(NYTIMES) — A leading advertising trade association has hired two companies to look into the practices of media agencies, reflecting rising concern among advertisers over a lack of transparency in how ads are bought.
The Association of National Advertisers, which includes roughly 700 companies that collectively spend more than $250 billion on marketing and advertising, has selected K2 Intelligence, a corporate investigative consulting firm, and FirmDecisions, a marketing auditor that is part of the Ebiquity consulting firm, to lead a “fact-finding effort” into questionable media-buying tactics, including rebates and arbitrage.
Bob Liodice, president and chief executive of the advertisers association, said in an interview that the goal of the investigation was to “see to what degree any nontransparent behavior is taking place in the market.”
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