If Agency New Business was an Onion…

…it would be worth peeling back a layer.

 

A data point that stood out in the RSW/US 2016 New Year Outlook Survey was 34% of Marketers indicating plans to increase spending somewhat or significantly in traditional media.  

 It was noteworthy for two reasons:

• This is the first time in recent years that Marketers indicated intention to increase traditional media spending to this degree.
• It far outpaced the expectations Agencies expressed regarding clients’ traditional media spending plans: only 19% of Agencies forecast traditional media spending to increase somewhat or significantly.

 

The gap between Marketer and Agency forecasts was so compelling that we wanted to see what more there was to learn behind the Marketer responses. To great degree, it’s a matter of size.

Analyzing Marketer responses by annual revenue, it became apparent that those Marketers forecasting more traditional media spending were those whose revenues greater than $500M.  Furthermore, nearly half of these respondents post revenue greater than $1 Billion.

Perhaps not surprisingly, none of the respondents from companies of this size forecast decreasing spending in general.  For them, social media was the only exception, and this was limited to only two respondents.

While questions still linger around agency/client alignment at the strategic level*, here’s a tactical implication from the agency new business perspective: if your firm excels in traditional media, focusing your new business efforts on larger companies will be more likely to generate results.

Looking ahead, here’s another layer to the onion: the question that will evolve is – and this will happen before too long:  “What is traditional media?”

As noted in the 2016 Salesforce State of Marketing report, “the term ‘digital marketing’ borders on redundancy.”  The report goes on, saying 2016 is a “tipping point”, with more than 70% of Marketers total budgets directed toward digital channels.  When does “digital” become the new “traditional”?

This, of course, raises further agency new business questions.  Just one is: if your business was founded on digital expertise at a time when it was rare, and your services are exclusively digital, how do you differentiate yourself as redundancy grows in “digital marketing”?

So many layers to peel back in the agency new business world.

Answers exist to all these questions.  It does take some peeling back of the layers to define a strategy that uniquely carries your firm to agency new business success.

Take advantage of our resources, or give us a call.

---

*Related reading:

Post: Agencies: Have you Checked Your Client Alignment Recently?