When we audit corporate-agency partnerships, we frequently ask marketing leaders to rate their satisfaction. Every so often, we get an answer wrapped in a shrug of resignation.

In the corporate world, an 85% sounds like a solid ‘B.’

In high school, it might have landed you on the honor roll.

But in the high-stakes, fast-moving arena of modern marketing and agency performance, 85% isn’t a safe baseline. It’s an invisible tax on your brand. It means your relationship is broken – you just haven’t felt the full impact of the crash yet.

Here is why an 85% relationship is actually a warning sign, and why settling for “good enough” is costing you more than you think.

The 15% Blindspot

When an agency is hitting 85%, they are delivering the bare minimum of the contract. They show up to meetings, they check off the deliverables, and the creative isn’t inherently broken.

But look closely at what lives inside that missing 15%:

• Proactivity: They aren’t bringing you new ideas or keeping an eye on the horizon; they are waiting for your brief.
• Radical Candor: They’ve stopped pushing back on your bad ideas because agreeing with you is path-of-least-resistance accounting.
• Top-Tier Talent: Agencies put their A-team, their innovators, and their problem-solvers on the 100% accounts—the ones that challenge and inspire them. The 85% accounts get the steady, uninspired execution team.

When you settle for 85%, you aren’t buying partnership; you are buying a vendor.

The Cost of Complacency Equilibrium

The most dangerous part of an 85% relationship is its stability. It’s what we call Complacency Equilibrium. Because it isn’t an outright disaster, it doesn’t trigger an immediate Request for Proposal (RFP). It doesn’t force a hard conversation.

Instead, it quietly erodes your market position.

While your agency is giving you a comfortable B-grade performance, your competitor’s agency is working at 100% – re-imagining their media mix, weaponizing new AI agents, and aggressively capturing market share.

In marketing, you are either moving forward or falling behind. Standing still at 85% is just slow-motion regression.

Why Do We Settle?

Marketers usually tolerate the 85% mark for two reasons: fear of the unknown and the exhaustion of the pitch process. The thought of writing an RFP, sitting through endless chemistry meetings, and onboarding a new team feels like a professional masochism. So, we make peace with mediocrity.

But transformation doesn’t always require blowing up the contract and launching a massive, disruptive agency search. Often, the fix starts with intentional listening.

Getting Back to 100%

An 85% relationship is rarely one-sided. It is usually the result of a breakdown in communication, misaligned financial incentives, or shifting client expectations that were never clearly articulated.

If your partnership has drifted into the ‘good enough’ zone, it’s time to intervene before the rot sets in:

• Have the Uncomfortable Conversation: If you’re a client, tell your agency they are sitting at an 85% and explain what a 100% looks like. If you’re an agency, ask your client where the friction lies.
• Undertake a Request for Transformation (RFT): Instead of blowing up the relationship with a costly, disruptive RFP, formalize this entire pivot through an RFT. This structured process challenges your incumbent agency to re-engineer their team, re-evaluate their tech stack (especially AI integration), and pitch a modernized roadmap for your business.
• Realign the incentives: Look at the commercial model and ask if your agency’s compensation structure actually reward innovation and business growth, or does it merely reward volume and hours logged? You cannot expect a transformative partnership if you are paying for mere maintenance.

The Bottom Line

Your brand, your budget, and your growth goals deserve a partner that is fully invested. If you look at your roster and realize you’ve built a collection of “just fine” partnerships, it’s time to name the problems you’ve been avoiding.

Because at 85%, you’re not saving a relationship. You’re just delaying the termination.

Fixing an 85% relationship takes a proven framework. At Listenmore, we specialize in architecting and managing RFT processes that turn stagnant vendor dynamics into high-performing partnerships. Let’s start the conversation.

If your agency meetings have started to feel like a recurring subscription you forgot to cancel, it’s time for a reality check. There is a massive difference between a partner who drives your growth and a passenger who just enjoys the ride (and the retainer). Before you commit to the soul-crushing paperwork of a full-blown pitch, you owe it to your budget – and your sanity – to ask these ten questions:

1. When was the last time you surprised and delighted us ?

And no, a box of lukewarm cupcakes with the agency logo on them doesn’t count. We mean a strategic pivot or a creative “aha!” moment that didn’t make you wince. If the last time you were delighted was during the pitch, you’re officially in a “ghosting” phase.

2. If we didn’t speak for a week, would we actually notice?

This is the ultimate test of your retainer. If the agency disappeared into a silent void for seven days and your business kept humming along perfectly, you aren’t paying for strategic partnership – you’re paying for a very expensive security blanket.

3. What’s the last really smart thing you shared with us?

Agencies should be your external brain, not just your extra hands. If the last “insight” they gave you was “video is big on TikTok right now,” you’re paying for a news feed, not a consultant. You want the kind of smarts that make you feel like you’ve just had a double espresso.

