When an agency must change along with its clients' businesses

A change in a company's positioning rarely starts with the search for a new slogan. More often, a moment comes when the current way of talking about oneself ceases to correspond to what the company actually does and what value customers expect from it. 

In our case, it was the clients who were one of the most important impulses for change. The conversation increasingly started with marketing, but quickly led further: to brand strategy, sales, offer, customer experience, data, and the way growth is built. 

At some point, we had to ask ourselves a question that we used to ask primarily our clients: does the way we talk about our company still match the value we actually deliver? 

First, reality changes 

For years, the agency market operated according to a relatively simple model: the client came with a need, a brief was created, followed by a campaign, branding, or another specific output. This model still has its place, but is increasingly proving to be insufficient. 

A company may come for a campaign when its real problem is unclear brand positioning. It may expect more leads, but at the same time fail to clearly answer the question of why a customer should choose them. 

In such a situation, efficient execution of the brief is not enough. You can prepare a very good campaign for a poorly defined offer, or an impressive website for a brand whose competitive advantage remains unclear. The business problem will remain unsolved. 

The customer simultaneously interacts with marketing, sales, the website, content, service, and the product itself. From their perspective, these are not separate areas, but a single experience with the company or brand. 

That is why many companies today do not suffer from a lack of activities or marketing budgets. The problem is the lack of consistency between the offer, sales, communication, and customer experience. Even a well-designed campaign will not be effective if it is not supported by appropriate internal and external activities and tools.  

We also had to look at ourselves more broadly 

We also observed this change in our own work. It became increasingly clear that solving a client's problem effectively requires looking more broadly than through the prism of a single campaign. 

This is not just an observation from our daily work. According to the Edelman and LinkedIn "B2B Thought Leadership Impact Report 2025" [1], more than 40% of B2B buying processes stall due to a lack of internal alignment among those involved in the buying decision. In practice, this means that companies today compete not only with their offer or communication, but also with their ability to build a consistent experience for multiple stakeholders simultaneously. 

If the goal is sales growth, entering a new category, increasing market share, building demand, or improving marketing efficiency, a campaign is just one of the possible tools. Sometimes it will be the best solution. Other times, the work needs to start earlier: with deeper questions and working hand-in-hand with the client. 

After nearly 30 years of operation, we reached a point where the traditional term "advertising agency" ceased to describe the full scope of our work. That is why today we position Ancy as a strategic marketing agency, acting as a Strategic Growth Partner. The most interesting thing is that we had to reach many of the conclusions we had been recommending to clients for years within our own company as well. Just like them, we faced the question of whether the model that brought us success in previous years would be equally effective in the next decade. The answer was not obvious. But that is exactly why we decided to look at Ancy the way we look at our clients' businesses. 

We do not treat this change as a rebranding or an attempt to reinvent the company from scratch. It is naming and developing a model that had already been emerging in practice. 

We still rely on the competencies we built the company on: strategy, creation, communication, and media. Today, we combine them into a cooperation model based on six integrated pillars: strategy and product development, branding, sales and retail, communication, media, and content & production. Each of them is managed by offering partners who have been developing their areas for years. This allows us to support clients not only in executing marketing activities but also in designing strategic change, implementing new solutions, and building sustainable growth. From the client's perspective, this means one integrated team that can combine strategy, implementation, and accountability for the business outcome. 

Repositioning does not mean rejecting the past 

A valuable transformation does not require building a company from scratch. It should start with determining what to keep and what competencies to build upon. 

In Ancy's case, the foundation remains nearly three decades of experience and work for over 400 brands. We still create strategies, campaigns, and communication. 

The role of Strategic Growth Partner does not mean that every client should use all of our competencies simultaneously. It is not about adding services to a project, but about combining strategy and implementation, and tailoring solutions to a specific problem. 

Growth itself does not have a single definition. For one company, it will mean increasing sales, for another, reaching a new target audience, growing market share, improving marketing efficiency, or building a stronger brand. The starting point should therefore not be the question of what the agency wants to sell, but what the client's business wants to achieve. 

The offer, communication, and sales arguments must therefore be understandable to the entire group looking at the purchase from different perspectives. Marketing cannot operate in a separate silo. It must be linked to the offer, sales, customer experience, and the way the company builds its advantage. 

First change, then communication 

We start positioning changes with the question: "How should we talk about ourselves now?" 

This narrative results from earlier decisions. First, you need to define what problems the company wants to solve, what results it wants to take responsibility for, and what competencies it needs to do so credibly. Only then does the time come for language, website, offer, or branding. Otherwise, it is easy to change communication without changing the organization itself. 

In our case, the new positioning names the direction we have been developing with clients for some time: moving from executing marketing activities to co-responsibility for their business outcome. 

The best marketing does not start with a campaign. It starts with understanding the business, its customers, and the problem that actually needs to be solved. That is when it truly works toward growth. 

[1] Edelman, LinkedIn, 2025 B2B Thought Leadership Impact Report: Invisible Influence. Unlocking the Power of Hidden Buyers, 2025, accessed: 27.08.2026, Edelman B2B Thought Leadership Impact Report 2025.