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The New Business of Advertising

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A Lost $80 Million Advertising Agency Account That Rocked The Ad World

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Would You Like Your Advertising Agency And TV Commercial On The Front Page Of The New York Times Because You Lost an $80 Million Advertising Agency Account? Not This Executive Creative Director. Not This Time.

Let’s just start with 1988’s The New York Times headline

Cigarette Maker Cuts Off Agency That Made Smoking-Ban TV Ads

Patrick Peduto was the ECD and I was the Management Supervisor on Saatchi’s Northwest Airlines account. We were just doing our jobs, even super well, when unbeknownst to us, RJR Nabisco simply got pissed off at one of our Northwest Airlines commercials.

SHOW LINKS

Patrick Peduto On LinkedIn

New York Times RJR Nabisco Article

Northwest Airlines No Smoking TV Commercial

Do not forget to subscribe to Advertising Stories whenever you Listen To Podcasts. See the handy links to podcast players.

A nice thing for me… Feedspot has already recognized Advertising Stories as being a top 15 advertising podcast.

 

The Birth, Life And Death Of L’eggs Pantyhose

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Michael Donahue Has Many Letters to His Name. DFS, S&S, L’eggs, 4A’s, and ANA. Hear Him Discuss The Birth, Life, And Death Of L’eggs Pantyhose.

Michael is going to tell us about how a brand can be born, grow to greatness, and die. This interview covers the birth, life, and death of one of America’s best-known brands – Sara Lee’s L’eggs. Michael ran this account. He also managed to corral ZZ Top and the Radio City Rocketts for the brand’s advertising – two names not usually associated with any brand at the same time. Nothing is forever in brand land.

Michael, an original Mad Men man, has been an Executive Vice President and Board member at Saatchi & Saatchi Advertising; EVP at The Association Of American Advertisers and Senior Director Of The Association Of National Advertisers. He is also the tallest man in advertising. And, if that was not all, he did in fact urge the advertising industry in the 1990s to move into the world of digital marketing using his exalted position at the 4A’s.

We will also discuss what the Association Of National Advertisers is and does for mankind.

SHOW LINKS

Watch: Michael Donahue – from the LinkedIn Trust Series at Advertising Week New York 2017

1988 L’eggs TV With ZZ Top

Association of National Advertisers

A nice thing for me… Feedspot has already recognized Advertising Stories as being a top 15 advertising podcast.

Do Not Forget To Subscribe to Advertising Stories Whenever you Listen To Podcasts. Please Tell Your Advertising Friends.

Dallas Advertising Agencies What Agency Is On Top At Google?

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Why Is Miller Ad Agency On Top At Google? Why The Answer Is Important For All Advertising Agencies No Matter Where Your Agency Is.

I’ve been doing some work for my advertising agency clients about how they get found by their future marketing clients. To narrow the process, I took a look at how Dallas advertising agencies are listed on Goole’s SERP home page.

It isn’t pretty.

Today is a rather important time to check every “how clients find your agency” box given the current state of the COVID-19 craziness and inevitable client spending pullback. If you were not around during the 2007 recession… ask someone who was. The agencies that fell asleep — fell off the map. I owned an agency at the time and got aggressive – we prospered.

Dallas Advertising Agencies And Google

As part of my research, I did a quick search on Google, via a Chrome incognito browser, to see what Austin, Houston and Dallas advertising agencies are listed first on Google (of course YMMV, depending on your browser and history). I did a fast search as if I was a prospective client searching for a new agency. My search term was simple… “Dallas advertising agencies.”

Here is a screenshot of the results. Kinda critical results for future clients as Google only provides a very limited list on page one.

Dallas Findings

  1. WALO Creative comes up first. They are smart to buy the ad to get out ahead given that Clutch says that there are over 500 Dallas advertising agencies.
  2. Miller Ad Agency is second. They have 75 reviews, so I assume that that helps Google make a decision. However, Slingshot with five reviews is listed as four. So, maybe the number of reviews isn’t the secret.
  3. Finally, I am going like, where is Dallas’ leading Richards Group? They are not on page one. Huh, given their size and history. This time I searched via Google map and Richards shows up as number 4. This makes sense, right? But, again, I am a bit perplexed since smaller Miller is number one.
  4. A “conclusion”. Miller has all five-star reviews as is listed at 5.0. Richards has lots of reviews but because it has a couple of lower review numbers has a 4.5 rank. But wait, Slingshot which is listed as number two only has a 3.4 review rank. Yikes.

My Conclusion… Find a seriously smart, expert SEM / SEO expert and drill down if you want to be listed high on Google’s results for Dallas Advertising Agencies.  Maybe start at Google’s Improve Your Local Ranking On Google page. Keep reading – Google’s algorithms are fluid.

One more… make knowing where a prospective client will look for your agency and make sure you are there. If it means that you might have to buy an ad or a listing, do it. The way to get here is to put on a client hat and understand their buyer persona and act like them. Or, have your mom do the search.

