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Interpersonal Chemistry and Body Language

Peter · August 4, 2017 · 1 Comment

Interpersonal Chemistry and Body Language and Sales

Many pitches are won not because you are brilliant, but because the client simply likes you. I’ve sat on both sides of the advertising agency and client sales table and I can safely say, from my client side, that interpersonal chemistry is a critical factor in agency selection decision making.

Given the similarities of agency A to B to C to D (especially by the time an agency has made a client’s short list), interpersonal chemistry — the… “Hey, I like these guys” vibration will be the “all agencies sound the same” deal breaker. Actually, based on many of the interviews in my book on pitching (see above), chemistry is THE decision maker. If we agree that interpersonal chemistry is a critical component in agency selection, then we better get out our test tubes.

I believe that interpersonal chemistry can be managed. Your agency simply (OK, nothing is that simple), should think hard about a few elements of creating love. Here are some:

Study the client’s brand history and, especially, its and its category’s, marketing pain points. In the best of all possible worlds, you already did this to get into the meeting in the first place.
Get to learn who the individual clients are. You have a world of tools to ID and learn about each decision making client. This research on work and personal history, education, social media posts, etc. forms the back bone of your account based marketing program. I tell all of my clients that there is no such thing as a blind-date in 2017.
Ask for a pre pitch chemistry meeting. And, make this critical meeting work for you.
Back to the dating metaphor: remember the meeting is about them, not you. This may be one of the biggest mistakes an agency makes. The client needs to know how you will address their issues. Not, list ad nauseam the elements of your unrelated really cool Instagram program.

Body Language Is Critical

One experiment that you don’t want to run in the face-to-face meeting is how to manage, use, and read body language. This isn’t new territory for most agency people as we spend a fair amount of time trying to decipher our current client’s body language in strategy and creative meetings. It really is amazing to see the difference between a client that leans in and one that folds their arms, crosses their legs, and leans back.

Albert Mehrabian, the Professor Emeritus of Psychology at UCLA is well known for his study of verbal and non-verbal communication. According to Mehrabian’s 3 V’s of Communication, visual cues rule. Here’s his take on the relative value of three elements in face-to-face communication:

Verbal – words, content – 7%
Vocal – tone, pitch, intonation – 38%
Visual – body language, facial expression, gestures – 55%
Wow, content only gets 7%!?

I was a bit dumbfounded when I first saw this verbal, vocal, and visual breakdown. Is it possible that non-verbal communication is the essential ingredient of a successful presentation? Well no. And, that isn’t what Mr. Mehrabian is saying. Here is how a sage Wikipedian reports on Mehrabian’s conclusions.

“It is not the case that non-verbal elements in all senses convey the bulk of the message, even though this is how his conclusions are sometimes misinterpreted. For instance, when delivering a lecture or presentation, the textual content of the lecture is delivered entirely verbally, but the non-verbal cues are very important in conveying the speaker’s attitude towards what they are saying, notably their belief or conviction.”

Ah, the demonstration of “belief or conviction”.

This point is very important because we know that there can be an element of distrust in how some clients in the room might view an advertising agency presentation – “Oh, they will say anything to win the account; they are ad guys after all.”

I think that some of this client-think comes from the nature of our presenting the intangible magic of advertising (and, lately, the BS of digital marketing). A sense of disbelief is part of being on the buyer end of any somewhat subjective sales pitch. Therefore, we need to pay close attention to our non-verbal cues.

Playing to the intangibles of body language requires you to play two roles.

The first is the role of observer. Is the client leaning in? Are they making eye contact or looking around the room or at their papers? How are they holding their arms (hopefully, not folded in front of them)? Are they fidgeting? Better, are they nodding in agreement, and are they taking notes?

Make sure that your team understands how to read the important positive and negative ‘tells’. Everyone should think like a poker player. If you need some extra stimulus on how to read the room, watch David Mamet’s great gambling movie House of Games.

2. Your other role is to be aware of your own body language, and make sure that your team is fully conscious of how they deliver their body language. Personally, I have always focused on my breathing, posture, and the position of my hands, head and eyes. I remind myself to go to an out-of-body view of how I might be perceived during the presentation. Self-awareness during the pitch is all-important.

