Attend any conference or chat to any marketing leader and you’ll likely hear a refrain along the lines of: “it’s a tough time to be a marketer”. But why is it a tough time, specifically?
To find out, creative and marketing agency Scooter asked more than 100 of Australia’s top marketers to find out what is really on their minds, with B&T able to exclusively reveal the results.
In some ways, the results are not surprising. There is a downward pressure on costs affecting every section of the marketing journey. But the results also reveal tensions in the industry that, if left unresolved, could pose significant headaches for the country’s largest brands.
More With Less
Everyone wants to do more with less. The market is tight. In fact, the survey revealed that marketing budget constraints were the top concern for marketers in FY26 with more than half of marketers listing it as their top challenge.
Meanwhile, two-fifths said that doing more with fewer resources was a challenge, placing it the third gravest concern for the industry. What’s more, nearly a fifth of marketers said they expect their teams to shrink by headcount, in order to focus on core competencies.
At the same time, nearly two-fifths of marketers said that they will seek to build more in-house capabilities and reduce agency dependence in the coming year.
Clearly, shrinking teams and tighter budgets are not necessarily the best bedfellows with in-housing, which takes time and resources to get right. In order to be successful, in-housing should also be a long-term strategic choice, rather than a short-term tactic to get marketers through a squeezed market.
“Marketing teams are being asked to achieve more with fewer resources than ever. At Scooter, we’ve built an agile model grounded in a deep understanding of our clients’ businesses, allowing us to provide the strategic and creative muscle they need without the overhead. It’s about scaling expertise, not headcount, so marketers can stay focused on driving growth,” said Misha Horsnell, Scooter’s marketing director.
Data and Privacy
Personalisation has long been considered the next big differentiator in advertising in a platform-driven world. It’s not surprise that this was evidenced in the survey’s results, with more than 40 per cent of marketers choosing it as one of their big bets for FY26. Among retailer and CPG marketers, in particular, a quarter are prioritising first-party data to personalise customer journeys across channels.
However, Australia is on the cusp of significant changes to the Privacy Act. ADMA CEO Andrea Martens has said the industry is “entering one of the most significant periods of reform” it’s ever seen and that “marketers are now operating in a completely different risk environment than they were 12 or 18 months ago.”
Despite this, less than 10 per cent of marketers listed changes to the Privacy Act and evolving privacy regulations among their top three challenges. That could mean the industry has its privacy compliance sorted. Though B&T reckons that seems unlikely at this juncture, given recent high-profile data breaches.
Similarly, nearly a third of marketers said they had concerns about the data privacy and security employed by agencies using AI in FY26. Clearly, there’s a tension here that could, if unresolved, blow up quite spectacularly.
AI, AI Everywhere
Unsurprisingly AI is top of mind for most marketers, both in their own organisations and in their expectations of agencies.
Nearly half of those surveyed placed the use of AI for creative outputs in their top three big bets for the coming financial year, with more than a third adding the rise of AI-driven search in their top three big bets, as well.
There has been significant consternation in the industry about how AI will (or won’t) eliminate jobs. Of the marketers surveyed, nearly 30 per cent said that they agreed or strongly agreed that AI would “automate everything—from creative to campaign execution”. Nearly half said that AI would lead customer insights and engagement and nearly 80 per cent said that AI will significantly impact their organisations.
Nearly 90 per cent of marketers said they will most likely integrate AI tools and tech into their workflows and more than 90 per cent said they will experiment with AI-generated content and media in FY26. Despite that enthusiasm, however, half of marketers said they are “uncertain” about AI’s impact at this stage. How this uncertainty manifests itself in the market remains to be seen and, again, could be quite dramatic.
“AI is unlocking incredible new ways to articulate and visualise ideas, giving marketers and agencies more control to bring bold concepts to life. But its power is only as strong as the strategy and the prompts behind it. Used at the right time and in the right measure, it can elevate creativity while still creating authentic connections with customers. Finding that balance is where the real opportunity lies,” said Anna Hodgson, CEO, Scooter.
Next week, B&T will be diving into marketers’ expectations of their agencies in FY26. Again, it promises to be dramatic.
