by Next Wave Team | Jul 30, 2006 | Advertising, Everything You Want to Know About Advertising, Future of advertising, How To Select An Ad Agency, Practical Marketing 101, Search and Business, Web strategy
You’re here because you want to do great advertising, or at least are interested in it. That’s why we’re here- to help business create positive connections and community with people who may want to buy or use their product or service-
so- low and behold, there is a site called, ready:
Commercials I Hate!
And the owner of the site says:
Hi, welcome to Commercials I Hate.
I started this site in 1997 because the advertising industry thinks we’re stupid.
Commercials assume the worst about us.
Commercials use ugly stereotypes to appeal to the lowest common denominator.
That’s nasty and insulting. Lucky for you, my reader, so am I.
Enjoy,
Nathan Alexander
This is where you don’t want your ads to show up. Luckily, for advertisers- Nathan hasn’t fully discovered the power of web 2.0 and outside of the message boards- there are no RSS feeds.
If you start seeing inbound links to your site from his URL- you may want to consider hiring a new agency (but that would only happen if you follow our rule and have all your spots online, with complete searchable text, and a unique URL which rules out most companies).
In case you are wondering if your ad agency is presenting work that may possibly end up on “Commericals I hate”- Nathan provides a list of cliche’s to avoid here:
http://www.commercialsihate.com/offenses.html
Luckily none of our TV spots are on his site, and hopefully, none of yours are.
What other industry has websites like this?
by Next Wave Team | Jul 28, 2006 | Advertising, Everything You Want to Know About Advertising, How To Select An Ad Agency, Practical Marketing 101
Of course every agency wants your account- especially if you spend a lot of money. But what about the smaller client, who has a limited budget? Search firms are out- as are many of the suggestions in the following article:
Choice of ad agency like marriage — pick wisely - Charlotte Business Journal:
They do start out with this comparison:
Picking an advertising agency can be like dating. It all boils down to chemistry, gut feeling and finding a relationship that works for you.”The process starts out as a linear, logical one. It ends up with gut feel and intuitive fit,” says Cleve Langton, chairman of the American Association of Advertising Agencies. “The best process is the one that most closely simulates a marriage. Chemistry is what decides it at the end of the day.”
We agree with the idea of a marriage- but it’s not chemistry that makes the difference- it’s mutual benefits- chemistry just makes it easier.
Just like a marriage- trust and respect are key- as is honest open communication and a willingness to try new things.
Afterall, you didn’t hire a new agency just to continue doing what you were doing with the old one, did you?
But as you read further into the article, the suggestions start going south:
The process has three parts:
- Contact agencies and find out the minimum size budget for its client base.
- Inquire about the areas in which an agency has the most experience before you say what industry you’re in. If an agency doesn’t have experience in your industry, look elsewhere.
- Metrics refer to the increase in sales or foot traffic that an agency has generated for a client in the your industry. If an agency will not disclose that information, that’s a bad sign. A client should seek an agency that’s not afraid to make projections of benefits based on their experience.
Start with up to 20 agencies, experts say, and then whittle that to six or fewer. The final round should include three agencies. Avoid limiting your options to two, just in case one of them backs out late in the process, Langton says.
In the final stage, the agencies should come up with some creative ideas for you to see.
We think there is a better way- and it doesn’t start out with your budget size now. Afterall, when you get married, often times you don’t have much to work with do you? The idea is to grow together- shared risk, shared rewards- because if there is no risk- there is no reward (at least not in business).
So- instead, start identifying the type of work you like. Things you are comfortable with- and put together a “portfolio” of aspirations for your companies marketing. Write your business plan- and show what you hope to achieve through the relationship- so that you and your potential new agency can both be looking toward the same thing. Advertising isn’t instant gratification- it all takes time and patience. If you both start out with the same vision- you have a better chance of reaching it.
Next, identify agencies who have clients similar in size to you- then look one step below. That’s right- look for the one who needs your account more, because you will be higher on the priority list. Then look at the work they’ve done- does it look like the work you’ve got in your book? Look at their website- is it up to date, how does if feel? Is it about the work, or about the agency? Agencies that talk too much about themselves- are just like a bad date.
Then, and only then- ask for a meeting. Be totally honest about what the meeting is about. Ask to see some work they’ve done for other clients- and discuss the process, the restraints, the budgets (if they’ll share) and get a feel for how the agency approaches a project. Don’t ask about what they would do for you- or any kind of spec campaign. You wouldn’t ask for sex on a first date, would you? At least not from someone you respect.
At the end of this meeting, you should know if their vision for growth, could be part of yours.
The next step is to offer a small project, with a small budget to the agencies you felt most comfortable with. Better yet- give them all the same project - and see what they come up with.
