s no room for generic strategies or ‘brand awareness’ campaigns that don’t move the needle. Every single penny needs to work hard.

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Post-pandemic consumer behaviour has shifted permanently and value matters more than ever.

Customers are favouring purpose-led, independent brands, with Gen Z and Millennials placing authenticity, impact and value above legacy loyalty. While direct-to-consumer sales are surging with Shopify now accounting for 44% of brand transactions.

As media continues to fragment, TV is no longer the only way to scale your reach, with platforms such as YouTube, TikTok and digital OOH offering alternative, cost-effective ways to scale. AI has revolutionised creative production meaning small brands can now compete with the global giants.

In short, agencies can’t keep playing by the old rules, it’s time to evolve. Here’s how:

Stop charging to push buttons

Challenger brands don’t need button-pushers, they need strategists. A partner who will help them outsmart the competition, not just outbid them on Meta.

Great agencies now drive category-shaping thinking, conversion-focused creative, and deliver growth frameworks and data models that provide clients with real answers, not just reports.

If your agency can’t sit at the same table as a founder, CFO or investor and explain how your plan grows the business – not just the impressions – you’re not a partner, you’re an overhead.

Use AI to do more than just save time

Whilst most agencies are still scratching the surface when it comes to AI, the bigger opportunity lies with how you use it for strategic thinking.

Use AI-driven media mix modelling (MMM) to guide the real-world impact of media investment. Run incrementality testing to prove what’s actually driving growth. Use AI-powered tools like Midjourney for creative optimisation to lower production costs while maintaining quality.

AI won’t replace strategic thinking, but the agencies that fuse human creativity with AI-powered efficiency will lead the next wave.

Your best talent wants to work in a startup

Top media talent isn’t dreaming of agency life anymore, they want to work in tech, in-house teams, and startups.

The old model of paying media planners a salary and expecting loyalty no longer exists. Instead, they want profit-share or equity incentives, and visibility into how their work drives real outcomes for their clients. They want ownership, not bureaucracy.

If agencies want to attract the best talent, they need to act more like startups themselves.

Burn the timesheet

Challenger brands don’t care about billable hours, they care about growth. Yet, most agencies still charge by effort, not outcomes.

But that doesn’t work in today’s climate. Agencies should be rewarded for impact, not input.

Focus should be on customer growth, revenue, or contribution margin, with commercial incentives for outperformance. And in an ideal world, incrementality testing should prove media effectiveness.

Stop being a vendor, start acting like a growth partner.

The need for speed 

Too many agencies push challenger brands into performance-only loops with low upside, or big brand plays before product-market fit. Both are traps.

Cash flow for challenger brands is crucial, every media pound needs to earn its keep, there’s no cushion to waste spend.

What’s needed is brand and performance working together, not competing for budget. Real-time media planning needs to evolve with lifetime value (LTV), customer acquisition cost (CAC), and stage of growth, and it needs to be built around profitable scale, not vanity metrics.

Agencies were built for Goliaths; slow, bloated, and obsessed with process over performance. But the future belongs to Davids.

Challenger brands need speed, precision, and partners who drive outcomes, not just fill in timesheets. It’s time to start building agencies for the brands actually changing the game.