For years, technology has helped agencies show progress. Faster fieldwork, dashboards, automated reporting and more advanced analytics all made research feel closer to the pace of business. 

AI pushes that further, but it also changes what clients are likely to value. If data collection, basic analysis and first-draft reporting can be done faster with widely available tools, they become harder to defend as the main reason to choose one agency over another. 

That doesn’t mean speed and technology no longer matter. Clients still want research that moves quickly, integrates easily and reduces unnecessary manual work. But those things are becoming expectations rather than differentiators. 

“The main factor is value,” said Liubov when asked what clients should look for in an agency partner. 

That is where the pressure sits. Value isn’t just faster delivery, a smoother platform or a better-looking dashboard. It is the agency’s ability to improve the question before the work starts, judge whether the evidence is strong enough for the decision and explain why a movement in the data matters for this client, in this market, at this moment. 

AI can help process information, but it doesn’t know which internal debate the client is trying to resolve. It doesn’t know why a brand team is nervous about a campaign, why finance is questioning investment or why senior leaders need evidence framed in a particular way before they can act. 

That is where agencies can still add value, if they are clear about the role they play. The best partners will use technology to remove friction from the work, then spend more time on the thinking clients actually need: what the evidence means, what deserves attention and what should happen next. 

Liubov’s advice to agencies was to understand their “superpower.” 

That becomes more important when clients have more tools, more suppliers and more ways to get to an answer quickly. A broad claim to do everything can sound reassuring, but it can also make an agency harder to choose. If a partner says it can solve every type of problem, in every market, with every method, the client may struggle to understand why that agency is right for this decision. 

Clearer focus doesn’t mean becoming narrow for the sake of it. It means being specific about where the agency adds the most value. That could be a category, a type of decision, a method, a data asset, a way of working with client teams or a particular strength in turning evidence into action. 

This is especially important when budgets are being challenged. A vague promise of better insight may not be enough when a client needs to justify why one partner is worth more than another. The agency needs to be able to show why its experience, thinking and approach will lead to a better decision. 

That requires agencies to apply the same discipline to themselves that they often apply to clients. Who are they for? What problem are they best placed to solve? Where do they have real credibility? What should they stop saying because it makes them sound like everyone else? 

The agencies that are clearer about their role will also be easier for clients to use well. If a client understands where a partner is strongest, it becomes easier to bring them into the right conversations, judge their contribution fairly and use their expertise before the brief has already been locked down. 

The language of partnership is everywhere in research, but the work can still be transactional. A brief is written, a proposal is approved, the research is delivered and the agency moves on. That model may still work for tightly defined projects, but it limits the agency’s ability to influence decisions that are more complex or politically sensitive inside the business. 

A decision partner needs to understand more than the research question. It needs to understand why the question is being asked now, who needs the answer, what decision the work is meant to support and what assumptions are already shaping the conversation. 

Without that context, an agency can deliver a technically sound piece of work and still miss the bigger issue. It may answer the question in the brief without helping the client see whether it was the right question to ask in the first place. 

This is where stronger agency relationships matter. Not because every partner needs to be embedded in the business, but because context builds over time. A partner that understands the brand, the history of previous decisions, the tensions between teams and the evidence already available is better placed to make the work useful. 

That also makes it easier to challenge the brief constructively. If the agency is brought in early enough, it can help clarify what the business already knows, what remains uncertain and what kind of evidence would actually change the decision. If it arrives only at the point of delivery, its role is much more limited. 

For clients, that kind of partnership is more valuable than another polished deck. For agencies, it creates a clearer reason to be in the room. 

As AI compresses parts of delivery, clients will become more conscious of what they are really paying for. If a report, summary or first pass of analysis can be produced faster and with less manual effort, the premium has to sit somewhere else. 

That does not mean the mechanics of research stop mattering. Good design, data quality and proper analysis remain essential, especially as more tools enter the market and make weak evidence look more convincing than it is. Clients still need partners who can protect the credibility of the work. 

But credibility alone is not the full answer. The work also needs to be useful at the point of decision. 

Agencies will be paid for knowing when the evidence is strong enough and when it is not. They will be paid for joining the dots across sources, spotting what deserves attention and explaining what the client risks by acting now or waiting for more evidence. They will be paid for the confidence to give a recommendation, and the discipline to say when the data does not support the conclusion people want. 

That is a different value story from faster delivery alone. Speed matters when it helps the client act in time. It matters less if the output still leaves the business unsure what to do next. 

The strongest insight partners will use AI to reduce the work clients never really wanted to pay for, then make the human contribution more visible. That contribution is not only experience or expertise in the abstract. It is the ability to bring evidence, context and judgment together in a way that helps a client make a better decision. 

AI will keep changing how research is produced. What it will not remove is the need for someone to decide what the evidence means, how much confidence it deserves and what should happen next. 

That is what will make an insight partner worth paying for. 

You can watch or listen to the full podcast episode here:  https://www.research-revolutionaries.com/adapt-or-be-cut-the-hard-truth-about-the-future-of-insights/