Start with a brand. Find the work behind the logo.
A brand name gives you another way into agency research. Look up a company, see which agencies name it as a client, then follow the source links to understand what they actually say. Use those connections to build a better shortlist, prepare for a conversation or explore a market.
The useful question is what happens after you recognize the logo. Who did what? For which part of the business? When? And how much of that experience matters to the job in front of you?
How brand search works
- Start at Brands. Enter a company name and select Search. This searches brand names. Use Browse Agencies when you want to search by service, industry, location or platform.
- Choose the matching brand. Check the name, industry and website where shown. Similar names can belong to different companies. A parent company, sub-brand and individual location can appear separately.
- Read both sides of the connection. Select the agency name for its AFG profile. Select “Named on…” for the agency's original source page. One helps you assess the agency; the other helps you inspect the particular claim.
- Write down what is supported. Record the work, dates, business unit and results only when the source states them. Leave the rest as questions.
- Choose a next action. Add the agency to your own shortlist, investigate a case study, prepare a question or rule out a mismatch.
The popular list is a starting point based on agency mentions in AFG. A high count is not a quality score, a measure of marketing spend or a complete count of a brand's agency relationships.
For marketers: turn familiar brands into a useful shortlist
1. Find experience that resembles your problem
Choose three to five companies with something meaningful in common with yours: their customer, sales cycle, business model, distribution or operating complexity. Search each brand and read the agencies and sources behind it. A company with a similar problem may be a better starting point than the biggest name you can think of.
For example, if you run an independent hotel and need more direct bookings, you might start with a Marriott search. Then establish whether each piece of work involved a single property, a regional team or the corporate brand. Look for booking, acquisition or website work relevant to your brief. A brand mention by itself does not establish any of those things.
Open promising agency profiles and compare their services, other clients and case studies. Keep three to five candidates in your own notes. Confirm budget, capacity, current team and relevant results directly.
Leave with: a shortlist where every agency has a specific reason to be there and a question still to answer.
2. Understand the work your competitors have commissioned
Search your competitors and read the linked material. Note any explicitly described projects, channels, markets and dates. Look for questions about your own priorities: have you neglected a customer journey, a channel or an operational problem that others have addressed?
Public case studies are selected stories. They cannot reveal the competitor's whole strategy, current agency roster or spend. Hiring the same agency also does not give you access to another client's strategy. If a team looks relevant, ask how it handles category conflicts and confidentiality.
Leave with: two or three ideas to investigate in your own business, with the sources that prompted them.
3. Check the relevance of an agency's pitch
When a pitch mentions a familiar client, look up the brand and open the source. If you find the agency, compare the public description with what you heard. If you do not, ask for the evidence directly; missing coverage does not establish that the claim is false.
- “Which part of that business did you work with, and when?”
- “What did your team own, and what did the client or other partners handle?”
- “Which people from that work would be involved in our account?”
- “What would transfer to our budget and circumstances?”
- “Can you walk us through the result and how it was measured?”
Leave with: a more useful conversation about fit. See how to evaluate agency case studies for a deeper evidence check.
For agencies: use the research before you make the pitch
4. Prepare for a prospect conversation
Search the prospect's name and any relevant parent company or trading name. Follow the source pages. Capture the project described, the agency's stated role and any dates. Then write down what you still need to learn.
If a source describes a website launch, a useful question is: “I saw the published story about your site launch. What has changed in the business since then, and what does the site need to do next?” That gives the prospect room to explain their situation.
A historical case study does not tell you who runs the account now. It also does not tell you whether the prospect is happy, has available budget or wants to replace anyone. Ask about the current setup before proposing a role for your team.
Leave with: three source-informed questions and a hypothesis you are willing to change.
5. Learn which kinds of companies buy work like yours
Start with agencies serving your market. Read their profiles and client rosters, then look up selected client names in Brands. Follow the source pages to see whether they actually describe the service you sell. An agency offering paid media and web development did not necessarily sell both to every client it lists.
