驶入2026...：期待什么/该做什么

TABLE OF CONTENTS About Us03 03 About Our Report 06The State of Our World 07The Times Are a-Changin’ (for the better)! 09Build the Organic Plan Feeling Good Too!11 13Proper Pipeline Management 22In-Housing Here to Stay? 26 Conclusion ABOUT US This report was developed by our team at RSW/US. We are a leading out-sourced business development and lead generation firm dedicated exclu-sively to serving marketing agencies and other professional services firms ofall sizes and specialties. Since our founding in 2005, we’ve partnered with firms across the globe, act-ing as their go-to outsourced sales and marketing team. Learn more about our RSW/US outsourced business development programsat www.rswus.com. ABOUT OUR REPORT The 2025 RSW/US Survey Report: “Rolling Into 2026...What to Expect/What toDo” was conducted with senior-level executives across a range of marketingservices and other professional services firms during August 2025. While the past 24+ months have been challenging for sure, there are somepositive signs of improvement for the industry outlined in this report. We will tell you what’s happening and what to do. All our content is madeactionable for your benefit. We also tackle the topics of AI, In-House Teams, and Productization in thisreport. Some good learnings and insights from those that completed the sur-vey…thanks! We hope the findings and takeaways from this study provide valuable guid-ance as you work your way to the close of 2025 and the start of a brand new(and even better) year in 2026! The sample came from our database of over 20,000 professional servicesfirms in the U.S. and Canada. If you’d like to reproduce any of our findings in any format, please reach outto Lee McKnight (VP, Sales & Marketing) or Mark Sneider (Founder & CEO) at(513-559-3111/3101) or via email at lee@rswus.com or mark@rswus.com. The State of Our World The state of the world we’re living in right now, things like “Client BudgetConstraints,” “Longer Sales Cycles” and “Economic Uncertainty” rule the daywhen it comes to finding and winning new business. This has been the case for the past 24+ months, but fortunately, as we’ll seenext, the prolonged state of uncertainty we’ve been dealing with seems to beturning the corner a bit. Marketers and other professional services prospects are opening up, seem-ingly more ready to spend and consider changing out the support for theirbusiness. And marketing and other professional services firms seem ready to spend tosupport their marketing and sales efforts, as we’ll see shortly. So, while we’re not back to 2022 levels when the pandemic’s impact had sub-sided and people were spending again, things are moving in the right direc-tion for professional services firms. What are the biggest challenges you face inwinning new business right now?(Select up to 3) The Times Are a-Changin’(for the better)! How do you expect your overall businessperformance to trend through the second half of2025 (relative to the first half of 2025)? Findings Recap Always good to start a survey report with some great news! 57% of marketing agencies and other professional services firms feel like thesecond half of this year is going to outperform the first half. Seeing that the companies that we work with most often are telling us thatthey feel like business is moving in a more positive direction is so nice to hear! And we’re seeing the same thing among our marketing services and profes-sional services client base at RSW/US. More prospects are willing to talk with our clients, and more clients are start-ing to win new business or see the opportunities to win new business – moreso than they have over the past 6-18 months. Implications for You The key with any new business effort is sticking with it. We’ve been running this business of outsourced new business for the past20 years (11/11 is our 20th birthday!) and we’ve seen it all over the last two de-cades. Interestingly, while the events change, the patterns don’t change. We saw similar patterns during the ’08 recession and saw similar situationsoccur during the pandemic. ÖMajor event occurredÖProspects pulled back out of fear and uncertaintyÖProspects eventually had to turn things back on and support their busi-nessÖAll was good again until the next event came around! In ’08 it was relatively focused on a handful of core categories (e.g., finance,building). During the pandemic, while a disaster, we were all bolstered by PPP money,so it made the fall-off a bit more manageable. Today’s situation is different. It’s broader in terms of its impact, there isn’t asafety net, and it’s been longer lasting. So, stick with it. Put your head down and plan and plow through it. And if youneed help, download our Definitive Outline for a Productive First ProspectMeeting. Build the Organic Plan How do you expect your client’s spending willchange during the second half of 2025 (relative tothe first half of 2025)? Findings Recap Inte