The benefits of relationships in ad agency new business

November 13, 2012 By 3 Comments

Buenos Dias, agency new business professional. A friend of mine was once the CMO of a large retailer any agency would want on its roster. My relationship goes back with him nearly twenty years. He’s a great guy. Smart, too. And we have enjoyed a mutually beneficial connection. From my perspective, there are at least three business benefits of the relationship. Consider them reasons why building relationships should be a key focus in your agency’s new business efforts.

Pitches

Number one with a bullet. If you and your agency leverage more relationships with people outside your shop, you will pitch more. This is referral business: more than likely, your biggest category of new business leads. By the way, don’t be thinking this just means relationships with Chief Marketing Officers. Referrals come from many places!

When my friend’s brand was going into review, he gave me a call. It was en excellent fit for my agency. We pitched and won. It was in my friend’s best interests to have the agency pitch the business. He knew he would get the agency’s best people and thinking.

Insight

Relationships can also provide you with valuable information in new business prospecting and pitching. Tasty little morsels that can make the difference between a losing and winning pitch.

Another agency once pitched my friend’s business, but they did not have a relationship with him before pitching it. Instead, they purchased research from what amounted to be a private detective. The agency tried to learn everything they could about my friend, including the idea he was a huge NASCAR fan. So, they worked NASCAR content into the pitch. And every time they mentioned, “NASCAR,” they looked directly at my friend, the Chief Marketing Officer. The problem? My buddy knew nothing about NASCAR!

Access

It is debatable if this is as valuable as the first two benefits. It could be a subset. Yet it’s still relevant. Some pitches limit the amount of contact you can have with the decision-making team. This is particularly common in search consultant or procurement-led pitches. In these cases, your connection can be a portal. And in prospecting, a relationship can mean your phone call is returned or your email opened.

With my CMO friend, I had his ear. It helped!

Anywho, hope these few hundred have helped inspire you to build more relationships with folks outside your agency. Should you have any stories you wish to share about how relationships have helped your agency, feel free to share. Thanks.

And happy relationship building!

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Filed Under: New Business Lore, Planning, Prospecting, Uncategorized Tagged With: , , ,

How to gate-crash an ad agency new business pitch

November 1, 2012 By Leave a Comment

Hello, ad agency new business fan. So, there you are, reading an article in Ad Age or Adweek about a review. And you think, “we should be in that pitch!” Here are a few hundred words on how to do just that.

Going in, you should know that your odds of success are extremely small. (This is NOT a good prospecting technique.) You must have strong, compelling reasons why your agency should be in the pitch. It is with this in mind the following recommendations are made:

1. Ask yourself, again, if this is a good idea

Most times, it isn’t. You could be doing something smarter with this time that will help increase your pitch rate. Better ways to prospect for new business. Just sayin’.

2. Do some research beyond the article

Understand the brand’s challenges. Understand the main decision-makers. Other agencies will simply read the article  and quickly cobble together an email or make an unwelcome phone call. You can do better. Do some homework. The more you know beyond the article, the better your odds of success. Even an hour of work would help.

What you’re doing in this step is understanding why you deserve the chance to pitch. Most agencies will lead with past, RELEVANT experience in either the category, the consumer or the marketing challenge. But those are table stakes. You must be able to check this box with a minimum of spin.So, what can you bring beyond this experience? What can your agency do beyond what others can? Do you have any proprietary research? Interesting relationships with other brands? Access to thinking that can make a faster impact than other agencies? A capability that others might not have? Etc.

3. Play the name game

Before you join the fray of all the other agencies screaming “pick me,” figure out if anyone on your team knows anyone on their team. Find a friend. Obviously, your chances increase the tighter the relationship is and the closer the relationship to a decision-maker, the better. What you’re looking for from the contact is not to get in the pitch. But to get your case heard. Because asking your contact to get in the pitch might be asking your contact for too much. But if you really have a legitimate shot – and the reasons are clear and compelling – it is in the friend’s best interest to help you.

4. Make the pitch (hey, batta batta)

Once you know why the prospect should include you in the review, give it your best shot: approach. Be brief and be brilliant. This can be very fun. Or it can be very straightforward. The less your story aligns with their needs, the less you should spend and invest in the approach.

Having said all this…

As a professional, I feel compelled to suggest that trying to gate-crash a pitch, for the most part, is an AWFUL idea. Generally speaking, if it’s in the trades, it’s too late. The competitive field has been set. The process has already been started. And you would start out at a major disadvantage. But the royal we that is Thunderclap digresses.

Should you have any gate-crashing stories, feel free to share! As always, thanks for your time. And should you ask nicely, I’m more than happy to write a post or several about how to increase your pitch rate (and avoid gate-crashing.)

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Filed Under: Marcom Industry, New Business Lore, Prospecting, Uncategorized

Identifying winning language in ad agency new business

July 17, 2012 By Leave a Comment

Hi. So, I was out of town last week, staying in a fancy hotel. Just got hired by an agency to help build a prospecting plan (then execute). It’s a terrific assignment with a great firm. Anywho, there I was, in the bathroom of the hotel. Fortunately, you are being spared the details. With the exception of the thing that inspired these few hundred.

The “cleansing bar.”

Ya mean…soap?!

Yeah. Now, this place wasn’t all that fancy. Nice room and all. But no doormen. No concierge, even. And yet they felt compelled to call their soap a “cleansing bar.”

