Marketing Briefing: As clients manage a difficult year, ghosting normalization leaves some agencies without answers

This year hasn’t been easy for agencies. Ghosting — when agencies are in talks for a project or even a potential agency-of-record assignment but never hear back — hasn’t helped. And some agency executives say they’ve dealt with or heard about a higher level of ghosting this year, attributing the normalization of the practice to overwhelmed marketers who are so focused on short-term wins that any longer-term planning goes out the window.

“It seems like clients are struggling to know what they need,” explained one agency exec, who spoke under the condition of anonymity. “Clients are like, ‘I’m not sure what I need so throw everyone in the mix and I’ll figure it out along the way.’ [Once they figure it out,] there’s also a sense of, ‘I need what I need and need to move on, so I didn’t get a chance to get back to you.’”