This first appeared in the AdNews print magazine. You can read it all below but if you want it as soon as it goes to press, you better subscribe here.
There’s one thing that bothers me in this industry I recently re-joined, and that’s the blaming of specific client functions without understanding their role.
Take procurement, for example. Talk to anyone in agency side, from the highest ranks to the most recent newcomers, and the overwhelming message you’ll hear about client procurement is along the lines of, “All they want is cheap rates and fees!”
I might have thought that too, once upon a time, but going client side changed my perception. The CFO and his teams always placed the best interests of the company at the centre of decision making in regards to suppliers. And, now that I’m back in agency land, I don’t mind being called a supplier.
We think we in the media industry run on skinny margins. Well, I have news for you – so do a lot of clients. Not just among car dealers and car manufacturers which has been my experience – I believe it’s safe to assume that marketers in many varied sectors also face the challenge of skinny margins, considering the huge capital investment they undertake. Add to that pressure the need to meet their targets and the business objectives they report to various stock markets around the world, and a much more complicated picture emerges.
So since reverting back from client side to agency life, I have taken a keen positive outlook to dealing with procurement departments, pitch consultants and auditors and I suggest my agency counterparts across the industry do the same. After all, we all share the same vision – to make our clients’ business successful.
A wise mentor of mine always said: What is the purpose of business? To stay in business. Wise words to remember, no matter which side of the business you’re in.
In this age of collaboration and transparency, it should be evident to all that our industry needs to stop playing the blame game and adopt a more mature attitude in dealing with procurement teams.
Working together rather than against each other is a more effective way to achieve our common goals.
A critical part of nurturing a more productive approach towards procurement is demonstrating the indispensible value, insights and expertise agencies bring to the client relationship.
As a starting point, I sincerely suggest that we need to be better at defining our value equation – moving from meaningless media speak to measureable business outcomes that drive the clients’ bottom line results. Agencies should fully explain the reason for advertising and marketing: to elicit a business outcome, sell more, move more, be more profitable or whatever else it may be.
If as an industry we can’t demonstrate something as basic as this, then the cost part of the value chain will always be the crude measurement tool, and fair enough.
So don’t blame other people and especially don’t blame procurement, blame yourself. Classic time to look in the mirror.
Mark McCraith is CEO of Maxus Australia