We should want to look relaxed and stand straight. In this case, you also need to beware of looking too cool, or looking like the shifty poker players you see on TV who often want to demonstrate power by acting aloof. Rather, lean in like President Obama or Sean Hannity (hey, I am an equal opportunity viewer). Look like you believe in what you are saying and that you are confident.

Much of your conscious performance will be driven by your rehearsals which will make you familiar with your ideas, words, tone, pace, and body position. It is ok to critique your teammates during the rehearsal. Better that you point out a colleague’s wandering eye problem than have the client experience it later.

Tip:

Be very uber conscious of your surroundings.

Make sure that you actively read the room. Pay attention to your audience, listen closely to their comments for clues, and note their posture. Be prepared to make subtle adjustments to your presentation based on what you are seeing. I have been in pitches where I know that my colleague is failing by watching the audience’s reaction. In a worse case scenario, the speaker isn’t paying attention to his audience — he is just trying to deliver his lines and get though his section. Bad move for him and for you. All of your presenters must be aware of how they are being received and make adjustments. Have a set of visual codes to alert your colleagues about any body language fails. You might want to have your impartial pitch critic (I discuss this in my pitch book) act disinterested in your rehearsal just for practice.

The Diminished Ad Agency AE

Peter · June 11, 2017 · 1 Comment

Today’s Ad Agency AE

A friend of mine, a long term Executive Creative Director and advertising professor, is writing a book on advertising based on his multi-decade major league career. He is asking a range of experienced colleagues and friends to add to his book’s subject matter (by the way, a great way to get smart content to bulk up your book). He asked me about my thoughts on today’s Account Executives – yes, the AE.

Here is a part of my contribution. As you’ll see, I think the role of the AE has been diminished. I view this as being a result of lower gross margins – we no longer can afford to train our AE’s and, in many cases, we don’t pay them enough to attract the best and brightest. Parsimonious clients are reaping what they’ve sowed.

As an aside, I once ran the Northwest Airlines account. Northwest left Saatchi & Saatchi because they got a new CMO. An insecure bloke who decided he’d give the account to his friends at Ogilvy. I ran into one of the client’s mid-level execs one day and she asked me why Ogilvy did not provide the same level of account management care as Saatchi. I reminded her that she was now paying an 8% media commission vs. the 15% she had paid Saatchi. Yup, you get what you pay for: Parsimonious clients are reaping what they’ve sowed.

My Take: The Diminished AE

Like much of advertising, the role of the account executive has morphed over the past 25 years. In the olden days, the AE was an agency’s highly valuable point person. The AE had daily conversations with the client, acted as the go between the client and agency services, tracked programs and, in the best of all worlds, was a strategic thinker and brand resource. Today, given the reduction in agency gross margins, we are not training our account people to be the best representative for the agency. As a result of this plus the fact that many clients want to talk directly with the “doers” i.e. the creatives or digital planners, the AE role has been severely diminished.

That said, the best AE’s do have a holistic understanding of today’s complex marketing options and know how to build a client relationship. The key difference is that we have fewer of this type of AE. Agencies simply do not pay enough to attract the best AE candidates (thanks in part to reduced client compensation) to be competitive with other career options.

My Experience

I started my first AE job at New York’s giant (over 1,000 people in the Crysler Building) Dancer Fitzgerald Sample in the 1980’s. We were eventually bought by Saatchi & Saatchi and I even got some lunch money. My first job was working on the large General Mills account. I quickly became the agency’s lead on Total and Kix cereals and began traveling to Minneapolis. I felt highly valuable to my client and agency… it was fun.

Every week the agency had a two-hour training program that included client management, presentation skills, and strategy development. After 6 months I was promoted and had my own office with a desk and window — take that today’s large AE field of desks.

Over the years, I got to use my early management training to help train the employees of my own companies and agency.

….. I’ll let you know when the new advertising book comes out.

Expedia And Sales Chutzpah

Peter · May 22, 2017 · Leave a Comment

A Lesson From Expedia On Sales Chutzpah

OK, we all have bad customer service experiences. I get it. But when the bad experiences go across four Expedia service phone conversations (that lasted about three plus hours over two days) and another six back and forth Twitter direct tweets and the customer who is spending over $5,000 on the trip is still unsatisfied (that’s me), there must be something wrong with how Expedia runs the humanbeing (vs. digital) sales service side of its business.