4. Who actually works here anymore?

Is the senior lead who sold you the dream still on the business, or have you been quietly handed off to a more junior team? If the turnover is higher than a pancake house, your brand soul is leaking out the door.

5. What’s the AI plan (besides “we’re looking into it“)?

If your agency doesn’t have a clear AI roadmap, they’re basically bringing a horse and carriage to a Formula 1 race. You need to know:

• Are they using it to save time (and are they charging you less for that time)?
• Do we have guardrails so our data doesn’t end up in a public bot’s stomach?

6. Are you caught up in Holding Company Hunger Games?

With all the mergers and synergy talk you need to know: Is your account lead focused on your ROI, or are they busy updating their org charts because their department was ‘consolidated’ into a different business unit.

7. Are you growing our business or just keeping the lights on?

Is the agency a thermostat (changing the environment) or a thermometer (just telling you it’s cold)? If they’re just executing the SOW like a robot, they aren’t a partner; they’re a utility bill.

8. Is there a turf war happening on my dime?

If your creative agency and your media agency are fighting over who owns the brand’s soul like divorced parents at a birthday party, you’re the one losing out. Performance should be the only goal, not who gets to claim the most line items in a budget.

9. Does our contract belong in a museum?

If your Scope of Work hasn’t changed since 2021, you’re likely paying for ‘print ad coordination’ while your competitors are winning the Metaverse (or at least the current version of it). A stale SOW is just a slow way to overpay.

10. Would I recommend you to a friend, or would that be a mean prank?

Be honest. If a peer asked for a recommendation, would you enthusiastically hand over the agency’s number, or would you change the subject and ask about the weather? Your gut usually knows the ROI before the spreadsheet does.

The Request for Transformation (RFT)

If these questions left you feeling a bit awkward, don’t panic.

You don’t have to fire everyone and start a grueling six-month pitch process. You can issue a Request for Transformation. It’s the marriage counseling of the marketing world – a chance to reset the rules, fix the fees, and get the A-team back in the room without the drama of a breakup.

The traditional agency-client relationship is being pulled in two directions: On one side, the “holding company shakeups” are forcing consolidation and headcount reductions; on the other, the rise of “agentic AI” is redefining what value even looks like.

For marketers, this isn’t just about whether your agency is doing a “good job” – it’s about whether they are still the right shape for your business. But perhaps before you default to a gruelling RFP, you should ask if your relationship needs a Transformation rather than a Replacement.

Huh?

Well, hear us out. Because there are some questions you could ask that may reveal exactly where you want to take your agency relationship (or not):

The “State of the Union” Questions

Start by looking at the foundation and ask some questions that might help determine if the cracks you’ve noticed are surface-level or structural.

• Is our current model based on “Headcount” or “Outcome”? In an AI-driven market, paying for hours is a legacy trap. If your agency is still resisting performance-based pricing or hasn’t shown how they are using automation to reduce your costs, it could be a profit-maximizing strategy – at your expense(!)
• Do we still have “Institutional Memory,” or has the “Great Shakeup” erased it? With Forrester predicting a 15% cut in agency jobs this year, many marketers are finding their “A-Team” has been replaced by rotating juniors. If the people who knew your brand’s “why” are gone, you may have already lost the primary benefit of your incumbent.
• Are we a “Top-Tier” priority? It’s a tough question. But the truth of it is, that in Canada, if you’re not a US or globally aligned business with a sizeable budget, and your agency is part of a holding company undergoing significant restructuring, it may be they’re more focused on their own internal worries than your creative or strategic breakthroughs. (Did I say that out loud…? Well, sort of. I’m just encouraging you to ask yourselves the question and come to your own conclusions.)

The AI & Tech Litmus Test

AI is no longer a “roadmap item”. It’s the operating system of 2026.

• Does the agency have “Agentic Guardrails” in our contract? You shouldn’t just ask if your agency just uses AI. To one degree or another – of course they do. So ask how they govern it. Do you have clear agreements on data privacy, ethical red lines, and human-in-the-loop, leadership oversight? If they can’t show you their AI governance framework, you are carrying the brand risk.
• Are they collapsing the “Decision Drag”? Modern marketing moves at the speed of software. If it still takes your agency two weeks to iterate on a campaign that an AI-native shop could optimize in two hours, your “incumbent” is actually an anchor.

Transformation vs. Search: Which Path to Take?

