Peter Levitan & Co.

The New Business of Advertising

New Business

The Advertising Agency Client. How Do They Find You?

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What Type of Advertising Agency Client Do You Want?

Advertising Agency ClientYour next advertising agency client probably has multiple needs, even if they think all they need is an Instagram influencer program or seriously good video storytelling.

Yes – It’s often difficult for a client to clearly state their needs / business objectives.

Objectives range from increasing sales and revenues, growing brand awareness, building loyalty, new product development, geo expansion to more Xandr please. Just to name a few. I’ve seen an inability to express clear objectives across client seniority. I once had a senior Nike client who didn’t have clearly stated sales goals. I know, kinda crazy. Instead of asking for those metrics, I asked my client how she made her bonus. There were interesting revelations in that discussion, including finding out where the agency could act to help make her a Nike star.

Let’s look at industry research on advertising agency client selection criteria.

The UK firm SCOPEN interviewed 81 senior marketing professionals, 57 chief marketing officers, and 56 agency professionals.

The overwhelming majority of respondents (72.8%) were the ultimate spending decision-makers. The research showed that creativity is the number one criterion used in agency selection.

However, SCOPEN also reported,

It’s interesting to see how (clients) are talking more about innovation related with business transformation and digital transformation, which is a different territory from creativity,

I’ll parse this out. Here is SCOPEN’s list of large client needs.

1. Creativity

2. Innovative ideas (how W+K got that first piece of Ford)

3. Digital capabilities

4. Strategic planning

5. Marketplace insights

6. Competitor insights

7. Brand knowledge

8. Trend awareness and predictions

9. Media planning

10. Social media prowess

11. Integrated services

12. Good value

That’s a long list. Not all clients need all of that. To simplify, I believe that most clients are looking for advertising experts. Be the expert who delivers smart, efficient programs plus measurable results. High ROI results.

OK. A podcast about client selection.

Thank You, Google’s NotebookLM, For This Episode.

Some insights from my book, “How To Build A Kick-Ass Advertising Agency,” on how to position, describe, and sell your advertising agency services.

That’s the story. Go forth and position your advertising agency for success.

How To Build An Active Website Contact Page

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How Powerful Is Your Website’s Contact Page?

advertising agency contactI’m updating a 2023 blog post about the good, bad and ugly of advertising agency Contact pages. I’m into this today because I am helping a California agency build a kick-ass (action-oriented) website that sells.

In my journey, I came across the contact page for the “cool” agency Animal. YIKES! They have a contact page without any way to make a fast contact. WHA! Take a look. Their Contact page is the same as their home page sans any contact method other than giving you links to their social media. Two steps are one too many.

OK, To You

You’ve built your advertising or marketing or digital agency. You work on your client’s business. You want more clients. You have a website you hope your lead generation programs drive people to.

Then people go to the website and you hope they get so interested (and in some cases excited) that they go to your contact page and… you sound so lame and passive. Like you say virtually nothing that would make them really want to make contact. Harsh? Yup. True for the majority of advertising / digital agency websites (and, hey, the marketing world in general).

Here are some examples of what NYC and Cleveland agencies say on their Contact page. Would these “words” make you want to make contact?

  • To send our team a message, please use the form below.
  • Contact us using the form below and one of our team members will reach out as soon as possible.
  • Get in touch.
  • We’d love to hear from you and show you more of our work!
  • Just fill out the form and one of us will get back to you as soon as possible.
  • If you want to reach out to us, feel free to do so by email:

    These Contact Page “Words” Are So Freakin Passive… Being Passive Sucks

    Driving contact from the website visitor is where the rubber meets the road – isn’t this the reason y’all have a website?

    My tour of agency websites shows a wide range of contact pages. Most are too weak. Some (most) just provide an email contact. Some contact pages go for it by providing reasons to make contact. These contact pages are much more assertive than just having a passive contact email form.

    I am a strong believer that the contact section should be warm and welcoming. Businesslike but friendly. Contact should be an invitation and a metaphorical fist bump.

