Gartner says 84% of companies are stuck in a “brand doom loop” in which weak measurement leads to low confidence, lower funding, and further underinvestment in brand.
The finding comes from a survey of 426 senior marketing leaders conducted between September and October 2025 and presented at the Gartner Marketing Symposium/Xpo in Denver. Gartner said the cycle prevents marketing leaders from proving brand’s impact on enterprise growth.
The research identifies a persistent problem for marketing leaders: brand is often treated as an intangible communications asset rather than a measurable driver of commercial performance. When companies underinvest in brand measurement, senior teams lack confidence in the results. That lack of confidence then weakens the case for investment, reinforcing the cycle.
Julie Reeves, VP Analyst in the Gartner Marketing practice, said: “The challenge is that most organisations lack the measurement discipline and executive narrative needed to connect brand health to business performance.”
The finding lands during a difficult budget period for marketing functions. Spending is under pressure, AI pilots are competing for funding, customer acquisition costs remain high, and boards are demanding clearer evidence that investment translates into revenue, margin, retention, and market share.
AI pilots are already drawing on existing marketing budgets, while wider adoption of marketing AI has exposed skills gaps across the function. Gartner’s brand research adds a further pressure point: marketing teams are being asked to modernise tools and prove traditional brand value at the same time.
Brand measurement has long been difficult because its effects are distributed across multiple outcomes. A stronger brand can lower acquisition costs, increase pricing power, improve customer retention, lift conversion, support recruitment, and strengthen resilience during downturns. Those effects do not always appear quickly or in a single attribution model.
Digital performance marketing trained many organisations to expect near-term metrics: clicks, impressions, conversions, cost per lead, and campaign return. Those measures are useful, but they can push spend towards activity that is easier to attribute rather than activity that builds future demand. The result can be a portfolio tilted too heavily towards short-term activation.
Gartner’s “doom loop” framing describes an internal governance problem as much as a marketing problem. If the board and executive team do not understand the pathway between brand health and commercial outcomes, brand investment is vulnerable during budget reviews. Marketing leaders then have less funding to measure brand properly, leaving the next budget cycle no better informed.
AI may intensify the measurement challenge. As generative search, AI summaries, chatbots, and automated recommendation systems influence discovery, brands may need to understand how they appear not only in paid channels and search rankings, but in AI-mediated decision journeys. Gartner’s own conference highlights pointed to AI as a new front door for brand discovery and decision-making.
Customer journeys now include search, social, marketplaces, direct traffic, reviews, AI summaries, creator content, sales conversations, and offline influence. Measuring brand in that environment requires discipline, but also a narrative that finance, sales, product, and executive teams can understand.
No single metric is likely to settle the debate. Companies need a measurement model that links brand awareness, consideration, preference, pricing, customer behaviour, and financial outcomes. They also need governance that prevents brand from being judged only against short-term lead generation targets.
CMOs face the task of translating brand into business language without overstating precision. The strongest case for brand investment will combine evidence, commercial logic, and clear accountability. Gartner’s data suggests many companies have not yet built that bridge, leaving one of their most important growth assets trapped in a cycle of underfunding and weak proof.
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