Remember to evaluate the qualtity of the ideas- it’s more about the process at this point- and the relationship. How well they listened- and how well they shared their ideas.
For this marriage to work- communication is key.
We have a page of “agency search firms” on this site- you can check many of their sites for their methodology- or you can try it our way.
Either way- the cost of a failed relationship can be huge- there are no such things as pre-nups for hiring an agency.
by Next Wave Team | Jul 27, 2006 | Advertising, Change the world, Everything You Want to Know About Advertising, Future of advertising, Marketing & the Web, Practical Marketing 101, Search and Business, Web strategy
This “news section” of our site is a blog about advertising- it’s our way of letting clients and potential clients what’s on our minds when it comes to advertising. It also gets us to the top of Google and improves our search results and brings a lot of visitors to our site. Can’t beat that.
We are students of advertising- we pay attention to what is happening in the business. We believe it’s essential for us to know what leading thinkers are thinking about, who did what campaign, what the strategy is, and if it’s working. To do that- we read other advertising blogs- and often, we’re disappointed- not in the content- but in the tools they use.
Web 2.0 depends on “building community” with your readers. That’s what the little comments section at the bottom of each post is all about. It’s a way to become part of a discussion- and to build connections with people who share your interests. Unfortunately, many of the ad blogs don’t include tools to keep those conversations going- and it frustrates me no end.
Example: Ernie Schenck, co-founder of Pagano Schenck & Kay, winner of all the big ad awards, and now a freelance creative, has an insightful blog Ernie Schenck calls this advertising? He has a ton of bright readers, who comment often- however, Ernie uses a hosted TypePad solution- and has no way of notifying commenters that there have been additional comments on their thread. In WordPress, this is the subscribe to comments plug-in, and it can help your comment count (user generated content) grow considerably- fostering long discussions on a subject (we have one post with 109 comments at last count). Alas, Ernie is another great creative- with minimal understanding of the technology. Room 116 at VCU suffers from this same issue.
Same can be said of Mark Silveira’s “Ordinary Advertising” blog- again, using a non-wordpress platform, the site almost never is able to post comments without an e-mail to Mark. He doesn’t post that often, but I keep it in my feed reader because I liked his book “Ordinary advertising – and how to avoid it like the plague.” WordPress has an excellent plug-in called “Spam Karma II” that allows you to make sure you aren’t being comment spammed- and post immediately (without moderation) to keep your site discussions humming without requiring your attention to every comment (you can still blacklist bad words, or go back in and edit comments easily).
Some sites use Blogger- like “The ranch”- the University of Texas ad blog. Blogger ticks me off because to comment- they want you to set up your blogger blog. Just like good advertising, a good blog back-end shouldn’t force you to do something you don’t want to do (or make it difficult to contact you).
Luckily- all these sites can switch to WordPress- since there is a built in import and translate function for Blogger, Dotclear, LiveJournal, Moveable type and Text Pattern- there is also a way to import via RSS – which could be used for importing from some other arcane solution. See more about importing on the codex.
While there are successful blogs using tools other than WordPress- the key to good open source software is the size of the development community. The bigger the community- the more developers, bug testers, bug squashers, theme developers, plug-in writers etc. WordPress seems to be the technology with momentum- and, it also allows for a pretty simple translation to Drupal if you need your site to do much more (although the commenting functions in Drupal still don’t work as well as WordPress- see D’Arcy Normans site for info on making the change).
WordPress also has an amazingly simple, yet powerful interface- and allows for multiple authors on the same blog- with different levels of access- making it a great tool for any agency to get their entire staff into the content creation process. We’ve been so successful with results for our clients with WordPress that we now offer a seminar called Blogosopher, but soon to be rechristened “Websitetology” (due to the Midwest’s fear of the word “blog” it’s not considered a serious business tool by the local Luddite community). We’re available to come speak to your Ad Club chapter with an abbreviated version of the seminar- and/or to give the seminars (a basic and advanced course- each 3.5 hours long) to your membership- contact us for details.
Using the right tools to blog is like using the right media to reach your audience. The creative types who have taken the leap to use a blog to communicate their message to the masses are all smart people- just not all are tech savvy. Hopefully, this post will lead them to a better blog- and a larger audience.
Comments anyone?
by Next Wave Team | Jul 26, 2006 | Advertising, Change the world, Creativity, Everything You Want to Know About Advertising, Guerrilla Campaigns, Low Budget Advertising, Practical Marketing 101
FREEWAYBLOGGER.com - Free Speech: Use It or Lose It
It’s political speech- and it’s protected- and you may or may not agree with the content- but if you want a primer on how to get your message out without spending big bucks- the video on FreewayBlogger shows you how to use paint, cardboard and a few overpasses to get your message out. Wild posting is common in big cities- but, you have to be careful of local laws and regulations.