Also, check out my article about there being too many advertising agencies. I also have a list of everywhere you want to be.

Note: If your superior expertise can help ME figure this specific Google ranking stuff out…. make contact. Thanks.

 

 

 

Is Domino’s Delivery Insurance Bad Advertising?

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A quick note before I get to Domino’s and their Delivery Insurance advertising… We’ve all seen the, mostly consternation, at the husband who buys his wife a Peloton bike for Christmas. The issues: husband type gives beautiful wife an exercise bike; she (at 120 LBs kicks into gear and by the end drops three LBs.) PC issues here. People go crazy. Spoof TV commercial goes very viral. But, for comparison on the PC scale, I discuss worker exploitation that stars in a Domino’s TV commercial. Did this ad get anyone’s attention? Well, a bit. But not at the level of Peloton.

I am sitting in front of my TV in Mexico watching Sunday NFL football games. Domino’s is spending some big bucks to show me a commercial about its “Delivery Insurance” where their employees freak out, run around the kitchen, drive fast and run down the street and walkways to deliver pizzas that quite possibly had arrived earlier without the right topping. Holy shit, who can live without their pepperoni?

Domino’s Advertising Problem

Like you, I have seen numerous articles in the past couple of months about how Amazon’s hourly-wage employees suffer injury trying to get you that new pair of headphones within 24 hours. Some parts of Amazon’s warehouses look like slave-driven machines. This hasn’t been a good PR season for Bezos.

Given the Amazon press, do you think that Domino’s Kate Trumbull, VP of advertising and Hispanic marketing has been paying attention to how a major corporation can damage its employees in a quest for speed? Does Domino’s ad agency pay attention?

Take a look at this commercial. Take a look at how the hourly-wage employees, note – average hourly wage at Domino’s is $6 to $11 per hour for a delivery driver (I’ll do the math for you – that’s about $20,000 per year) – is hustling like a fucking NASCAR whirling dervish to get you that missing dipping sauce.

I guess the next question is… does the TV viewer care about the insane Domino’s work system as long as they get their sausage?

Am I being too sensitive?

How to Build A Winning Advertising Agency New Business Program

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shark

An Advertising Agency New Business Survival Guide

I admit it, the blog post “How to Build A Winning Advertising Agency New Business Program” has been read by your competitors over 40,000 times. Glad you stopped by.

Advertising agency business development is a 24/7 operation that requires the right agency positioning, strategies, action, and high efficiency. I help my agency clients get there faster.

The post’s popularity is due to three key factors:

1. It directly addresses a major marketing pain point: how to build a winning and efficient advertising agency new business plan.

2. The post is well optimized for search engines, delivers high value, and, therefore…

3. Google loves it. FYI, my number two trafficked post is, “How To Name Your Advertising Agency – Part One” at 30,000 + views. While always rethinking their website, advertising agencies also obsess about their name. By the way, this post is also a very good cheat sheet on naming that you can steal if a client ever needs a new brand name.

“How To Build…” is all about the most important thing an advertising agency can do (while it is nurturing its current clients)… run a new business program that ensures that the agency will keep growing. Agencies are like sharks. They must keep moving forward to eat or else.

Your potential clients have over 4,000 marketing communications ‘agency’ options (other agencies, new consultancies, freelancers, even your ex-creative director…).

Therefore, any form of business development passivity on your part – sucks. If you think you are doing everything right, you probably are not. How can I say this? I never thought that all was well whilst running business development at Saatchi & Saatchi and when I owned my own agency.

Here’s my “ad”: I suggest that you give me a shout and take me up on my Corleone offer – It’s hard to refuse.

OK, Let’s Go… The 24/7 Business Development Plan

I moved from New York to Bend Oregon in 2002 to buy a very successful advertising agency (and raise a family 20 minutes from a ski lift).

Citrus grew to add a Portland office and national accounts including Dr. Martens, Harrah’s, Leagalzoom, Nike, Providence Health, Montana Lottery, and the UN.

I woke up every day as if a client like Nike was going to walk out the back door along with its revenues. I bet as an ad agency owner or manager you have rough nights too. One of the things I knew I could and should do was to manage this back-door issue was to have an active, I stress active, new business plan in place.

Here are some (I stress some) of the elements of my marketing plan. They helped me grow Saatchi & Saatchi and my agency Citrus. I hope my insights help you grow your agency.

Execution Rules.

When I set out to write this advertising agency new business post I didn’t think that it would be this long – a warning to the ADHD types. But, advertising agency new business planning is complex and is getting more complex every day due to the rapid changes in our industry and technology. That said, the devil in business development, you know what’s coming, is in the detail. Success is all about execution.

For example, running a successful inbound biz dev program that attracts market attention must be based on a sound strategy and smart agency process if you want to run a 24/7 sales program. Staying the course is critical.

The Advertising Agency Business Plan. First Things First.

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