    Bland does not work for me. I need some online hospitality. This is a place to show some personality. Even humor. Even empathy. Try to get past the passive voice. Ask for the order. Gently. Not too Glengarry Glenn Ross.

    A quick idea (if you don’t want to read more)… Instead of bland text, why not deliver a 20-second video on why the visitor should talk with you?

    An Active Contact Page Drives Action

    Given people’s general inertia, go ahead and tell the visitor to make contact. Consider how to give them a good reason to act. Maybe make an offer to capture attention and a reaction. This isn’t a brand-new idea—SaaS companies do this all the time because it works.

    Here is what I say on my Contact page:

    Three reasons to contact me. I deliver the most creative approach to an advertising agency’s positioning and lead generation.I am the most experienced agency business development coach. Read the “My Story” page. I stole the idea from Austin Kleon. My goal is to make your advertising agency unignorable. Unignorable drives awareness and action. Think of the alternative.

    ++ I deliver an offer…

    Take me up on my free Corleone Godfather offer. This is an offer you can’t—or rather, shouldn’t—refuse. Let’s talk for thirty minutes—just 0.50 on the timesheet—to discuss your agency’s issues and opportunities and how I will help you build a more powerful advertising agency business development plan.

    Does my Godfather offer work? Yes.

    Does my Gandhi testimonial video at the bottom of the contact page help? Yup, I got Gandhi to give me that fist bump.

    Chicago’s Orbit Media website development firm goes a bit further than most agencies. They address the fact that the client might not be immediately ready for them. They have this interactive dialogue-building offer on the Contact page – it keeps the “conversation” going:

    Work with Orbit Ready to start a project? Fill out the form and Chris or Stephanie, our Web Strategists, will be in touch with you as soon as possible.Have a project but not quite ready to contact us? See if Orbit is a fit for you.

    Last BIG Point.

    Do not ask for too much personal information. You do not need the prospect’s date of birth.

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The Big Advertising Agency Resource List

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Advertising Agency Resource List – Updated Often

advertising agency resourceThe advertising agency resource was recently updated with three new AI information tools. I use them.

My Advertising Agency Resource List is often curated to help advertising, digital, design, and PR agencies easily find the inspiration and industry resources to help you build killer agencies and careers.

FYI: According to Google, people spend mucho minutes perusing this long list.

If I were you, I’d grab a glass of Larkmead Cabernet Sauvignon 2016 (LOL only $150 or a nice craft beer – a bit less expensive) and check out all of these links. I guarantee that at least one of these websites and/or tools will help you or your team grow your agency.

A kudo from David Ogilvy: “I wish I had this advertising resource list when I was in the ad biz. All I had was my brain.”

OK, one more. Go here: Corleone offer. 

New Resources.

AI Related… Websites + A Podcast Just For Marketers + YouTube

Marketing Intelligence Institute: From Paul Roetzer (super smart marketer for eons) on how to use AI in marketing and advertising. Read it, attend their seminars, and listen to their “Artificial Intelligence Show” podcast. Do it!

Decode: A daily news and info resource. Decode “unlocks exclusive access to Decode’s ultimate AI tool book, with 500+ verified, vetted, and powerful tools across 40+ categories.” Includes AI tutorials, lists of what’s new, etc. A smart one.

Superhuman: Yes, more info and news. Their words — “Learn how to leverage AI to boost your productivity and accelerate your career. Join the world’s biggest AI newsletter with 650,000+ readers from companies like Apple, Amazon, Google, Meta, Microsoft and more.”

AI Tool Report: Yes…. More… “Learn AI in 5 minutes a day. We’ll teach you how to save time and earn more with AI. Join 500,000+ free daily readers from Tesla, Apple, A16z, Meta, & more.”

Matt Wolfe: A rather beyond-decent YouTube channel dedicated to AI.

A Short But Sweet List of The Best AI Directories For Marketers

We are all a bit (understatement) overwhelmed with the barrage of new AI tools. To help sort this overload, here is a list of what I think are today’s easiest-to-use AI directories for marketers. Note, this is a short list.

