Yeah, I know what you mean. The first time I tried a cherry wheat, I used cherry puree. I thought I used a ton of it, but in the end, there was only a faint cherry flavor. For my next cherry beer, I tried cherry candi syrup. This one had even less cherry flavor in the end than the first. In fact, you wouldn't even know it was supposed to have cherry flavor in it if I didn't tell you. I tried a few other things on some other beers such as Mahleb (cherry seeds), but never got enough.
I think part of the reason I was so surprised is that I had tried a lot of other ingredients in much smaller amounts and gotten very powerful flavors, so I wondered how adding so much cherries could have almost no flavor at all.
Then I read in American Sour Beers about the recommended amount of cherries (fresh or frozen fruit). It said between 2.5 pounds and 10 pounds per 5 gallon batch was optimal. Well, that was wayyyy more than I imagined would be needed (considering how strong of a flavor cherries have), but I will tell you that when I do my next cherry beer (which will probably be a sour/wild beer this time, like an American lambic), I'll probably do between 5 and 10 pounds of fresh cherries frozen and then smashed.