Check out the link above.
by Next Wave Team | Jul 25, 2006 | Advertising, Brand Relevancy, Change the world, Creativity, Crispin Porter + Bogusky, Everything You Want to Know About Advertising, Future of advertising, Great Ad Agencies, Guerrilla Campaigns, Marketing & the Web, Media, Practical Marketing 101, Search and Business, Viral Marketing, Web strategy
So the client looks at the proposed budget for the TV spot- and swallows hard. Those are big numbers- especially on the FX (effects) – green screen, miniatures, models etc- big cast- and then- they see- almost as much cash to make a “Making of the spot” documentary- and the clients says “Over my dead body.”
So the agency account exec whips out a pistolo, shoots the CMO and off they go to make the spot- plus the documentary- which by the way- is only available online (not even on the clients site- click image on right to view in a new window)- and you have what Ad Age calls the most liked spot of the month: The Burger King Stackers spot- made by the hottest shop on the planet: Crispin Porter + Bogusky.
So- was this little documentary a wasteful indulgence? Not if it gets people to sit through 3.5 minutes of entertainment featuring your brand.
Would this have happened on a conventional compensation plan- where no media is bought to run this bit of agency extravagance- no. Would the brand have the buzz that BK is enjoying now? No. Is there hope for other fast food feeders to still own a piece of the “Meat head” market segment of men, aged 18-25 who are likely to eat fast food 3+ times per week? Not if you play it safe, and worry about offending some segment of the market. I can just hear a brand manager at P&G worrying about offending small people with this spot. Hence, P&G hasn’t been able to master the buzz machine of the Internet.
There is a burning question on my mind about Crispin’s Internet delivery strategy:
- Are they purposefully avoiding putting work onto the client site so that it doesn’t seem to be delivered by the client (as a sort of distancing mechanism) and forgoing the measurement tools from the site stats-
-or-
- is it that they don’t care about utilizing the information that can be gleaned from having the customer on their own server- watching where they go- and what they do?
To someone who believes in the power of webstats to provide insight into customers minds- the first option seems reckless. However, if the focus is on velocity of concepts- which seems to be a key to Crispin work (the factory concept)- measurement doesn’t matter- until they have a client that is actually selling online (like Gateway- who didn’t listen to their advice to streamline their product lines).
Either or- how a client justifies the expense of these can only be by one method- have sales increased – and word on the street is that Burger King is seeing results at the registers. Was it worth the extra money- absolutely, would most clients spend the extra money- no.
What do you think? Is Crispin missing out on opportunity to connect with customers by using Google video to distribute content instead of their own site?
by Next Wave Team | Jul 23, 2006 | Advertising, Careers in Advertising, Change the world, Everything You Want to Know About Advertising, Future of advertising, How To Select An Ad Agency, Practical Marketing 101
how to choose the right ad agency - Google Search
Just another example of Google magic by The Next Wave- we’re number 3 with our post on selecting an advertising agency- something that seems to bewilder so many clients.
The saying in the business is companies get the advertising they deserve- but many times, they get the wrong advertising by picking the wrong agency. It’s not just a question of size, or expertise- many times it gets down to passion.
Does the agency have a passion for your product or service- and are you spending enough to make that passion translate into a mutually valuable relationship?
My neighbor works for Iams, manufacturer of premium pet foods. He worked their before P&G and after- and as we were painting his carriage house- we agreed on one thing that hasn’t changed: Iams still has bad advertising.
Of course, the moment P&G bought the company- big agencies took notice- and Satchi now has the account. There are also “Brand managers” and “Assistant brand managers” running aroung all over the place. Does this make for better ads- or better strategy? Of course not- and for all the gains P&G has made with their distribution might- one may consider that they’ve actually lost customers by losing their cool cred. Much like Ben & Jerry’s lost their cool when they sold out.
Satchi looks at Iams as a piece of the P&G world to service- and reap the revenue- a smaller agency might look at the account as a stepping stone to bigger things- the right agency would look at it as an opportunity to spread the word about a great pet food- and how it can make your relationship with your pet last longer and keep your four-legged friends healthy and happy.
If you aren’t happy with your advertising- take a look at why you picked the agency you picked- and how you work with them.
Maybe there should be a new career field counseling agencies and their clients- to bring the passion and love back into the relationship- just like marriage counselors?
Or, maybe you should just divorce your agency and get back on the ad dating circuit- since you’re reading this- you are obviously shopping.
What do you think?
