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Nauseam
James Surowiecki ("Buy This Ad
Agency!") would like us to believe that the reason clients are jettisoning
their advertising agencies is because the agencies don't know how to market
themselves. In fact, much more has changed than meets the eye.
When David Ogilvy started
his ad agency, corporations looked at ad agencies as marketing consultants.
They would approach an agency and basically say: "Here's our product. How do we
sell it?" Consequently, agencies were able to attract the top marketing talent
around. On the research and account management side, this meant the top MBAs.
And, because clients expected elite services from their agencies, they were
willing to pay the high salaries such professionals demand.
That's changed. Management
consulting firms realized that ad agencies had tapped a lucrative market in
selling marketing services. And they already had a cadre of MBAs from the top
schools. Suddenly, ad agencies were faced with substantial competition for one
of their basic services. Eventually, they were no longer able to compete for
the top MBAs, because these weren't the services their clients were
demanding.
I don't really think it's
fair to characterize this shift as a "marketing problem." I think it was a
fundamental shift in thinking on the client side. Agencies had been seen as
marketing partners. Now they're seen as service vendors, not unlike any other
outsourced vendor.
Today, we
have the sad situation where most marketing decisions are made long before ad
agencies get involved. Typically, the client calls an agency and says: "Here's
the strategy. Execute it as cheaply as possible." That's a big change.
-- Jeremy C.
Feldman
Seven
Brides for Seven Geeks
What
Michael Lewis ("The New Organization Marriage") doesn't mention is that these
so-called power marriages are ever the same. Since Restoration comedy, the
normative couple--he the rake and she the one who will never, ever agree to
marry anyone--find themselves in society (read: office structure) at the
highest levels and must prove themselves to one another by being bright,
competent, and able to handle lesser people in their circle. Having done so,
they finally agree to marry but with stipulations: She has privacy, freedom to
pursue her own life and friends, control over money, etc. The deal is struck
and creates a new kind of marriage--or so they hope. She wins the admiration of
her peers for landing the rake and he wins by landing the filly who was known
as impossible to break. Status achieved.
-- Richard
Geldard
Disheartened in Hong Kong
I thought
you folks would be quicker off the mark. It's a pea-soupy spring Thursday
morning in Hong Kong, and I was looking forward to a cup of coffee and dose of
Slate
to sort out Clinton's beating the Jones rap. Instead,
you're still leading with Jacob Weisberg on Clinton's African apology
("Sorry Excuse") and Cullen Murphy's discourse on lying ("The Lie of the
Land"). Scott Shuger's OK ("Today's Papers")
but kinda warmed over and unsatisfying. I count on you guys for instant
analysis, not the play-by-play. I don't know if it's connected, but you were
quicker when you were free. After anteing up last month to subscribe I still
love you, but this morning I'm disappointed.
-- Jonathan
Ferziger Hong Kong
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