ad agency

Ted Leonsis, The Capitals and My Advertising Career

Peter · June 8, 2018 · Leave a Comment

Ted’s Digital Advertising Advice

I don’t usually talk about career development on this website. But, last night’s Washington Capital’s hockey game and their owner Ted Leonsis made me think of my own advertising career. More on this later.

Watching Ted Leonsis’s Washington Capitals win the Stanly Cup was exhilarating for two reasons (for my international audience, the Stanley Cup is the National Hockey League’s 60-year-old champions cup).

First, hockey is the only sport that equals the second by second excitement of football (for my USA audience, football means soccer).

Second, Ted had a great impact on my career because he helped give it/me purpose.

Ted And My Purpose

In 1994 I returned from working at Saatchi & Saatchi London to our New York office to run business development with my buddy Beau Fraser. Unfortunately, 1994 was the worst year in the history of the agency with poor management, very bad USA press, loss of any new client interest and the ultimate departure of Maurice and Charles, the founding brothers. We couldn’t sell a damn thing. I even got laughs from Goodby and Silverstein in a shared NYC cab when they heard that my job was selling Saatchi’s services.

BUT… another thing that happened in 1994 was that I “discovered” digital marketing and the Internet. Coming from Luddite-rich Great Britain and seeing what was going on in the states with CD-Roms (LOL) and the graphical web, delivered a HUGE WOW. I sensed that digital was the future (duh!).

I used my Saatchi credential to go down to Florida to meet with Ted Leonsis and his Redgate Communications – as far as I knew, Redgate was the first digital agency. Ted explained what a digital agency did and informed me that AOL had just bought Redgate and that he was going to be AOL’s president. How did Ted do at AOL? Well, he now owns Washington’s hockey and basketball teams. Here’s the AdAge annountment.

Most importantly, he gave me this advice:

“Get the fuck out of traditional advertising and get into digital.”

I did. Ted’s advice was instrumental in helping me find my purpose – and at that time, it was not working at a failing full-service advertising agency. My true purpose was becoming a brilliant marketer. I think I did grow into that. I won’t bore you with the bio details. You can see the post-Saatchi digital bio here.

Peter, What’s The Point?

The point is that you need to locate the one or two people that can help you find your purpose and light the light. It wasn’t an accident that I flew down to Florida on Saatchi’s dime to meet Ted. I went to learn about digital marketing for the agency. But, I knew quite well that I needed to hear what a digital agency was, what digital marketing was going to be (the promise) to help me get to my next stage. FYI, Saatchi management did not agree with me about digital marketing at that time.

Last night… So, when I saw Ted’s team win, there was a bit of extra personal satisfaction and “hey, that’s some cool shit.”

I listened to the right guy in 1994. He is a winner.

By the way, a few years later Ted, as president of AOL, called me up to tell me that AOL was not going to buy my early-stage bot companyActiveBuddy. But, that’s another story.

Amsterdam Is Fun

Peter · May 27, 2018 · Leave a Comment

KesselsKramer Makes Amsterdam Fun

Yeah, you know Amsterdam is fun. I’ve just had that confirmed: spring weather; the gorgeous canals; tall blondes; really fine design; marijuana is legal (but, I am from Portland so who cares.) And the two best photography museums I’ve been to. Foam and Huis Marseilles. I’ll put links to them at the bottom.

Getting to the real point… there is an Amsterdam agency that has never been boring. Never been unignorable. From their website history to their publications, they act different.

Different in a world of zillions of agencies. This is a good thing.

KesselsKramer

On my first day in Amsterdam, I took a random walk and found an excellent photography bookstore that had books by Erik Kessels, one of KesselsKramer’s founders. I already own a couple from his series In Almost Every Picture. My books include a flat-headed rabbit and a woman that never gets out of her car. Erik’s books are mostly sold out but you can find some on the KesselsKramer website and on Amazon.

Back To Fun

I’ve written about KesselsKramer’s approach to acting and looking and sounding different (rare in the agency world). This was way apparent when they had an ever-changing website plus an absurdist angle. You can see my take on their approach here.

The agency’s current website is tamer. However, take a hard look and you’ll see that these guys understand the power of the different thing. This makes it way easier for a future client or employee to want to make contact. Yo, good vibes and contact are what an agency website is all about.

Why is fun excluded from the way most agencies represent themselves? This has always baffled me. Sure agencies need to be serious as they help marketers market and have to be prudent with client budgets. But, unlike accountants, agencies can offer a bit of humor, fun and even sound a bit over the top creative. Afterall, creativity and fun are what the client organization does not have.

Things I like:

Clean, simple graphic approach.

To the point agency description: “Established in 1996, KesselsKramer is an independent communications agency in Amsterdam, London and now in Los Angeles with about 50 people of 10 different nationalities. We bring brands and communities together by creating meaningful experiences in every media imagined.”

Need more? Here is what the L.A. office says (Hmm, I’d like to meet and eat with these guys.): “KK Los Angeles is a communications agency, original content studio and art gallery all under one roof. We set up shop in the heart of gallery row in Chinatown and promise to blur the lines between culture, commerce, content and collaboration.”

KK leads with the work. (Though, I am not a huge fan of carousels.)

Their work + cases make me want to work with them. Here is one sweet client case + work. It’s for ONZV, a healthcare insurer. Not the usual.

The Exhibitions and Publishing sections deliver proof that this is not your ordinary agency. Please dig in. When many agencies think that brewing their own beer is the cool thing to do, KK has been a serious member of the Amsterdam art scene for years.

