branding

How To Build A Kick-Ass Advertising Agency

Peter · June 2, 2023 · Leave a Comment

Do You Want To Build A Kick-Ass Advertising Agency? Here’s The Book

I am sure that the answer is yes. Who does not want to build that winning advertising agency?

So, I asked Google Bard’s AI tool to help me find the right person to help you… and then have him write a 261-page treatise on how to get the job done.

Peter to Google Bard: “Does the marketing world need a new book about how to run a profitable and happy advertising agency?”

Bard: “It’s difficult to say whether the world really needs a new book on how to run an advertising agency. However, if the book offers unique insights, valuable advice, and practical tips, it will be an invaluable resource for people in the advertising industry or those interested in starting their own agency.”

Peter to Google Bard: “Who should write the comprehensive book on advertising agency management?”

Google Bard: “The best candidate to write a book about how to run and grow an advertising agency would be someone who has a deep understanding of the advertising industry, someone who has run an agency and can provide practical, actionable advice to those looking to start or run their own successful agency. It would also help if that person was also an advertising agency client.

According to my assessment, that person is Peter Levitan.”

Buy the world’s most comprehensive multi-subject agency how-to book HERE.

The Big Advertising Agency Resource List

Peter · April 27, 2023 · 47 Comments

Advertising Agency Resource List – Updated Often

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

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.

Dig growth and sharing? Therefore my friends, go ahead and share this page with your friends, family, and staff.

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. This here Peter Levitan blog has over 860 posts dedicated to helping your marketing communications company grow. I hope that my insights on the art and science of agency business development, growth, and management help you to make more bucks. Speaking of resources and advice, take me up on my Corleone offer.

AI Tools (April 2023)

Yikes. There are new AI tools designed for marketers every day. OK, OK. But, here are a few of my current favorites (I stress current):

ChatGPT. Obviously, you know about this. Here is a nice prompts mini-list for marketers:

Jasper and Copy.ai are AI content generators that utilize AI to generate high-quality content for various purposes. Jasper has been in the market for longer and is more feature-filled, while Copy.ai offers templates, a chatbot, and team features.

MarketMuse is a content optimization tool that utilizes NLP and machine learning algorithms to improve the quality and relevance of your content for better SEO and audience engagement.

Pictory and Synthesia are AI video generators that create high-quality videos without prior experience in video editing or design. Synthesia offers over 60 languages and various templates, a screen recorder, a media library, and more.

A Couple More Quickies:

Website Speed Is Good. A slow website drives down SEO. Check out your website.

Google PageSpeed Insights. Do you know how fast your website download speed is and how its performance ranks against your competitive agencies? Here’s the drill. If your site takes too long to download, it will lose some traffic.

Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test. Here’s another very important test. If you are like me, over 20% of your website visitors are looking at you on a mobile device then you better make sure that they are digging how fast your website loads.

BROWSEO.We might be getting a bit geeky here. That said, BROWSEO helps you view any web page like search engines see it. The tool helps you to identify issues with your site and with your current and future clients’ websites.

And, To help Your Thought Leadership Program: What Are People Searching For?

AnswerThePublic. This is a free visual tool that shows you what questions and queries your consumers have by getting a free report of what they’re searching for at Google.

Exploding Topics. Yes, just like it sounds.

Google Trends. Chances are good that you are aware of Google Trends. This a powerful tool to help you know what is hot and what is not on Google’s search universe. A look at the top 2019 Google searches may or may not make you a fan of humanity.

Social Mention. Ever wonder what the world is saying about you or your company? Here you go.

