Why Can’t (Some) Agencies Change?
Can the leopard really change his spots? Don Draper and the rest of the Mad Men might say sure. But does saying the words “we’ve changed” really mean there is progress in the right direction? Actions speak louder than words.
“Manage the change, or it will manage you.”
In our world of constant evolution, “the most successful organizations are those that embed change from top to bottom.” We’ve been touting “change or die” for over a dozen years. So why do so many agencies pretty much behave like they did in 2006?
It is not for lack of trying or desire. If you subscribe to AdAge or AdWeek or Forbes or BusinessInsider you already know that certain ways of working are simply on the way out. Client demands are accelerating the evolution. But why do some agencies remain impervious to the change necessary for them to thrive in the future?
Inherent bias towards existing production capabilities
When you are a carpenter with a hammer, everything looks like a nail. Agencies might be able to pitch something different. But they are inherently biased to the past because of their existing capabilities. If your staff is built to write editorial or magazine content, it is difficult to pivot overnight to the staff capabilities necessary to create videos or VR. What got you here might not be what propels you forward. Hard decisions must be made about staffing in order to invest in change.
“I just can’t take another meeting with a half-dozen account supes”
An unwieldy process can prevent agility
A client-side friend of mine told me the other day she was on the verge of firing her agency because she just “can’t take another meeting with a half-dozen account supes” clustered around a conference table buried in their laptops and not contributing any real value. Is it any surprise it takes six weeks to schedule a review of creative concepts? That process cannot possibly create compelling content at the speed of culture. It’s a process designed for billing hours first and foremost. The default for this way of working is too many meetings and not enough amazing, relevant work. Sure, clients are culpable in this issue. But at the end of the day, it is the agency’s problem to fix.
The same people are still in charge
Anybody who has spent more than a few years at a legacy agency knows how difficult it is to bring in new leadership and empower them for success. Maybe the faces change, but if the process and structures of the agency do not change, how can changing leadership truly deliver? If the ECD has created a certain kind of award-winning campaigns in the past, why should they be required to learn new tricks? Don Draper still has a corner office on Madison Avenue and still very much likes to go to Cannes every year. With or without his clients.
CMOs don’t know how to get change from their agencies
Let’s face it. There probably weren’t too many courses available in digital marketing analytics or e-commerce or social media marketing when you got your MBA from Kellogg in 1988. The pace of change has outstripped anybody’s ability to keep up. How does a CMO demand change from their agency when the CMO themselves doesn’t understand the fundamentals that need evolution in their own organizations? The agency can be a biased collaborator. Too many times when the CMO says something like “so what do you think about Snapchat” the agency will come back with an 84 page deck and a freshly minted Snapchat expert (whom last week was writing tweets for someone else) and make an argument to move a significant part of the budget to this new and exciting channel. No wonder CMOs are the shortest lived of the C-suite.
Money makes the rules
As CMO, does it really make sense for you to perpetuate relationships that automatically deposit 20-30% of your budget into the pockets of the shareholders of a public network or the bankrolls of private equity investors? Arguing that network agencies provide some safety just doesn’t hold water since they are just as vulnerable to market forces as a smaller shop. If you truly want innovation, you will get better, faster and less expensive results working with a small boutique or a medium sized owner-operated agency where your account is a major one and you get to deal directly with the principals. Every dollar of your budget must be productive. Your job as CMO depends on it.
A New Hope
I am sure more than a few of my agency friends will dispute the tenor of this post. Of course there are many great examples of agencies that have managed change well and have continued to do amazing, relevant work. And I am sure just as many agency friends will see perhaps a bit too much of their past or present in these thoughts. There is no reason for despair! If there is one thing my 23+ years in this business has taught me, the more things change, the more they will continue to change. Every one of these challenges can be turned to the positive. Forces throughout the industry are pushing hard to make this happen. The key is to manage the change before it manages you.
Jonathan Ashton is the Founding Partner of Ringer, a cooperative of independent senior marketers helping CMOs and their brands to grow faster at a lower cost. Ringer does this with a ruthless focus on the personal priorities of the CMO: finding and attracting new customers, improving revenue performance, intensifying data-driven strategies, and accelerating brand transformation.