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A Jaguar Request For Advertising Proposal

Peter · June 29, 2021 · Leave a Comment

I Bet You’d Dig A Sweet Jaguar Request For Advertising Proposal

Imagine getting a request for a proposal from Jaguar. The car manufacturer. You’d feel mighty fine, right? Below is a segment from Mad Men in which Rodger Sterling gives pitching advice to his British partner Layne Price. Give it a look. First, here are a couple of my takeaways.

Look at the office. I started in offices like that. First I was in an AAE Qube (with walls, what a good idea), then I got my AE window office, then an Account Supervisor window office with a couch, and then the big Management Director office where we could also hold meetings at a table. Imagine that. NOTE: It was all way better than today’s (or yesterday’s) people sitting at long tables plus headphones.

Rodger talks about how to do a ‘chemistry’ meeting. Use your time together to get to learn about your prospect. Pay attention. “Smile, sit there, and let him talk.” “Don’t let him near the check” and “Find out everything about him before you get there.” Allow me to parse this out. Be friendly, listen, learn all about him (her) before you get there. In my parlance – there is no blind date in 2021.

A couple of stories. How to get or not to get a request for advertising proposal.

I once ran the $60 million Northwest Airlines account at Saatchi & Saatchi. When we lost that (we were fired by the new CMO at an award dinner while winning a Gold EFFIE). If you think you’ve met a bigger asshole, let me know. A couple of years later I was running global biz dev and had a get-to-know-you dinner in D.C. with the President of US Air and the New York Saatchi Chairman and President. My NYC guys talked about their golf game for two hours. Non-stop. I never had a chance to talk about airline industry issues. After yawing, the client guy left. Never heard from him again.

Early in my career, I got some advice from a smart Minneapolis agency leader. He would travel out of town to meet a business prospect. Invited him to dinner. Before they met, my guy would head to the restaurant, hand over his AMEX card and put down a 20% tip, told the restaurant to just charge the account… not to bring the bill over (made the guest go, “WTF” with a smile). Serve my guy a watered drink (see the video). Also when they walked into the restaurant to call my guy by his name and say “nice to see you again Mr. XXX.” Ok, yup, kinda corny. But for me a learning experience about managing an experience. Especially the part about the bill.

Need more info on how to win an account? Buy me dinner sometime. Or just… Buy my book.

Mad Men’ Rodger Sterling On: Request For Proposal From Jaguar

The Best Advertising Agency Creative Brief

Peter · June 12, 2021 · Leave a Comment

The Best Advertising Agency Creative Brief – I Think (Well, I Know)

I started my advertising agency career at New York’s Dancer Fitzgerald Sample, one of the original Mad Men agencies. Other than having an absurdly rich AOR client list (Toyota, P&G, General Mills, Nabisco, Wrangler, HP, and on) we were known for our ‘best’ advertising agency Creative Brief. This brief worked so well that it was adopted by the 4A’s as the gold standard.

That was then. Does this agency Creative Brief still work to guide brilliant advertising? I think so.

The Best Advertising Agency Creative Brief For A B2B Podcast

I applied the Creative Brief format to one way I think that an advertising agency or any B2B marketing org could build and run a standout podcast. By the way, think that it is easy to stand out in the world of podcasts? Check out these numbers from PodcastInsights.

Also, a common question is “how many podcasts are there?” and most of the data out there is outdated, but we have an accurate method for determining the number of shows – and it’s currently over 2,000,000.

There are also over 48 million episodes as of April 2021.

I wrote this Creative brief for one of my agency clients a few months ago. Therefore, it might seem a bit outdated, or better yet, prescient. Go ahead and use the idea. The idea will work for many industries.

I highlighted the core CB sections / questions in red.

A Sample Podcast Creative Brief

CREATIVE BRIEF: Giant Gorilla Agency Product/Service: The Marketing Journey Podcast

January _1_2021

Background

London’s Giant Gorilla agency specializes in hospitality industry marketing.

It has been successful in building a large client base across a range of industry subcategories. Giant Gorilla is known for its strategic approach, data expertise, high ROI programs, and for its business insights and social media channels.

It is time to move this energy into podcasting.

What is the objective of the project?

Create and produce a daily, unignorable podcast for the hospitality industry.