OK – The Advertising Agency Resource List…

Here are the topics covered:

Advertising Agency News Sites
Ad Agency Directories
Top Advertising Blogs
Favorite Social Media Tools
Video Marketing Tools & Information
Creative Inspiration & Idea Generation
Creative Space & Time
Online Advertising Education
Online Legal Resources
Life After Advertising & How To Make $$$
Top Twitter Tools
Top Advertising And Design Awards
Marketing & Advertising Podcast
Marketing Tool Generators

Advertising Agency News Resources

The Ratti Report. Your agency needs fresh business development leads, right? So check out this website for a daily list of business development opportunities. News you can use to buy that new Tesla Roadster.
Advertising Age. Ad Age delivers the latest news from the world of advertising and marketing agencies.
Ad Asia Online. AdAsia Online focuses on automation, advertising technology, and creative technology,
AdNews. Australia’s advertising, marketing, and media industries news resource.
Adweek. Adweek covers media news, including print, technology, plus.
branding in asia. Need to know what’s up in the Asian marketing and advertising world? Sure you do. Check out this comprehensive resource for creative work, news, interviews, and insights. Read it and you just might take the next non-stop to Singapore.
Business Insider. Business Insider’s daily take on the ad industry.
Campaign Asia. Campaign Asia reports on advertising and emerging media in the Asia Pacific region.
Campaign Magazine. Ad industry news from the UK’s advertising industry “bible”.
Communication Arts. Print publication offering competitions, forums, feature articles, job bank, graphic design resources and online shopping.
Creative. The magazine of promotion and marketing.
Digiday. Digiday creates content, services, and community that foster change in media and marketing.
Direct Marketing News. Provides news, feature articles, columns, and special reports on direct marketing.
The Drum. The alternative to Campaign. Delivers lots of news and views.
MediaPost. Comprehensive advertising and media industry coverage.
TechCrunch. Keep up (or try to keep up) with the fast-paced world of startups and VCs.

Ad Agency Directories

ADWEEK Fastest Growing Advertising Agencies

Peter · November 7, 2022 · Leave a Comment

Here Is A List Of The ADWEEK Fastest Growing Advertising Agencies

As ADWEEK promises: “Ranking 75 global companies that thrived in uncertain times.”

Fastest growing is a good thing. I wondered what these agencies say about themselves – how they try to stand out – quickly. As in on their home page. Here you go.

Movers+Shakers: Connect To culture. Spread Joy.

ALTO: A creative company for courageous brands s

The Stable: Forging The Future Of Commerce.

The MRN: Eliminating Random Acts Of Marketing.

Headlight: We power breakthrough growth marketing for disruptive consumer brands.

Socium Media: We specialize in digital marketing, backed by data, and executed from strategies developed over years of digital marketing experience.

The Snow Agency: The Snow Agency is a full-service digital marketing agency for businesses looking to grow.

Refinery89: Digital Advertising Specialists.

Media Matters Worldwide: Your Experienced, Independent Media Strategy., Planning, Buying and Analytics partner. Women-Owned.

Bray & Co.: We are The StoryBuilders.

hunterblu: hunterblu is a full-service media partner that makes media simple. You know what your message is. We know where and how to place it to reach your audience.

Elumynt: Objectively Better Advertising.

Eyeful Media: Proven digital marketers delivering value and earning the trust of our partners every day.

Supply: The Persuasion Planning Media Agency.

NP Digital: The alternative to the agency status quo.

My favorite agency brand promise? Did these messages help them to be leaders in the ADWEEK fastest?

I’ll go with these two since they push a competitive message that makes me want to learn more:

The MRN: Eliminating Random Acts Of Marketing.

Elumynt: Objectively Better Advertising.

The full list.

Hey, why not subscribe to my LinkedIn newsletter??????

WTF Takeaways From Ad Age Small Agency Conference

Peter · August 10, 2022 · 1 Comment

Ad Age Small Agency Conference: Stating The Obvious… Way Too Often

Here are some smart, yet painful, takeaways from The Ad Age Small Agency Conference. I am not surprised at what the speakers say. But also a bit horrified. I mean, what you are about to hear are what I would consider no-brainers for how to run an advertising agency.

No Brainers… That is my What The Fuck. Am I being too dramatic? I don’t think so.

