# Agency Review Concentration in 2026: The 80/20 Rule of Client Trust

*Pick an Agency · Insights · DISTRIBUTION · Sep 2026*

Data on 113,956 agencies shows just 10% of firms hold 56.9% of all client reviews.

> The top 10% of marketing agencies hold 56.9% of all reviews, while the bottom 10% hold just 0.3%.

Across a directory of 113,956 agencies and roughly 4.26 million total reviews, trust is not spread evenly. Splitting agencies into ten equal-sized groups by review volume shows a sharp drop-off from the top group to everyone else.

## The Top Decile Dominates

The top 10% of agencies, 11,396 firms, account for 2,424,405 reviews, or 56.9% of all reviews in the directory. The second decile, another 11,396 agencies, adds only 14.7% more. Combined, the top 20% of agencies already hold 71.6% of all reviews.

Add the third decile's 9.3% and the top 30% of agencies control 80.9% of all review volume, a near-textbook 80/20 split.

## The Long Tail Barely Registers

The bottom half of the market, deciles 6 through 10, together hold just 8.0% of all reviews (3.3% plus 2.3% plus 1.4% plus 0.7% plus 0.3%). The bottom decile alone, 11,395 agencies, has only 13,345 reviews total, 0.3% of the market.

That means the average agency in the top decile sits on roughly 182 times more reviews than the average agency in the bottom decile (2,424,405 versus 13,345 reviews).

## What This Means for Buyers

Review counts on agency directories are heavily concentrated in a small cluster of firms. A buyer scanning by review volume alone is effectively evaluating the same top 10 to 20% of agencies that everyone else sees, while 70% of the market splits the remaining 28.4% of reviews (100% minus 71.6%).

## The data

| decile | agencies | reviews | pct_of_all_reviews |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | 11396 | 2424405 | 56.9 |
| 2 | 11396 | 627988 | 14.7 |
| 3 | 11396 | 395608 | 9.3 |
| 4 | 11396 | 275679 | 6.5 |
| 5 | 11396 | 195720 | 4.6 |
| 6 | 11396 | 139263 | 3.3 |
| 7 | 11395 | 96853 | 2.3 |
| 8 | 11395 | 59387 | 1.4 |
| 9 | 11395 | 31553 | 0.7 |
| 10 | 11395 | 13345 | 0.3 |

## Methodology

Data covers 113,956 agencies and their total review counts, split into ten equal-sized deciles ranked by review volume, with review totals and percentage shares computed live from the directory.

- Review counts are self-reported by agencies or aggregated from third-party platforms and may not reflect actual client satisfaction.
- Older or more prominent agencies have had more time to accumulate reviews, which can inflate top-decile concentration versus newer entrants.

Free to cite with a link to Pick an Agency. Methodology details: [/methodology](https://www.pickanagency.com/methodology).

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