Forrester’s Brand Experience Index (BX Index™) quantifies and evaluates perceptions of 406 brands among customers and noncustomers across 11 industries in 13 countries. In 2026, 38% of brands improved their BX Index scores year over year, 5% saw worse scores, and 57% stayed the same. This report and its underlying methodology provide brands with a data-driven approach to winning and serving customers.

Discover Forrester’s updated Total Experience Score, a powerful method for companies to quantify the combined effects of brand, customer, and employee experience. By using competitive growth grids grounded in the Total Experience Score, companies can develop strategies to better win and serve customers to drive growth. Our new Employee Experience Index (EX Index™) helps leaders understand whether their employee experience (EX) helps or hurts their total experience improvement efforts. Read this report to see the latest Total Experience Scores and understand how improving the total experience can drive growth and revenue.

The development and implementation of an effective advertising technology (adtech) roadmap begins with an assessment of the systems currently in place. Marketing executives should conduct a complete inventory and assess the functionality and user adoption levels of their various advertising tools. When finalizing an action plan, consider the costs, resource requirements, and impact to other initiatives. This report describes an expanded six-step process for assessing an organization’s current advertising technology ecosystem and provides a downloadable Excel tool to perform the assessment.

In Forrester’s Marketing Survey, 2026 , 29% of B2C marketing decision-makers said that measuring the ROI of their marketing efforts was a top challenge; 20% stated that this difficulty was exacerbated by having too many metrics to measure. Linking objectives and key results (OKRs) is a goal setting and tracking methodology that aligns teams to organizational goals. B2C marketing executives can use OKR frameworks to link OKRs to the metrics that matter and build consensus on marketing measurement methods throughout the customer lifecycle. Use this template to measure marketing outcomes and identify how to plan and deliver effective marketing efforts across the customer journey.

Video games have become a popular pastime for online adults in the US, largely because consumers can play them on virtually any device, whether a handheld gaming console, smartphone, or VR headset. Although the majority of consumers play video games frequently, their behaviors, attitudes, and preferences vary by certain demographic attributes and whether or not they identify as gamers. This report uses data from Forrester’s Consumer Technology Insights Survey, 2025 to uncover these dynamics among consumers in the US.

Stakeholders — anyone important to the personal or business outcome you are trying to achieve — will make or break how well a marketing function accomplishes its purpose. CMOs should engage key stakeholders by customizing value propositions directly to them. The downloadable Forrester guide “Unlock Hidden Value: The Keys To Stakeholder Engagement” shows CMOs how to create relationships with critical stakeholders and effectively leads them through the engagement process.

Forrester’s Digital Go-To-Market (GTM) Review evaluates brands across the attributes essential to their long-term digital success, focusing on the strength of their direct-to-consumer (DTC) operations. We conducted earlier apparel- and footwear-specific brand reviews in 2021 and 2023. In this research, brands are primarily B2C companies that manufacture their own products and generally distribute via wholesale partners. Our analysis uncovers the results of Forrester’s Digital GTM Review for brand categories, highlights best practices, and identifies key findings for digital leaders at apparel and footwear brands.

Trusted governments enjoy public support for their policies and actions, attract the best talent for government jobs, and create resilient working relationships with local communities and partner ecosystems. This report offers insights into the relationship between public trust and mission-critical behaviors among various segments of the US population to help public sector leaders develop informed strategies on how to earn and retain the trust of the people they serve.

A portfolio messaging approach is coming to marketers as AI disintermediates the need for a customer to ever click through to a brand’s app or website. This tool provides a step-by-step workbook to help marketers begin the transition from their current campaign-oriented approach to messaging to a portfolio-oriented one.

When consumers are empowered, they make better decisions, are more satisfied, and have stronger relationships with businesses. While technology generally empowers consumers, specific kinds of technology, such as AI, reclaim some of that power. As the technological landscape shifts to influence consumers’ behavior even more, savvy marketers can be better aware of the current ways consumers seek control. This report helps B2C marketing executives understand current consumer behaviors and spot early indicators of future shifts in empowerment.