Once you’ve answered the questions above, you’ll likely find yourself at a fork in the road. Here’s a decision map:

The Case for Transformation	The Case for an Agency Search
Shared Ambition: The agency is eager to co-create a new SOW that reflects modern tech and pricing.	Cultural Stagnation: The agency is defensive about their legacy models and “the way we’ve always done it.”
High Strategic Value: They still provide “high-touch” human insights and “white-glove” strategy that AI can’t replicate.	Talent Brain Drain: The key leaders you trusted have departed, and the replacements lack category expertise.
Agile Willingness: They are willing to move from a rigid MSA to a “Product Roadmap” approach with flexible sprints.	Redundancy: You are paying for a massive overhead/bureaucracy that no longer serves your specialized needs.

---

A Better Alternative: The “Request for Transformation” (RFT)

Before jumping into a full-blown RFP which – frankly – might take 3-6 months – consider the Request for Transformation (RFT) option. Instead of asking new agencies to pitch, ask your current partner to pitch why they should still be your valued, trusted and perhaps most sought after agency, by presenting a vividly different operating model. If they can’t envision a version of themselves that is faster, leaner, and more tech-integrated, then you have you’ll have your answer.

Either way. If you’re looking for an RFT – call us and we’ll show you how to get the wheels in motion. And if it turns out you need an RFP, we’ll make it is as painless as possible.

Remember 2023? Simpler times. Before “AI integration” became every agency’s favourite buzzword and org charts started resembling abstract art. Well, here we are, staring down 2026, and if you’re a marketer, you’re probably feeling a bit like you’re in a perpetual game of agency musical chairs, but with higher stakes and fewer comfortable seats.

And if you’ve had an email with a subject line along the lines of “synergistic ecosystem re-alignment” land in your in-box as a result of “unified brand experience mandate” (translation: “you’ll be seeing another new org chart very, very soon…” ) you could be forgiven for wondering if your creative team is going to be replaced by an AI savvy plugin as early as Thursday.

It’s enough to make you long for the good old days when “digital transformation” meant getting a website that didn’t look like it was designed in 1998. Now, it’s about navigating a landscape where AI promises to revolutionize everything (and yes, maybe take your job in the process), economic uncertainty is the new norm, and your agency partners are seemingly more focused on their internal restructuring than your actual, pressing marketing challenges.

Let’s be honest, you’re probably a little irritated already. Irritated by the jargon, irritated with the constant change, and daunted by the thought of launching another full-blown agency search as your only alternative.

But what if there was another way?

What if you could transform your existing agency relationships without having to divorce them and start completely from scratch? What if you could inject new life, fresh thinking, and a healthy dose of strategic alignment into your current partnerships, all while avoiding a potentially disruptive RFI, RFP?

Enter the Request for Transformation (RFT)

Issuing an RFT has a huge advantage over an RFP in that you’re only sending it to your incumbent agency(s) as a formal way of bringing them to the table to talk about transformation for your business – not theirs. Consider that an RFT can help with: 

• Addressing changes in scope from when your agency was originally appointed
• Under performance within the agency and / or shortfalls in key objectives
• Weakness in key service areas that have been lingering for too long
• Cost management issues – including overruns or uncompetitive pricing
• Significant resource changes that may be disrupting your business

And yes, understanding how the agency will leverage AI to deliver better results for you, not just talk about how it’ll transform business for everyone else.

In short, a transformation package designed to reinvigorate your business, address issues that have been impeding progress and reset the whole relationship for success.

Diagnostic: Fix or Finish?

Is your partnership a candidate for a “renovation,” or is it time to move to an RFP? Let’s look at the 2026 reality check:

Pillar	The Case for Transformation	The Case for Search
Trust & Chemistry	You still like them, you’re just annoyed by the process.	You’ve started “ghosting” their check-ins because they’re too painful.
AI & Efficiency	They have the tools but are waiting for your “permission” to stop billing for manual tasks.	They still think AI is a “fad” or something they can charge a 30% premium for.
Knowledge	They know where the “brand bodies” are buried and why the 2025 campaign tanked.	They’ve had so much turnover that you’re the one onboarding them.
The “Vibe”	They feel like a partner who is stuck in a rut.	They feel like a vendor who is stuck in 2015.

Listen, you’re a marketer, not a holding company M&A specialist. You’ve got campaigns to launch, customers to engage, and ROI to prove. You shouldn’t have to decipher agency family trees to get the support you need. So if you’ve reached the point where you’re convinced your agency is more interested in playing corporate musical chairs than delivering actual marketing results, and you’ve decided enough is enough, then yes of course –  we’re happy to help you explore other options.

But before you embark on that journey, consider this: What if a little strategic transformation is all you need? What if you could achieve the results of a new partnership without the headache of finding one? Because this year, with all the shifting sands and technological marvels, the last thing you’re probably looking for is another agency pitch deck.

Ready to transform your agency relationship? Your sanity, your teams, your CEO, your budget, your business – potentially even your agency – will thank you.