The issue is that these expert takeaways and advice should be ingrained in all advertising, digital design, and PR agencies. Clearly these takeaways are not. But, YMMV. I include some thoughts and links to “helpful’ thinking. Mine.

Not Speaking Client Language. From Mirren:

Brent Hodgin, Mirren’s Managing Director, is focused on language. As in client language.

“Clients are focused on growth and revenue and most agencies are focusing on brand reputation and positioning,” Hodgins said. “And that is a gap.” Awareness “in and of itself is not an end benefit,” he said, because you can grow awareness and still not move one product off the shelf.” He added: “When you don’t use the language of your client … it’s like you are an outsider trying to be an insider.”

The Levitan take. Hey, agencies are selling services to a prospective client that wants stuff. Figure out what stuff they want (gee like more sales and customers and the right analytics + KPIs) and talk their language. Do the upfront research.

Get past typical agency “branding” talk to talking about “sales”. Like ROI.

Some “CLIENT” language from my pitch book:

Here is a quote from an interview I did with Ian Beavis who has been EVP Automotive at Nielsen and ex auto CMO (Kia, Mitsubishi.) He has been pitched by dozens of agencies (and ran the Toyota account at Saatchi & Saatchi Advertising, as well)

Levitan: A final question. Agencies have a hard time creating a competitive agency brand positioning. Any insights and advice you can give to the agency world on how to be distinctive in this highly competitive category?

Beavis: You rarely hear of an agency being a business solution provider, as it just doesn’t sound cool or creative. A good agency solves a client’s business issues and is a partner. Very few qualify and even fewer truly embrace this challenge.

Clients want agencies that understand business objectives and business results. They want to hear that you get it. That’s it, folks. This WTF is about not doing the research to learn what that prospective client wants.

Agencies Have a Serious Branding Problem. From The Martin Agency.

Be The Smart Local Advertising Agency

Peter · April 23, 2022 · Leave a Comment

**How A Local Advertising Agency Can Own Its City**

I was the senior partner at Citrus, a full-service & very digital local advertising agency with offices in Portland and Bend Oregon, and San Francisco. In addition to having national clients like Nike and Harrah’s, we wanted to be a strong brand and resource in each of our local communities.

For Portland, we created the event series Meet The Makers, a small but powerful speaker series where we brought in execs from companies like Microsoft, Yahoo, and Google. Our audience included current clients, prospects, the ad press, and, importantly, local influencers.

In San Francisco, we ran and distributed an agency-produced video series to break into that crowded agency market.

Your Local Advertising Agency Can Own Its City

I have worked with many smaller agencies that wanted to make some noise in their city. The primary objectives are awareness and high-quality branding. As in, how to be unignorable in one’s hometown or region to be famous for future clients and HR staffing needs. In this case, local could mean London or Boise.

Some Smart Ownership Ideas + A Really Big One

Advertising agencies are well-placed for city ownership. Agencies are creative, work at the local level (even if they have national clients as well), are community leaders, and know how to market themselves online as well as physically.

For example…

A city newsletter – On the simplest level, an agency can offer a city-oriented newsletter – a What’s Up / What’s Going On approach from the cool agency people. If done right, it will get read. YMMV but it could include an event schedule and even point to some great local stores and even point to local marketing programs – how that Italian restaurant markets itself on TikTok.
Speaking of TikTok, maybe your agency can ‘own’ the ‘your city’ TikTok channel. Or, be like Gary Vaynerchuck and use SMS. man, I get at least two messages from him a day.
Run an event(s) as citrus did. Or participate big time in an existing event. I don’t mean going to that Chamber meeting, not a bad idea, but more impactful high-interest events.
A cool idea (yes, if I say so myself) — Lease an empty storefront for a week and give away free marketing advice to local merchants, brands, and even wannabe entrepreneurs. Maybe team up with a local publication. Everyone wins.

Here’s one more very interesting – very community-building idea. I’ve got more but you’ll have to call me to hear about those ideas.