eBook

I Love HubSpot

Peter · September 5, 2014 · Leave a Comment

How Could I Not Love HubSpot?

They just bought a bunch of copies my new book for the Inbound Conference. I’ll be there talking about how advertising agencies can go from idea to having a published book in 6 months.

I did that for both of my books: The Levitan Pitch. Buy This Book. Win More Pitches. and Boomercide: From Woodstock To Suicide. Both are on Amazon – which is one of the ways to control the process and get published quickly. There are more.

I will be putting the presentation up on SSlideShare and here soon.

Yes, Liz Wilson, You Have To Read It

Peter · September 1, 2014 · Leave a Comment

Liz, read the book to win more pitches.

Boomercide aka Suicide

Peter · August 19, 2014 · 1 Comment

Boomercide The Book And Robin Williams

Within hours of Robin William’s suicide, I had some incoming email from marketing friends that suggested that I should use the press attention to promote my 2012 book Boomercide: From Woodstock To Suicide. While this idea might have made sense from the very pure marketing perspective of leveraging the news, I chose not to synergize my book marketing with Robin’s death for the obvious reason that it would be rather crass. Even ugly. I couldn’t see going through a keyword analysis related to his suicide to increase page views.

Now that some time has passed (how quickly the press moves on) I think that I can discuss my book . And, in case you think I am still being crass, crass in today’s world means that I would be promoting my book on Twitter using a Robin-related hash tag. I’m not. [Read more…] about Boomercide aka Suicide

One Reason Not To Do Advertising Agency New Business

Peter · July 22, 2014 · Leave a Comment

OK, I admit it. I am fibbing.

There is no reason that an advertising agency shouldn’t always be executing some form of business development activity. While you might want to slow down on outreach during the summer (but, keep those monthly emails going out), there is no reason that you shouldn’t be thinking and planning hard for the fall. You want to get out of the blocks fast. The reason is that your prospective clients are going to spend more marketing dollars in 2014 and 2015, and you want to get some of those bucks.

You would like some of that $180.12 billion, right?

Me and New Business

In my case, in the past few weeks, I have slowed down the number of blog posts, guest posts and LinkedIn activity that I have been sending out. People still find me via SEO but I am not actively stimulating the conversation at my usual pace.

Why? I am finishing my book and its marketing plan. Here is what is close to the final cover. I am getting psyched. It will be a very valuable book (If, I do say so myself) packed with my insights from thirty years of pitching and over twenty interviews with pitch experts of all stripes.

Get The Book Early

I guarantee that you will be able to deliver more successful new business pitches earlier and faster than the agency down the street.

35 Ways To Start & Grow An Ad Agency

Peter · February 25, 2014 · Leave a Comment

How To Start & Grow An Ad Agency

I sat down recently and listed a few recommendations for how to start and grow an ad agency. By the time I finished, I got to 35 pieces of advice. I put 3 below. The other’s are in the mini-Eish-book “26 Ways To Grow Ad Agency Profits Business-building tips from over 30 years running ad agencies.”, which you can get by subscribing to this blog using the form at the bottom of this post. I like getting subscribers because it makes me feel loved and it will provide me a list of folks to alert about my new book on pitching which will be published this spring.

{ You will see that I have narrowed the list to 26 major points from 35. I can’t change the URL (the 35 number) without confusing Google.

These 3 Are From the Marketing Section

Stay very hungry and have a solid business development plan. Business development is a 365/24/7 priority that needs a solid plan, an active approach and constant senior management attention. Too many agencies wait until they lose a large client to reactivate their business development plan. Speaking of plans. Most agencies do not even have a business development plan. Crazy!

Business development plans need to have clear objectives, lists of must have and should have clients and marketing strategies to target and reach out to these potential clients. Reach out, start to make friends and stay in touch. One of my worst new business experiences was that despite my agency’s work for Nike’s national college and Major League Baseball programs and our sports marketing for University of California and Oregon State University, we were not invited to pitch Portland’s MLS team the Timbers because our lead sports account manager hadn’t kept in touch with her friend who was leading the pitch. By the time we heard that the account was available, we were too late.

Think niche. Even if you are a full-service agency, consider leading your new business program with a high-interest niche service or product. The concept of less is more works for agencies as well as advertising messages. Citrus used interest in “invisible QR codes” (that were developed by our client Digimarc) to get us into companies like Nestle and Kraft. We never would have gotten the first meeting with Fortune 500 prospects if we simply said that we were yet another me-too “full-service” shop. A niche-pitch will get you in the door. Once in, work your new business magic.

B2B makes money. Even if you love that sexy consumer work, think hard about working with more B2B clients. B2B is a less crowded playing field; B2B clients have on-going budgets; positive ROI drives incremental spending and smart B2B clients will make you more digitally savvy. I am continually surprised at how many agencies leave B2B work to so few.

Other sections include Planning, Attention to Detail, Client Management, Your People, Digital Chops, Marketing and A CEO Thought. This last section is about the fact that it can be lonely at the top.

Check it out. Don’t forget to get the rest of this document at the bottom of the post.