Reporting on its 2012 results today, Ford said it had been “a poor year”. Although revenues increased marginally to £20.8m, operating profit fell 45% to £1.5m with diluted earnings per share decreasing by 44% to 7.9p.

Ford said: “The major factor behind the sharp decline in 2012 profits was the unexpected non-recurrence of the very high levels of business which BrainJuicer has traditionally generated in the last months of the year.”

Chief executive John Kearon wrote: “Every year, some clients spend unused budget in November and December, but in 2012, many big companies decided instead to cut back, and this had a material affect on our profits.”

He added: “As a result, we reduced costs and we’ll be less reliant on clients releasing spare budgets at the end of the year going forward.”