Forrester is out with a new “Forrester Wave” report evaluating commerce services which found Publicis, Omnicom, WPP and Accenture to all be “leaders” in the field. 

So-called “strong performers” included Dentsu’s Merkle, Interpublic and IBM. 

“Contenders” included Capgemini, Dept and Valtech.  

Analyzing Publicis, the report stated, “Publicis shows strategic strength in partner ecosystems, with significant capability to help clients optimize sales through marketplaces like Amazon, Mercado Libre, and others.” 

The Paris-based holding company has acquired commerce platforms like Profitero and CitrusAd, which it has integrated into its retail media platform, “a key asset for commerce operations,” the report asserts.  

In addition to retail media the report cited Publicis’ strength in content, and analytics and in “helping retailers build media networks and helping brands generate content, target audiences, and optimize their retail media performance.” 

“Publicis is a good fit for complex organizations with a full spectrum of marketing and commerce needs, particularly in food, consumer goods, retail, automotive, and banking,” the report concludes. 

The “Leader” rating for Omnicom follows the company’s acquisition in January of Flywheel Digital a specialist in digital commerce and retail solutions. (See related story here.) 

“Supported by its strong Omni platform and its ... large commerce and technology workforce, Omnicom is accelerating into commerce,” Forrester declared, adding that the company “can now help clients build a total commerce experience, for example, funded partly by savings in media performance and tying fees to business outcomes.”  

Per the report, “Omnicom shows strategic strength in its partner ecosystem, offering extensive commerce platform support and marketplace presence.” 

The report deemed Omnicom’s commerce services a good fit for marketing and media-focused global consumer products, apparel, high-tech, and healthcare brands selling through retail and online. 

Compared with others evaluated, the report states, “WPP excels in overall commerce strategic strength, hitting on all cylinders, leading with genAI innovation in its Open platform.”  

Per the report WPP shows strength in content production and in retail media, “using GroupM’s scale as a global media buyer and its own extensive retailer and marketplace relationships with Amazon and others to help brands and retailers optimize media and transactions. The agency is a go-to implementer of Adobe, BigCommerce, commercetools, Salesforce, and SAP commerce platforms.” 

WPP’s commerce capabilities are a good fit for global brands in automotive, CPG, luxury, retail, and life sciences, “particularly where creative and marketing drive purchases.” 

Accenture’s commerce revenue is double that of any other provider evaluated, the report stated.  

It did note that Accenture “has so far not focused on retail media services at the level of its peers.”  

That said, “Accenture continues to add capabilities by acquiring specialists around the world, with the goal of helping companies blend total commerce experiences and operations into a single operating model.”  

Accenture, per the report, “shows strength in the thornier aspects of scaled commerce operations, including organization design and change management, but doesn’t show the same breadth of total commerce experience services as some peers. It has stand-out engineering capacity for the Adobe, Salesforce, and SAP commerce platforms.” 

Forrester concluded that Accenture’s commerce services are a "good fit for consumer-focused companies in automotive, high-tech, luxury, and financial services as well as manufacturers and other industrial companies selling to other businesses.”