It’s my privilege to introduce a guest post from Sharon Toerek, a Principal of Toerek Law, a firm that focuses on counseling ad, marketing and creative agencies on their industry-specific legal issues.  Legal basics and nuances within the agency/marketing services firm landscape aren’t addressed often enough, and so I was thrilled when Sharon agreed to […]

  In physics perhaps, position is relative. In the agency new business world, however, a “relative position” could place you off the chart. Of the many intriguing insights exposed through our 2016 Thought Leader Survey, one is: Although the six participating Thought Leader panelists posed questions across a range of topics, the importance of strong, differentiated […]

Marketers must feel like they live under a waterfall with the steady volume of agency new business contacts they receive each week.  We DO talk with a lot of them every day, and a common refrain we hear is some variation of: “Do you know how many (fill in the blank: calls, emails, letters, etc.) […]

It’s my pleasure to introduce a guest post by Brian Shea, founder of Shea Consulting.  Brian helps agencies improve their new business efforts through CRM, sales process improvement, and marketing automation. He’s been working with organizations to build their business development practices since the early 2000’s. While I was aware of his work with agencies, […]

PepsiCo has it right and has given its marketing people and the agencies involved with the account an early Christmas present. Ad Age reported in an article recently they’re eliminating procurement’s involvement in making decisions as it relates to marketing and agencies.  Amen!  Hallelujah! I’m all for procurement. I think it serves a noble purpose…when buying […]

The Agency Management Institute and Audience Audit recently released a new study, Hiring and Firing Insights 2015 and you should definitely check it out. They surveyed over 500 marketing decision-makers to “better understand the circumstances and motivations behind the hiring and firing of advertising and marketing agencies.” Download it here at no cost. A few […]

And Persistent.      Okay.  I said it.  AGAIN. We do talk about polite persistence a lot at RSW/US.  Actually, we do more than TALK about it, we practice it.   But if you’re a bit weary of us talking about being “politely persistent” in pursuit of new business prospects for clients, we could call […]

There are three words of wisdom I live by and have impressed upon our team since the start of the business 10 years ago (11/11/2005). Add value Continuously re-invent Stay true to your core Actually there’s a fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh that are more important than any of these three: Be nice, respectful, thankful, […]

I’ve been on a jag lately in regards to clarity and conciseness in your new business messaging. (Well, not just lately, actually constantly.) Any time I write an email, a letter-whatever vehicle I may be using to prospect-I always ask myself, “How can I make this shorter, more concise and more relevant to the prospect?” […]

INFLUENCE.   In agency new business – where facing prospects who hold the decision making power that can potentially carry your firm to new heights – influence is a coveted ability. At every phase of the new business development process, building credibility and influence is vital. It’s quite an art to accomplish this pleasantly and […]