The Marketing School podcast from Neil Patel and Eric Siu, is an example of a daily listen. Each show averages 5 minutes and includes a commercial.

Who are we talking to?

Listenership will include food and beverages, lodging and recreation industry corporate marketers, business owners, and related press.

What do they currently think?

The hospitality industry took a major hit in 2020. We expect a slow but steady revival in 2021. Current trends point to growing domestic travel and then a resumption of international air travel by the third quarter of 2021.

The industry is ripe for the consumption of marketing information related to category growth.

What do we want them to think and what action do we want them to take?

We want the industry to view Giant Gorilla as the leading advertising and digital marketing voice and marketing communications agency in the hospitality industry. The essence of hospitality has changed, and Giant Gorilla is uniquely positioned to be a leading voice in industry marketing.

What is the message that will move this target audience to action?

Giant Gorilla’s The Marketing Journey hospitality podcast delivers business-building information, insights, and brief interviews – every day.

“Give us eight minutes every morning and we will help you accelerate your growth.”

Program Elements – The Show

The five-minute The Marketing Journey Show will be published every weekday at 8 AM EST.

Giant Gorilla’s COO Nancy Greene and Creative Director Jill Davis will host The Marketing Journey. Nancy will use her past broadcast experience to lead the discussions. Friendly, intelligent banter will rule.

From time to time, the show will bring in Giant Gorilla’s leading thinkers (like CTO Sandy Goddof on TikTok and travel), current clients and guests from the industry.

For production efficiency will gang record five shows every Tuesday afternoon unless there is late-breaking industry news.

The production team is TBD.

What are the support points?

Timely topics will include news about the business of hospitality: industry trends, Covid related issues, what’s hot in marketing, new business models, and a range of discussions on the constant evolution of hospitality marketing, with a concentration on digital marketing.

Great Guests = Traction & Unignorability.

We have already booked interviews with the CMO of InterContinental Hotels; Shake Shack owner Danny Meyer, a very successful Airbnb host, and the CTO of Hotels.com.

What is the brand’s character?

The Marketing Journey is super smart, knowledgeable, and curious – all with a touch of humor.

What is mandatory?

Each show will be broadcast on all of the major podcast platforms and will be supported by individual show landing pages.

Each show will promote Giant Gorilla’s hospitality industry expertise. See The Marketing Journey marketing plan for detailed information.

Oh, Oh… Does Your Agency Need An Action Plan To Get To Being UNIGNORABLE?

Give me a shout to get you there faster. Bottom line? I am like every other advertising agency business development consultant. OK, not. Name one that ran biz dev at Saatchi, owned his own agency, and started two Internet companies? I am more strategic, smarter, and more action-oriented. Also, funnier.

Advertising Agency Podcast Strategy That Cannot Be Ignored

Peter · February 14, 2021 · Leave a Comment

You Will Need An Unignorable Advertising Agency Podcast Strategy

I recently wrote a white paper on how to create a successful advertising agency podcast. “9 Unignorable Reasons Why Your Advertising Agency Should Not Podcast” covers learning from my 15-year podcast marketing journey and provides the pros and cons of podcasting. Even better, the doc is designed to guide you through an advertising agency podcast strategy that will deliver a must-listen-to podcast show. Here is how I start the 3,000-word white paper:

What’s Up With Podcasting?

I recorded my first podcast in 2007 when I owned the Portland advertising agency Citrus. After recording 18 shows, I gave up.

Why did I give up? It was just too early in the podcasting wilderness to put the time and effort into the show. I had great conversations with an editor of ADWEEK Magazine about the future of digital marketing and the growing power of Google as an ad platform (she was right); a business development guru that grew Saatchi & Saatchi Advertising Worldwide, and two with the father of podcasting itself. You can hear a couple of those early interviews in my current podcast series “Advertising Stories”.

I recently gave up again.

I just ended my latest podcasting series. Why? Last June I had a plan to test a series of podcasts to see if this audio platform, which has grown exponentially since 2007, could drive my awareness and leads to my advertising agency business development consultancy. My plan was to record 40 shows between May and December 2020. These are really good interviews with cool, smart advertising people from New York to New Delhi… and I am a good interviewer. But, despite doing lots of things right, I have seen no appreciable business gain from all of this work. Some pain, no gain.

