Marketing Procurement iQ Conference Day One: What the industry can learn from the world’s foremost marketing procurement leaders

 As one of the UK’s most storied sporting venues, The Oval is iconic for telling tales of old as well as frequently embracing the new. It was the venue for England’s inaugural Test match, the birthplace of the Ashes and the site of the very first FA Cup final, but has also continued to modernise and become a truly unique and admired landmark for 21^st century cricket. 

So there’s something quite apt about it being the place to host the 2025 Marketing Procurement iQ Conference. Because some of the issues facing the marketing procurement community feel like they’ve been frustrating those in the business since The Oval opened its doors in 1845 (hello simply being seen as ‘money savers’!), whilst other topics have evolved so fast that leaders are having to adapt to new challenges at a pace never witnessed before (did somebody say Ai?). 

Today, it was time to dig deep into those challenges and hear how the very best in the business are tackling them. After a full day of illuminating sessions, here’s what stood out most…

Knowledge is Power

A shared theme for many of our keynote speakers was the need for marketing procurement to embrace its community, to share ideas, talk to each other, educate and inspire. Many issues marketing procurement face on a day-to-day basis comes from an absence of training, Global Marketing Procurement Consultant Tina Fegent pointed out. Failure to maintain standards or run a good pitch process often comes from a lack of understanding the industry, insight and input. 

“We live in a knowledge economy”, Graham McKay, Procurement Director of Dyson, added in his keynote. “Knowledge is going to be key to how we all succeed in our roles. Spend time on LinkedIn and at conferences… immerse yourself within your agencies… acquire knowledge and bring it back to your business. Walk in and own the conversation.” 

It’s down to agencies as well as the community at large, and it’s incumbent on marketing procurement leaders to train and inspire at all levels, because marketing is one of those most diverse categories a procurement professional can be involved in. When working at Unilever, Procurement Strategist Expert Nina Chande said she realised her role was ‘bringing the business together, because I was the one who spoke with all departments’. Whilst for Tina, the call to arms was clear: “it’s time for marketing procurement to step out of the shadows and take ownership of a role that can deliver so much more.”

Don’t Fall for the FOMO that Ai brings

You won’t be surprised to hear that a large majority of the sessions had Ai at its heart, and absolutely every panel touched upon it more than once. But one of the overriding themes from those sessions was to not rush unnecessarily to solve all your Ai needs.  

“Everyone is running around like headless chickens when it comes to Ai,” Haleon’s Olga Tymchenko observed. And whilst every business Olga meets says they can solve her challenges, what she ends up being sent is still an idea in PowerPoint, not a tool that’s been developed. “So many start-ups say they’re looking for a partner, but what they really mean is that they’re looking for investors,” Olga said. 

So where will we – or should we – be by the end of the year? I liked  the answer from Sam Royston, Burberry’s Commercial Procurement – Marketing Lead: “I think we’ll have a better idea of what questions to ask, but we won’t have the answers. We’ll know the why, but not the how.” 

…But you can’t stand still.

So don’t press the panic button on Ai if you’re not where you think you should be. But standing completely still, waiting on the sidelines, is also not an option. “You have to try things,” Peter van Jaarsveld, AI Lead of Oliver, said in his session. “Gen Ai has to be a friend. If you’re not testing and trying things, you’re only going to end up playing catch up after.” 

‘Play not publish’ was a phrase uttered by a number of panellists – recognising that inertia is not an option, but also being well aware of the issues that testing Ai in the real world could cause, particularly when it comes to rights management. “It’s a full time job keeping on top of this,” Shelby Akoa, VP of Managed Service at Peach, said. “The knowledge and expertise needed in this space isn’t there yet in most businesses. And you only learn of the true impact of Ai rights infringement when it lands on your desk!”

Indeed, in a rather terrifying session, the panel predicted over the next few years we’ll see a huge increase in copyright infringement as tracking tools and other services improve. What guardrails and checks do your agencies have in place to keep working in an Ai safe space? 

Fragmentation is an increasingly tough nut to crack

We’re in a world where marketers need to produce more work than ever, often with less budget than ever. So how are marketing teams ensuring they have the right ecosystems in place? The large majority of businesses now handle some content creation in-house, but fully owned in-house models have dropped by 10%, according to a study conducted by Claire Randall Consulting and the World Federation of Advertisers. 

That’s why it’s never been a more interesting time to be working in the production business, M3 Labs’ very own Darren Khan observed. Clients are crying out for models that eliminates the fat but still delivers the best creative work at the right time. You need the right people, forming the right partnerships, marrying creative and production together to make it work. 

It was a view shared by Jon Peppiatt, the former Chairman of Bartle Bogle Hegarty. “Production agencies are born from a world of tech,” he said, “where they’re used to creating high-volume, quick, agile content that brands need. And now they’re bringing in creativity themselves, it makes for an increasingly attractive proposition.” 

Call it reconvergence, call it recoupling… having experts who can lean on media and production knowledge, who are constantly thinking about context and channel as well as ‘the big idea’ is vital in a world where so many agencies continue to be too limited in their thinking.  

Sustainability still isn’t in the DNA 

Before the infiltration of Ai, there was a time when ‘sustainability’ was the buzzword of every conference. Brands and agencies started to talk a good game, signed up to a few pledges… and it seems that’s about as far as it went. We heard of one CMO confiding that they didn’t believe ‘sustainability is truly in the DNA of the majority of their agencies’, and they’ll still send 50 people off to shoot in South Africa at the very first opportunity. 

Interestingly, it seems like some suppliers are failing to even talk a good game now, too. Dyson’s McKay projected his worry that you’re getting confusing answers from people when you try to talk sustainability. “You have agencies chasing different answers to the same question… we have to get to the point where we can at least understand what we’re all trying to do,” he said. It shouldn’t be up to marketers and marketing procurement leads to ‘catch suppliers out’, and as an industry we should be aligning – and truly working with – organisations like AdGreen who can provide clear, leading guidance in this space.