The Marketing Community’s Support of Diverse Suppliers  [REPORT]

This research is based on a survey of the ANA database of certified diverse suppliers serving the marketing/advertising industry. We wanted to hear from these diverse suppliers to learn: how interest from the marketing/advertising community in supporting diverse suppliers changed in the past year; how investment from the marketing/advertising community changed in the past year; top challenges for diverse suppliers.

Key Findings

There has been a notable uptick in investment from the marketing/advertising community towards diverse suppliers. That investment is expected to increase again in the next year.

• Per 38 percent of respondents, investment increased in the past year.
• Per 46 percent of respondents, investment is expected to increase in the next year.

Meanwhile, 56 percent of respondents say that interest from the marketing/advertising community in supporting diverse suppliers has increased in the past year.

So, there is a gap within the marketing/advertising community between the interest and actual investment support of diverse suppliers — between “intent” and “action.” One hypothesis about this gap is that many companies which have interest are still “sitting on the sidelines” and don’t know how (or where) to get started. To address that, the ANA is working with a cross-industry task force (which includes the 4A’s and AIMM) to develop guidelines to help those companies.

Meanwhile, the diverse suppliers identified their top challenges as:

• Lack of feedback when you don’t get the business
• Getting your foot in the door with national advertisers/agencies
• Extended payment terms required by some advertisers/agencies

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