Look for recurring business conditions: similar distribution models, geographic complexity, buying cycles or platform needs. Qualify potential prospects against your own criteria and check for a current reason to talk. Keep “has bought related work” separate from “is buying now.”
Leave with: a clearer prospect profile and a small set of companies worth investigating. A competitor's client list is not a list of people waiting to fire them.
6. Find a useful partner or sharpen your positioning
Look up brands in a category you understand, then examine the agencies around them. For a partner search, look for complementary capabilities and relevant delivery experience. Contact a promising team to discuss responsibilities, client ownership, capacity and how you would work together.
For positioning research, compare what agencies say they do with the work their sources describe. Write down where your experience differs and what proof you have for that difference. If nobody publishes evidence of a particular capability, that is a question to investigate. It does not establish that the market is empty.
Two agencies naming the same brand may have worked years apart, in different countries or for separate business units. A shared client name does not prove they collaborated.
Leave with: a partner conversation worth having, or a specific positioning claim you can support.
What the evidence can tell you
| What you find | What it supports | What to check next |
|---|---|---|
| A name or logo on a client roster | The agency publicly presents the brand as a client. | Scope, dates, business unit and current relationship. |
| A named project or case study | The agency's account of a particular piece of work. | Its contribution, the people involved and relevance to your problem. |
| A result with a number | A published performance claim. | Baseline, measurement period, costs, attribution and other changes. |
| A third-party credential on an agency profile | The specific credential supported by that source. | It does not verify every client relationship on the profile. |
| No matching brand or agency | AFG has no matching result to show you. | Other spellings, related names and evidence outside the directory. |
Brand connections are agency-reported. AFG linking a source does not turn the claim into brand confirmation. A source can be a homepage, client list or general work page; it may not provide a detailed case study. Use your browser's find function for the brand name. If the mention has moved or disappeared, keep that uncertainty in your notes.
Publication date, project date and the date you looked at a page are different things. Record each separately when available. Never fill in a missing project date with today's date.
Keep useful research notes
Use your own spreadsheet or document. One row per brand-agency connection is enough to start. Copy these fields:
- Brand name, website and specific business unit or location, if stated.
- Agency name and AFG profile link.
- Original source URL and date you checked it.
- Work described, project dates and the agency's stated role.
- Reported result, including the measurement context provided.
- Why this matters to your search or prospect conversation.
- What remains unknown and the question you will ask.
- Next action: investigate, contact, shortlist or set aside.
Keep published facts, your interpretation and unanswered questions separate. “The case study describes a booking-site redesign” is evidence. “They might understand our booking problem” is your hypothesis. “Does that team still work there?” is the next question.
When comparing several brands, count each agency once in your shortlist. Repeated mentions may help you find a pattern, but they do not create extra independent endorsements.
Make your own work easier to find
For agencies, useful discoverability starts with useful public evidence. Where you have permission, publish the client's name in readable text, identify the business or property involved, and explain the problem, your role, dates and results. A logo wall makes visitors guess at almost everything that matters.
Be specific about the scope. Work for an individual hotel should say which hotel. A project delivered through another agency should describe your part accurately. Keep confidential clients confidential; inclusion in a directory is not a reason to disclose them.
Check your AFG profile and the relevant brand page. If something is missing or incorrect, use the agency contact form with your profile URL, the brand name and a public supporting source. If your agency is not listed, submit it for review. Publishing a page or submitting a correction does not guarantee immediate inclusion.
Missing brands, name variants and corrections
Try a shorter distinctive name, another spelling or a known trading name. Check the parent company and sub-brand separately where relevant. The directory may hold separate entries for these names, and their agency lists may overlap. Do not add the counts together and call the total a corporate roster.
No result means we have not returned a matching record. The company may work with agencies whose work is confidential, unpublished or outside our coverage. You can also search agencies by service or industry and investigate their work directly.
If a name matches the wrong business, a source no longer supports a claim or a relationship needs correcting, send the page URL, the issue and the supporting public source. Marketers can contact us here; agencies can contact us here.
Read how AFG researches its listings, or start a brand search.