No, This Post Is Not About Expedia. It Is About Your Ad, PR, Digital, etc. Agency

Stick with me because this blog post is actually about a way to grow your agency – a way that requires a bit of chutzpah. However, before I get to your agency and an unignorable sales tactic, I have to share a tiny bit of customer service related background to set up the chutzpah recommendation.

A few weeks ago, I used Expedia to book two tickets from Mexico City to Budapest for a summer trip to see the Hungarian F1 Grand Prix race. This week, I called Expedia to change the trip by adding a few days up front and move the original first destination from Budapest to Vienna. I knew about and was willing to spend the extra $500 flight change charge and, before I called, I had also looked at all of the available flight options. I was prepared for the service rep call. But, I was not prepared for the following:

Expedia’s phone system could never recognize my itinerary number or phone number (the ones that are listed on Expedia’s original flight plan document). I knew I was in the system because when I finally got to a rep, she recognized the numbers. What’s up with Expedia’s automated phone system and the interface with its database?

While it took me about 30 seconds to get to the Iberia Airlines and Expedia sites to find my reservation detail, it took the multiple Expedia reps I talked to at around two minutes.

I was repeatedly asked if Mexico City was my origination airport (I live in Mexico) and if I was to change flights in Madrid as stated on my reservation. Um, yes.

The reps took forever to find alternative flights although I was helping them find the alternatives. And on. I won’t bore you with more including the third rep who apologized for how sloooooow Expedia’s computer was working.

Taken individually, these don’t appear to be too onerous. However, in aggregate, they were and I gave up without making the flight change.

OK, two more points.

I was so pissed off that I sent LinkedIn InMails to three Expedia marketing execs gently complaining about the service and asking them if they ever sat in on customer calls – consider this action an internal “Store-Check”. It’s been four days since I sent the emails. Any response? No. Sure these folks get lots of emails. But, I used attention-getting customer-centric subject lines.

The Cost Of Ad Agency Business Development

Peter · May 13, 2017 · Leave a Comment

Ad Agency Business Development. What Does It Actually Cost?

Simple answer? Ad agency business development costs… a lot. A more detailed answer follows.

I recently spoke about ad agency business development (essentially the art of Account Based Marketing) at Hanapin Marketing’s PPC Hero conference in L.A. and did a day long ‘how to pitch’ workshop for a major agency network at their annual meeting in Miami. I came away from both sessions thinking about the high cost of business development.

The True Cost Of Business Development

Since there is no one size fits all answer to what BD costs, I am going to illustrate the cost for a typical medium sized agency. Based on many conversations with agency leadership and the research done for my book on pitching (see the top of this page or just go here to buy it), the cost of participating in a serious pitch can cost close to $100,000. Sounds high, right? But, here is my math.

I am making the assumption that a typical medium size agency responds to 10 RFP’s and participates in 6 serious pitches per year. Of course, your mileage may vary.

RFP’s cost $15,000 to write and produce. This includes both hard and soft costs as in labor and overhead. At 10 RFP’s per year, that’s $150,000.

Pitches are more expensive. Lets go with $35,000 per pitch. If you are an active agency, you’ll do 6 per year at a total cost of $210,000. FYI, I’ve run pitches at Saatchi & Saatchi that cost over $100,000. Not at all happy about that but that is a fact at the huge agencies pitching for huge pieces of business.

OK, back to the mid-size agency. The annual agency cost for RFP’s and pitching is $360,000.

But, there is more and I am going to be very conservative here. I am going with $200,00 per year for the cost of an active business development program itself. That’s the hard costs and the cost of a BD director and significant management time.

The total… $360,000 plus $200,000 = $560,000 or $56,000 per RFP and $93,333 per pitch.

Ouch.

Business Development – A Cost Center Or Opportunity?

The big question at many client companies is whether or not marketing is a cost or a business opportunity. Of course, you tell your clients that it is an opportunity that pays for itself. No marketing, no sales. Well, this is the case at many agencies. They simply do not spend the effort (as in time, investment and planning – oh, and execution) to run smart aggressive business development programs. As both an ex-Saatchi guy and small Oregon agency owner, I am blown away by this.