Blog series - Brand-agency collaboration in times of AI. Four key insights. (1/5)

To explore this shift, UBA brought together brand members in a series of roundtable discussions on the evolution of collaboration between brands and agencies. This article brings together the key takeaways from these conversations and outlines how UBA will support its members across the priorities identified in the attached document.

Why these roundtables

UBA organised these roundtables to better understand how advertisers see the evolution of collaboration with their agencies in today’s context. The objective was not to produce broad theory or generic forecasts, but to collect concrete reflections from brand-side marketers across different sectors, business realities and levels of AI maturity.

What quickly became clear is that the discussion is not only about AI. It is about the future of collaboration itself. As AI improves efficiency and reduces time spent on repetitive tasks, advertisers are re-evaluating roles, expectations, capabilities and remuneration models. They are also questioning what should evolve internally on the brand side in order to get more value from agency relationships.

Four key learnings

1. Strong agency relationships are defined by strategic relevance

The most valued agency relationships are long-term partnerships in which agencies contribute to business thinking, challenge choices and participate in strategic discussions beyond campaign delivery. For advertisers, this becomes even more important in a context where execution is increasingly accelerated and commoditised. What makes the difference is no longer only what an agency produces, but how well it understands the business, the customer and answers the brand’s challenges.

2. The advertiser-side marketing organisation is becoming more tech-enabled, more insight-driven and with stronger media capabilities

Advertisers see AI as a way to save time on low-value tasks and redirect energy towards what matters more: understanding customers better, sharpening strategy, learning from the market and making better decisions. At the same time, some organisations are building more in-house capabilities, especially in media-related areas.

3. Brands expect a holistic approach from their agencies, integrating media and creative strategy across the customer journey

Participants clearly challenged fragmented agency ecosystems. They expect stronger integration across disciplines and want agencies to contribute to one coherent plan across the customer journey, not separate streams of work managed in silos. In this context, the added value of agencies lies increasingly in their ability to connect media, creativity, strategy and business context in a way that is relevant for the brand and meaningful for the consumer.

4. Modernising fee models around business targets

Many advertisers consider current remuneration models outdated. If AI reduces production time and changes the nature of deliverables, then fee structures based mainly on hours, production volume or media spend no longer fully reflect the value agencies are expected to create. Participants showed openness to models better linked to business outcomes, brand performance and collaboration quality.

What UBA will do next

At UBA, we want to turn these shared reflections into practical support for our members. For each of the themes addressed in the document, we will develop dedicated activities and content to help brands navigate this new phase of collaboration.

This means that in the coming months, we will put specific focus on topics such as strategic agency relationships, the evolution of brand-side marketing capabilities, integrated media and creative collaboration, and the governance and remuneration models that can support stronger partnerships. Our ambition is to help advertisers not only rethink collaboration in theory, but strengthen it in practice.

Because the underlying challenge is not simply to work faster or cheaper. It is to organise collaboration in a way that allows brands and agencies to each bring their best value to the table, with the shared objective of building stronger brands.

The attached document explores these themes in more depth and captures the reflections shared by advertisers during the roundtables. It offers a useful brand-side perspective for anyone currently rethinking the role, structure and value of agency collaboration in the age of AI.

Thank you

We would like to sincerely thank all marketing leaders from brands in Belgium who took part in these roundtables for their time and for sharing their use cases and insights. We also extend our gratitude to Sabine De veilder, observer of the world of brands, for her moderation and her strong contributions to the document. 

This article is part of a series based on roundtable discussions organised by UBA with brand members in Belgium. Held in March 2026, these sessions brought together about a dozen marketing leaders to share concrete experiences, perspectives and views on the evolution of brand–agency collaboration in the age of AI.