Futurepedia – From Google Bard: “This directory is one of the largest and most comprehensive, with over 3,000 AI tools and resources listed. It’s a great place to find AI tools for a variety of tasks, including machine learning, natural language processing, and computer vision.” Just today… 18 new tools. Yikes.

Zain Kahn’s Superhuman – The world’s biggest AI newsletter with 350k+ readers.

Marketing AI Show –  THE best AI podcast for marketers.

iLib – AI websites listed by popularity.

Product Hunt – As they say: “Product Hunt surfaces the best new products, every day. It’s a place for product-loving enthusiasts to share and geek out about the latest mobile apps, websites, hardware projects, and tech creations.”

Crunchbase – A comprehensive list of AI startups. Wowzer, this is a hot venture universe. Go find your new marketing agency client here.

GPTE – Just in case you need MORE!

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A Zoom Cartoon Just For You

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A Zoom Cartoon About A Zoom Pitch Problem

Pitch MistakesTo help illustrate the “mistakes” that often accompany the act of an advertising agency’s new business pitch, I included 12 pitch mistake cartoons in my book “The Levitan Pitch. Buy This Book. Win More Pitches.”

I love the fact that cartoons are a fast way to reach overloaded brains and evoke emotion. A cartoon can be remembered well past fleeting podcast interviews and blog posts like this. 

Possibly the most memorable Internet meme is the 1993 (!) cartoon “On the Internet, nobody knows you are a dog,” by Peter Steiner in the New Yorker. To help my GenX readers, it’s at the bottom.

Zoom CartoonMy Zoom Pitch Cartoon Just For You

Here is a Zoom cartoon I commissioned from master cartoonist and brilliant Creative Director Steve Klinetobe. Steve was a CD at my Portland agency Citrus. 

Steve’s nostril cartoon illustrates one of the worst uses of Zoom. It’s about where people put their camera in relation to their face. In this case, it is the camera that sits below a face and looks into your buddy’s (or future agency client’s nose. YUCK!

When Zooming, pay attention to camera placement + lighting + sound quality + your background. You know this right?

That said, I too often look up way too many nostrils.

Here is the most famous Internet cartoon. No Nostrils.

On the Internet nobody knows you are a dog

Which Social Media Strategy Is Best For Advertising Agency New Business?

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advertising agency social media Your Advertising Agency and Social Media.  Oh, And Your Business Development Program.

I am updating this older relatively well-read blog post about the how-to make it happen for an advertising agency social media program. Updating is a good blog strategy to help Google love you.

Does Advertising Agency Social Media Work Anymore (As In Drive Incoming Leads)?

Start here: “Which Social Media Strategy Is Best For Advertising Agency New Business?” I am not going to bullshit you. There is no perfect social media platform for advertising agency new business. Why? Cause ya know… the devil is in the details, and your details might just be different than the agency down the road.

2024.

I originally wrote this very viewed advertising agency social media blog post back in 2014. Yikes. Time for an update, right? Like I said… Updating old blog posts that once had decent activity is critical to bumping them back up on Google searches. There is an art to this.

When I wrote this back in the good old days, blog posts by ad agencies had not yet exploded, Twitter posts had not yet exploded, Instagram was not yet a smash, TikTok had not been invented, and on. Here are some of those “we are now bombarded” stats.

  • Depending on who you listen to, you’ve got like 4,000 competitive agencies and freelancers.
  • How many blog posts are there today? Here is just one directional figure: there are “like” over 2 million blog posts daily – out of 1.7 billion websites. You think your ad agency can stand out?
  • From Claude: Assuming 85% of the 229 million daily active users on X, that’s around 195 million real users tweeting daily.
  • It’s estimated that around 200 million businesses across the world use Instagram each month. Around 90% of Instagram’s users follow at least one business account on the platform.
  • There seem to a billion LinkedIn posts a day.
  • I have over 6,000 “advertising people” connections, yet when I post on LinkedIn, I get maybe 80 individual post views. Pay per play, baby. It’s not so organic these days.

Do you get the idea here? You are kinda fucked if you think that your blogs, tweets, etc are gonna get noticed. You are competing with other, probably really good at SEO agencies.

The best I can do is share my personal experiences. First, here are my social media objectives.

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