Cheated by your Marketing Agency through a Pitch?

Cheated by your Marketing Agency through a Pitch?

Have you had the experience of inviting the top dogs in the marketing and advertising industry to pitch for your campaign? I bet you were totally awed by their creative We Won!proposals and absolutely charmed by their account executives. You congratulated yourself on selecting the right marketing or advertising agency. But then, when the honeymoon period was over, the people that liaised with you were no longer the same team that saw you during the agency review and pitch day. I’m sure it has happened to some of you out there.

Sad to say, such encounters are not uncommon. In fact, this post is inspired by a friend of a friend who shared his frustration with me during a networking session. He was indignant that such a renowned agency would give him the snout so shortly after being appointed. He said he was “conned”. I was not surprised at his reaction; it was a misfit, a mismatch, from the start. He basically selected the wrong marketing agency.

Why?

The value of his company’s business is just under $250,000 and the big boys he invited are definitely more comfortable playing ball in a higher league. The simple rule in selecting the right marketing or advertising agency is this: The smaller your business, the smaller the agency you should hire. The larger your organisation, the less dependent you are on the size of the marketing agency and would be free to choose the most appropriate marketing partner.

We have to be pragmatic. The client hires a marketing agency not to churn out pretty campaigns. His objective is to have these extra brains to crank out more money for him. Likewise, the head honchos of these large agencies also want to make more money. $250,000 is probably desert on their usual silver platter of entree, but still, a nice-to-have. Do you honestly think that they will send their best people to serve a small account? They will get their best brains to conceptualize the pitch campaign, burn midnight oil to make sure every “i” is dotted and “t” is crossed and get their best suit (ad jargon for account executive) to put on a dazzling display of showmanship just for the benefit of the pitch. However, these will NOT be the same people who are going to work the account on a daily basis. These people will be reserved for the prima donna client who pays top dollars. Don’t blame the marketing agency (or advertising agency) because that’s what most companies would do to win a pitch, seal a deal. Next time, just be smart to ask who will be servicing the account if selected.

Hiring the wrong marketing (or advertising) agency will not only waste your money and time, it will also give you false expectations and high hopes that will eventually burst like a balloon. You can read my other post “4 Great Tips to Selecting the Best Marketing/Advertising Agency” on how to hire a marketing/adverting agency. You should also read this short, alternate view about “How to Select Your Marketing Agency” to get more ideas to help you make the right decisions in hiring or firing your marketing or advertising agency. So, when it is time to select a new team, do yourself a favour by remembering that you are not merely recruiting a company that does great advertising work. The beautiful creative is just one jigsaw piece to the entire picture. You are actually hiring marketing experts to help you grow your business and increase your profits. Whenever I’m asked by potential client how Versa Creations can help them. My reply is usually, “We position ourselves as your extended marketing arm to help you grow your business and increase your profit margins.”

Remember, contact me via vivienne@versacreations.com when it’s time to review your agencies. There’s no loss to you to have another opinion, another view.

Read These Popular Posts:

4 Great Tips to Selecting a Marketing/Advertising Agency

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[tags]ad agency, advertising agency, marketing agency, agency pitch, creative pitch, cheat by advertising or marketing agency, [/tags]

14 Replies to “Cheated by your Marketing Agency through a Pitch?”

  1. Vivianie..
    Its will be create that if you watch “the Secret” DVD.. Suggested that you can wrote it in more positive way. Thanks

  9. I think problems like this can afford to find help from executive recruiters. You just need to an executive recruiter directory to find someone who can do this job efficiently and productively! You might need somebody else to do that!

  10. Hey, very interesting post.

    My written English is not so good so I write in German:

    “Lieber den Spatz in der Hand, als die Taube auf dem Dach.”

    Yours sincerely
    Seo

  11. As the owner of a small Reno Nevada ad agency, I couldn’t agree with the article more. ‘The smaller the company, the smaller the agency you should hire’ is perfect. With our clients, the pitch, the creative and execution are all handled by a small crew, so we get to know our clients and they get to know us. I even try to answer the phone as much as I can…it goes a long way when the client is talking to the boss on the first try.

  12. Hi Jim
    Thanks for dropping by. Small agency like us just need to take time to prove to the client that we are as good as the bigger boys. Many of us were actually trained from there or has a mentor that’s from there.

  13. This is a really great point that you bring up about being careful about the size of the agency you hire. Making sure it is in line with the size of your own company.

    I am always wishing that my email advertising campiagns do well enough without having to hire additional people. But there is a point where you must expand, I suppose.

  14. Dear Anonymous
    Thank you for your views. Yes, come to a point, we need to leverage on others to grow. Like a plant, we’ll wither and die if we aren’t growing.

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