Which brings me to this instructive missive.

OK, that was the intro. You can get the white paper by subscribing to my occasional email newsletter (see the links on this page) or by contacting me at peter@peterlevitan.com

A Winning Advertising Agency Podcast Strategy – How To Be Unignorable

In the last section of my advertising agency podcast recommendations doc, after my take on some “how-tos”, I discuss how to create a podcast that is well-targeted and will be hard to ignore. I stress hard to ignore (by your cherished target market) because the list below covers the things that you will undoubtedly compete with for your future client’s work-life attention and time:

The client’s actual 8 to 7 management and marketing job.
72 daily emails.
All the incoming biz dev messaging coming in from your advertising agency competitors that are vying for the same client’s attention.
Facebook.
LinkedIn.
Instagram.
YouTube.
TikTok.
SMS text messages from Gary Vaynerchuk.
Clubhouse. Yikes, now Clubhouse.
And, a world of a zillion general podcasts from small players like The New York Times, Campaign Magazine, and NPR. Even worse, you will not be alone in the growing world of 30 to 60-minute marketing and advertising agency podcasts.

How To Get Loved? Here Is A Sample Advertising Agency Podcast Creative Brief

Minimalist Business Development Plan

Peter · December 25, 2020 · 1 Comment

How To Build Your Minimalist Business Development Plan

When I write what I call a minimalist business development plan for an advertising, digital agency client I split the plan’s deliverables into two documents. One is a comprehensive 360-degree look at my client’s business objectives, current market position, brand positioning and attributes, target market pain-points, existing biz dev plan, and a range of tailored inbound and outbound, i.e. account-based marketing approaches.

After we review the master plan document, I create a more simplified two-phase plan that is designed so that it actually gets implemented. I say actually gets implemented because many, too many, marketing communications companies do not run the business development plan they have. I have seen this at mega agencies and two-person shops. My two-phase plan, yes a minimalist business development plan, is designed to focus on a small set of marketing programs, to be highly efficient, and to be built on a clear process.

My minimalist business development mantra is KISS (keep it simple stupid) + focus on a small number of core marketing programs + be efficient + make sure that whatever you say (an agency’s positioning, sales proposition, and marketing messages) is UNIGORABLE.

OK, one more. Agency management must be dedicated to running the business development program. 24/7. Dedication to agency growth must come from the top.

8 Smart Elements Of A Minimalist Business Development Program

The Best Advertising Agency Podcast Ever

Peter · November 30, 2020 · Leave a Comment

I am so unbiased. Therefore, I can say without any hesitation that this is the best advertising agency podcast interview. How do I know this? I was recently interviewed by what I consider the best (well in addition to Advertising Stories) advertising agency podcast and host. Full stop. Great interviewer and I was, on that day, a brilliant speed-talking guest.

I discuss my loooong New York, London even Oregon advertising career, how to pitch (I wrote THE pitch book – see the top portion of this page), and how to buy and sell an advertising agency (get this 57-page freebie by subscribing to my occasional newsletter).

The Best Advertising Agency Podcast? It’s Aqui: The Businessology Show

The Businessology Show is a podcast about the business of design and the design of business It is hosted by CPA/coach Jason Blumer. Jason is a leading financial and accounting consultant for the advertising and marketing communications industry. I said expert, right? Also, a really cool interviewer.

Here is the show – go here: “Pitch It.”

About this show… from Mr. Blumer

Businessology is a platform to help designers, developers, and agencies run more successful businesses. One of the greatest things about the web industry is that we have the desire to share the most valuable tips and tricks of our trade with our “competitors.” When it comes to business, however, that knowledge seems to be kept behind closed doors.

This podcast was started because we want that information to exist in the open. We talk about what to charge for your work. We talk about how to do great work that your clients value. We talk about business models. We talk about managing projects. We talk about growing. We talk about the business side of design and how you can most effectively design your business. We coach real owners of real agencies working through their own growth complexities.

Guests have included Tim Williams; Matt Faulk (here is my interview on winning Webby Awards with Basic’s Matt); and, Drew McClellan of The Agency Management Institute (AMI).

Go listen…