Senior leaders overwhelmingly believe marketing drives growth. But when it comes to explaining how marketing is measured and defending budget allocation decisions in the boardroom, only half of senior marketing and finance leaders can clearly explain their marketing measurement approach.
This is the finding from the inaugural Decision Confidence Index from Haus, an industry leader in causal marketing measurement. Authors believe the findings suggest that while dashboards, data, and artificial intelligence (AI) tools are abundant, many organizations lack the clarity needed to make confident, high-stakes investment decisions.
While 90% of respondents believe marketing drives growth, 35% say more than a fifth of their marketing budget is inefficiently allocated. Many acknowledge they cannot confirm where that waste exists due to incomplete, conflicting, or unreliable measurement systems— creating real consequences for strategic planning and investment allocation.
Haus’ Zach Epstein Comments
The result is a system where activity is visible, but financial accountability remains unclear, making it harder to confidently allocate budgets, defend investments, or commit to long-term growth strategies.
“Only half of leaders can clearly explain how they measure marketing performance to the board,” said Zach Epstein, CEO of Haus. “Massive marketing budgets are being allocated based on methods that leaders themselves don’t fully trust. That uncertainty not only creates wasted spend, it drives cautious, short-term decisions that can limit long-term growth.”
Confidence Drops as Financial Stakes Rise
The survey was conducted by Sapio Research in January among 500 senior marketing, finance, and executive decision-makers across the U.S. who have responsibility over paid marketing budgets.
Half of respondents say they are very confident in their current measurement approach. But that confidence erodes in scenarios that most directly impact business outcomes as 51% admit they measure what is expected by leadership, highly visible, or easy to access and more than 20% lack confidence when evaluating ROI for large-scale brand investments
These gaps reflect deeper inconsistencies with measurement infrastructure as 34% cite reliability concerns as a primary limitation of their measurement approach, and one in three report conflicting data sources.
Measurement Gaps Are Shaping Strategic Decisions
Creative experimentation and brand-building initiatives, two of the hardest marketing investments to measure with short-term metrics, are disproportionately exposed to measurement uncertainty, according to respondents. While 81% say current measurement practices encourage creative risk-taking, 74% report abandoning or scaling back a marketing initiative because they lacked confidence in how to measure its impact.
That uncertainty appears to be reinforcing short-term decision making as 69% of respondents face pressure to deprioritize brand-building initiatives in favor of immediate performance and revenue targets, and 40% say their current measurement tools make it much easier to take decisive action.
AI Is Accelerating Execution, Not Accountability
With AI-powered tools are now deeply embedded in marketing operations, most leaders report confidence in using AI, and nearly all believe AI tools drive incremental ROI. But confidence drops sharply when financial accountability enters the picture:
- 51% are very confident explaining AI-driven ROI to the board;
- 71% believe current AI tools prioritize short-term performance over long-term brand growth; and
- 63% feel pressure to deliver more with fewer resources because of AI.
While 78% of leaders are being pressured to integrate AI tools to drive performance, the findings suggest that adoption is outpacing clarity. Execution may be accelerating faster than organizations can confidently validate financial impact, according to Epstein.
“AI is changing how marketing teams move,” he stated. “But these tools learn from observed data, which creates a structural bias towards short-term, easy-to-measure metrics over what drives business value. Organizations that can’t connect marketing investment to real financial outcomes risk letting AI scale the wrong objectives.”