Read their 100 FAQ’s.

The Photography Bookshop & Museums

Foam and Huis Marseilles.

PhotoQbookshop.

Yup, Amsterdam is fun. Especially the art.

3D Ad Agency New Business Marketing

Peter · May 7, 2018 · Leave a Comment

Ad Agency Marketing Is Holistic, Interconnected and 3D.

Brilliant ad agency marketing leads to searches that lead to your agency. Today these searches are much more 3D and, often, chaotic than you think.

Let’s imagine that you are the Marketing Director of Estee Lauder and you’ve just decided you need an ad agency to revitalize your women’s magazine program. Yes, magazines like Vogue still live. Before you go out and find an agency search consultant, you pull out your laptop and do a bit of research. You will use one or more of a combination of search tactics like getting referrals from like-minded marketing experts, you’ll review agencies that are current award winners, you’ll read ADWEEK and AdAge lists and on. You might even Google, “best women’s advertising agencies.” Believe me, having once been the CEO of two ad agency client companies, finding the right marketing partner isn’t easy.

Whatever the Marketing Director has done to get to a short list, her next stop is the agency’s website. I’ve written lots about how to build sales-oriented agency websites. However, I want to get a step beyond the website. It is a step I use whenever an ad agency client prospect contacts me. I take a look at their “about” / people page and then go to LinkedIn to get a bit more up close and personal about the agency’s key players. If I am interested, I’ll also check out the leader or employee’s Facebook page and Twitter feed. Here’s a duh… personal branding is critical these days. And, since an ad agency is made of its moving parts, in this case, its people, why wouldn’t Ms. Lauder check out the people’s brands and stories too. By the way, people chemistry is a key element in agency selection.

Best Practices: LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Personal Brands.

I often see a total lack of consistency between the way an ad agency projects its image and the images that its people project.

Look, I get it. We are all individuals. But, there is a team benefit to being consistent – in key areas.

I think that agencies should have a set of best practices and agency-related branding guidelines for their key player’s personal branding with respect to their company’s branding. While we have all read about how to set up a killer social media profile, for example, chances are very good that some key players have simply not optimized their profile. This means, they simply do not look good to the outside world, including you, hopefully, next new client.

While an employee owns their own brand (and, of course, might actually be using their LinkedIn page to find their next job), each employee should at least sound and look like they work at your agency. Here are some examples of what I mean.

All related LinkedIn, etc. sites should have the latest agency branding (graphics and other branding devices.)
There needs to be some consistency in how the employee describes the agency.
It would be nice if the employee had one or more client Recommendations.
The profiles should be complete. I am not going to get into the art of personal branding. But, someone at the agency needs to do a review of the key people.
Last point, no you should not be the personal branding police. But, you do need to control your agency brand. Review your group’s personal brands and make sure that each person is aware of how you want your company represented.

Holistic Marketing.

In today’s marketing world, everything matters. Everything you do brands the agency. How you answer your phone, your agency email signatures, your position on Google, your relationship with the search community, your blog posts, all of your magnet sites including The Creative Ham. You know what I’m talkin about.

And…. how you look in your employee’s world. It all adds up.

If you want, give me a shout and I’ll use our Corleone moment to help you do a quick review.

Pitch Consultants Advice For Advertising Agencies

Peter · April 9, 2018 · 1 Comment

Advice For Advertising Agencies That Want to Win

A chunk of my book on how to win more advertising agency pitches included interviews with industry playas. These folks were agency owners, 4A’s execs, search and pitch consultants, procurement decision makers and legal experts. Many readers found these interviews to be invaluable in helping to craft pitches that did not make any of the big mistakes that lead to coming in “second.” By the way, have you ever noticed that all of the not-chosen come in “second”?

More advice. I just came across the 4A’s “One Piece of Advice” for Agencies. Agency Search Consultants Advice for Agencies. (January 2018.) Since this advice is, in many cases similar to the advice in my book (and includes some of the same interviewees), I am forwarding the long PDF to you as continuing confirmation that some agencies do things right and, according to the consultants, many are still getting it wrong.

A link to the full document is below. There is so much truth here that I’ve highlighted one major point from each consultant’s advice.

Agency Search Consultants Advice for Agencies

“One Piece of Advice” for Agencies January 2018

4A’s asked industry leading agency search consultants to provide “One Piece of Advice” that the association could share with members as they begin thinking about their 2018 new business plans.

The 4A’s consultant request noted, “Based on your knowledge of client marketer needs/wants and industry dynamics, what is the one thing that you would recommend that an agency either do or not do that can help the effectiveness of their new business efforts? We welcome your advice in any area of the agency search and selection process (prospecting, RFI/RFP submissions, creds, chemistry, presentations, etc.)”

Opportunity Assessment

Joanne Davis Consulting: “It’s not about you; it’s never been about you; it’s never going to be about you. It’s about the client.”

Do you really need to hear this again? It is always about the client and her goals, opportunities and issues.

Mercer Island Group: “Something the consultants understand better than most agencies is that you can’t offer a prospect relevant value until you have identified the prospect’s true business needs. The basic idea of the elevator speech is inherently flawed — as are most agency pitches; if you’re talking about things the prospect has no interest in, they will stop listening.”

Why do you think that pitch consulatants keep saying… that it is always about the client’s goals and issues?

Drexler/Fajen & Partners: “Agencies could spend more time really understanding as much as possible about the prospect’s business and their people and be prepared to demonstrate that in a natural way.”

Study big time: the client, its industry and the macro and micro business opportunities.