I’m a Midwest kinda guy. Absolutely a what-you-see-is-what-you-get fella. But cleansing bar? C’mon now. I suggest to you this is bullshit. Smells good. But still…

Agency new business prospects can smell bullshit, too. We, as an industry, seem to be a little too high falutin’. We have names for processes. Special, proprietary thinking. And as we all know, most of it is the same. That’s why when something truly new and differentiating comes along, it’s all the more reason to get excited.

Does a “cleansing bar” suggest upscale? Sure. But it’s soap. If you are looking for a way to use language to differentiate yourself, consider McKinsey. I envy these professionals. The writing you will see on just about anything they do is clear, simple and easy to understand. Logical, too. It just flows. Don’t about you. But to me, these guys are the top of the professional service ladder. They are the bomb. And it’s not because they use cleansing bars. It’s just plain smart.

There are other ways to denote your agency is special. Service is one way. Plenty of others to consider, too. Break down the client/agency experience to find them. Identify what our target needs. Etc.

Looking for some more thinking around this? Check out The Rainmaker’s Toolkit. Written by Harry Mills, a professional services marketing guru. Chapter Two gets into “how to revitalize and renew your value proposition with new services, sharper differentiation and premium pricing.” It’s worth adding to your library.

To me, I think the notion of being special is related, of course, to your agency’s positioning. That ain’t rocket science. But what is super cool is taking your special sauce and demonstrating it through your agency.

And stay away from the cleansing bars! Thanks for reading.

A few related posts:

One agency’s take on the client experience

Some thoughts on an agency audit (inspired by Apple)

Some ways small agencies compete against bigger ones

Michael Gass: 7 benefits from the right positioning for ad agency new business

Tim Williams: 10 more ways to differentiate your brand

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Filed Under: Marcom Industry, New Business Lore, Planning, Uncategorized

The Team of Record approach in ad agency new business

June 1, 2012 By Leave a Comment

Hello there, agency new business development fans! Saw a good article in Ad Age recently that you should check out. It discusses four things to think about when you partner with other agencies. Marketing analytics smart Kenyon Blunt writes about something call the Team of Record approach. Meaning, sharing a piece of business with multiple agencies. He uses recent examples of large clients pulling together bits and pieces of agencies and stand-alone, one client, one team kind of approach. I like the branded moniker. And his suggestions.

But what’s missing is a small agency spin. No need for just the alphabet soup agencies to have all the fun. There’s also a missing reason for why an agency of any size should consider partnering with other firms: new business!

Here are five Thunderclap posts to get your head thinking about partnering with other firms:

True love vs. arranged marriage: agency partnership in new business 

True love, more on agency partnerships (part two) 

How to get three more meetings this quarter (part one)

How to get three more meetings this quarter (part two) More about suppliers than other agencies.

How to get more meetings (part three). Less about partnership, but more on relationships.

Hope this helps accelerate your agency new business development success!

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Filed Under: Agency Operations, New Business Lore, Planning, Prospecting, Uncategorized Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

How a Chief Experience Officer can make your ad agency new business more efficient

May 10, 2012 By 1 Comment

Hello there, fan of new business development for your ad agency. Yours truly read a story in Ad Age the other day about how some big agencies are creating a new position: Chief Transition Officer. Someone who leads the on-boarding process as your new client transitions from the incumbent. A fine idea. And not just for big agencies. So, what’s the small agency version of this?!

How about a Chief Experience Officer?

Hmmm.

I love this idea. It captures the soft side of a client / agency relationship. The human side. The people involved in delivering and receiving our Professional Service. It’s one thing to create and manage ideas that make money for a client. But when we talk about “experience,” we’re talking about the bits your agency can control to help ensure happiness. This, in turn, leads to a longer, more profitable relationship, new business referrals and more revenue for your agency.

This role was recently created at HY Connect, a terrific mid-sized, independent agency with offices in Milwaukee and Chicago. To learn more about their take on the position, I recently connected with Kellie Bliss, the professional in the role. We covered two basic questions.

What is the role of the Chief Experience Officer at your agency?
Kellie suggests this senior-level professional is responsible for ensuring success. HY Connect sums this up best: it is focused on improving and accelerating HY Connect’s ability to adapt to every client’s needs and exceed their expectations.

And just as important? The agency’s staff.

You will see this in some of the functions of the position:

  • Defining & improving use / sharing of best practices across specialties and departments
  • Streamline and enhance priority customer touch-points. This includes new client on-boarding, developing client retreats, and leading the development of agency thought leadership and value-added intellectual property.
  • Improved training:  developing an energized & competent staff that delivers an energizing (or inspiring) experience

How is this different than the Account Service leadership function?
The Chief Experience Officer at HY Connect does not drive client business strategy, manage day-to-day responsibilities for client management or get work out the door. Rather, the position is a resource available to account management to help cross-sell and up-sell agency services and ensure Account Service has what they need.

I’ve known this agency for years and have come to admire them. They understand the values of culture, relationship and partnership. It has served them well – for nearly 80 years.

Should your agency also hold these tenets close to your heart, consider how the role of Chief Experience Officer could work at your agency.

Should you wish to contact Kellie Bliss, feel free to do so here.

And if you’d like to know more about an agency experience audit, check this out. Or, maybe you’d like to read about reversing a slump…

Thanks. Hope this gets you thinking! Oh, and should you have any thoughts on improving your experience on this website and blog, feel free to lemme know at your convenience.

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Filed Under: Agency Operations, Existing Client Growth, New Business Lore, Planning, Uncategorized Tagged With: , , , , , ,
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