Ipsos MMA has been named a Leader—and a Customer Favorite—in The Forrester Wave™: Marketing Measurement and Optimization Services, Q1 2026, a notable endorsement in a market where measurement credibility increasingly determines budget decisions.

The report evaluates marketing measurement providers across 31 criteria, spanning current capabilities and long-term strategy. Forrester’s focus this year zeroed in on how well vendors help enterprises measure and optimize performance across channels, geographies, and customer segments—an increasingly complex mandate as media fragmentation accelerates and CFO scrutiny intensifies.

Ipsos MMA stood out, earning the highest possible scores in 20 evaluation criteria, a result that reflects both technical depth and operational maturity.

Why This Recognition Matters Now

Marketing measurement is undergoing a structural shift. It’s no longer enough to explain what worked in hindsight. Modern organizations want always-on, forward-looking intelligence that connects marketing activity to enterprise outcomes—revenue, profit, and long-term growth.

Forrester’s Wave arrives at a moment when brands are rethinking attribution, rebalancing short- and long-term investments, and demanding closer alignment between marketing and finance. In that context, Ipsos MMA’s dual recognition as both a Leader and a Customer Favorite is particularly telling: it signals not just analytical strength, but trust.

Unified Measurement at Scale

A central theme in Forrester’s assessment is unified measurement, an area where Ipsos MMA received strong praise. According to the report:

“Ipsos MMA shines with strong measurement tools, a hands-on consulting approach, and demonstrated acumen for complex measurement. The Activate measurement platform delivers unified measurement at scale—most clients do some type of unified modeling.”

That emphasis matters. Many enterprises now operate across dozens of channels, multiple countries, and both B2C and B2B motions. Fragmented measurement approaches—separate MMM, MTA, lift studies, and dashboards—often create more confusion than clarity.

Ipsos MMA’s approach consolidates these views into a single, coherent framework, helping decision-makers see how different levers work together rather than in isolation.

Consulting as a Differentiator, Not an Add-On

Beyond tools and models, Forrester highlighted Ipsos MMA’s client engagement and change-management approach, an area where many measurement initiatives stumble.

“Each consulting engagement starts with a detailed discovery roadmap for C-suite, finance, operations, and other teams. This first step in a change-management framework evolves as clients mature and trust measurement.”

That focus on organizational adoption reflects a hard-earned lesson in measurement: insight only creates value if people believe it and act on it. By engaging stakeholders across marketing, finance, and operations early, Ipsos MMA positions measurement as a shared enterprise capability rather than a marketing-only exercise.

Customer Favorite: What Clients Are Saying

Ipsos MMA’s Customer Favorite designation reinforces that point. In its evaluation, Forrester cited direct client feedback:

“Customers love working with Ipsos MMA and praise its modeling capabilities, measurement unification, and consulting across the enterprise.”

In a category often criticized for black-box models or overly academic outputs, client enthusiasm is a meaningful signal. It suggests Ipsos MMA has managed to balance statistical rigor with practical usability—a combination that’s increasingly rare and increasingly valuable.

Data Quality and Benchmarking at Enterprise Scale

Forrester also pointed to Ipsos MMA’s data quality and benchmarking capabilities, noting:

“Global benchmarks from 70+ sources monitor performance and assess data quality.”

As marketers contend with signal loss, privacy constraints, and inconsistent platform reporting, benchmarking has become less about league tables and more about validation. Being able to ground results in broad, cross-market benchmarks helps organizations trust their models—and defend decisions internally.

Built for Complex, Global Organizations

The report positions Ipsos MMA as particularly well-suited for enterprises with complex, multi-target and multi-country needs:

“With its powerful modeling and hands-on consulting, Ipsos MMA is a good fit for organizations with complex, multi-target (B2C and B2B), and multi-country measurement needs.”

That positioning aligns with broader market demand. Global brands increasingly need measurement systems that can flex across regions while still rolling up to a consistent executive view—no small feat in today’s media landscape.

Executive Perspective: From Reporting to Value Creation

Ipsos MMA leadership framed the recognition as validation of a long-term strategy focused on impact, not just analytics.

“Our clients face increasingly complex marketing investment environments,” said Pat Cummings, CEO of Ipsos MMA. “They require solutions capable of spanning multiple countries, channels, and customer segments. We believe this recognition reflects our ability to translate data and sophisticated analytics into actionable, forward-looking intelligence that CFOs, CMOs, and boards can confidently use.”

That theme—connecting marketing to financial outcomes—was echoed by Doug Brooks, Chief Client Officer, who emphasized the evolution of measurement itself.

“Marketing measurement has evolved beyond answering the ‘what worked’ to an always-on capability linking marketing and operational investments to finance,” Brooks said. He pointed to Ipsos MMA’s Unified Measurement Framework, Agile Attribution technology, and NextGen AI capabilities as enablers of faster recommendations, real-time demand tracking, and closed-loop optimization across the full media taxonomy.

The Bigger Picture for Marketing Measurement

Ipsos MMA’s performance in the Forrester Wave reflects a broader shift in the measurement market. As boards and CFOs demand clearer accountability, measurement providers are being judged not just on models, but on their ability to drive decisions, adoption, and incremental value.

In that sense, the Q1 2026 Wave reads less like a technical scorecard and more like a litmus test for enterprise readiness. Ipsos MMA’s standing suggests it has crossed that threshold—moving measurement from retrospective reporting to a strategic engine for growth.

For marketing leaders navigating rising complexity and scrutiny, that distinction may matter more than any single score.

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