From AdAge (original article)

NEW YORK (AdAge.com) — For some marketers, a new year means a new agency. If that’s your company’s annual resolution, you should know that line of thinking will lead to a bad reputation in adland.

Agency new-business executives and industry search consultants report a growing blacklist of sorts, composed of marketers that tend to put ad duties into play every year or two. Thanks to rapid turnover in the chief marketing officer seat (a CMO’s tenure averages 28 months, according to the most recent figures from executive search firm Spencer Stuart) and pressure to perform amid the troubled economy, long-lasting agency-marketer relationships are becoming more rare.

“I have a huge disagreement with people changing their agencies like they change their underwear,” said Jane Bedford, partner at the Bedford Group, a consultancy based in Atlanta. “Our clients tell us it takes them about three to six months for them to get fully engaged with their agencies. It’s very difficult for an agency to get up and running, and totally please the client, within the first year.”

And that’s coming from an exec who actually benefits when accounts go into review.

Take Chipotle: In January 2004, the burrito chain tapped Mother, New York, to be its first advertising agency. Six years later, that account has cycled through four different shops: After Mother came TDA Advertising & Design, Boulder, Colo.; Devito/Verdi, New York; Butler Shine Stern & Partners, San Francisco; and, its latest, hired this month, Compass Point Media, a division of Campbell Mithun in Minneapolis.

Thinking twice
The regularity with which Chipotle changes its agencies is more than most. But it’s hardly the only marketer with a penchant for flitting from shop to shop. Retailer Ikea and luxury automaker BMW are known for frequently reviewing their creative and media accounts, and Mitsubishi Motors North America moves its ad business around a fair amount as well.

Too many reviews could also mean that, over time, the very best shops will think twice before going after those accounts. “Agencies do a risk assessment when deciding whether to pitch an account, and there’s definitely a toxicity factor they look at. If [a client] does a lot of reviews, the client gets blacklisted,” Ms. Bedford said.

Even at a time when agencies are hungry for more revenue, such flip-flopping has consequences: Two different new-business executives said two accounts they wouldn’t touch with a 10-foot pole are 1-800-Flowers and Quiznos, as the businesses seem to be too volatile, regardless of their billings. The marketers did not respond to requests for comment.

Another consequence is cost: Constantly opening reviews can be incredibly costly and disruptive to both the marketer — for whom travel and other fees associated with agency reviews racks up — and the agencies, which shell out thousands of dollars in the hopes of crafting the perfect pitch that could win the business. If they do land it, there’s often an added cost of having to quickly ramp up freelance and full-time staff to work on the new account.

Michael Houston, chief marketing officer at Grey, New York, said the window for agencies to prove themselves has lowered dramatically.

“Results in our business are no longer evaluated on a semi-annual or quarterly basis, but on a monthly, weekly and sometimes daily basis,” Mr. Houston said. “Couple that with the level of dollars attached to the advertising line item on a client’s balance sheet, and we find clients forced to justify their marketing ROI in a way never seen before. In that process, agencies sometimes become the scapegoat, with the easy solution being to call an agency review.”

Consistency
What’s more, “serial reviewers” risk damaging their brand with inconsistent marketing messages.

“Clients shouldn’t be constantly jumping ship,” said Lisa Colantuono, managing partner at AAR Partners. As communication between consumer and client evolves, “they need to work together with their agencies. If that foundation is constantly changing, the marketer is hurting themselves in the long run in terms of building brand loyalty with the consumer.”

The Association of National Advertisers, the marketer’s trade group, doesn’t exactly see it this way. The ANA’s position is that conducting formal agency evaluations on a regular basis offers the best chance for fixing problems before frustration sets in. It believes that the companies that have two-way assessments at regular intervals have the most-productive relationships. “Having a formal agency evaluation process is always imperative but even more so at a time of heightened focus on marketing accountability,” Bob Liodice, president-CEO of the ANA, has said.

Said Grey’s Mr. Houston: “Desperation may be something new to many industries in the recession, but it’s something the agency business has known, embraced and perpetuated for decades. Agencies only have themselves to blame by playing right into the hands of these serial agency-review ‘players’ [and] making it too easy for the client to bully us.”

Endeavour Marketing and Media – A Murfreesboro, TN Advertising Agency

From Ann Handley (of MarketingProfs.com) for American Express Open Forum:

Dec 29, 2009 -

What do bacon, Bogota, yumberries and Foursquare have in common? They are all on the list of 100 Things to Watch in 2010 by the marketing communications company JWT.

Certain trends on the list suggest clear implications for businesses. JWT’s Ann Mack says that many items on it reflect broader shifts, like a growing action around health and wellness and environmental issues, to crazy-fast developments in the tech space.

There are also a number of trends tied to the so-called Great Recession (“trip bundling,” for example) and those that speak to various demographic, political and economic power shifts (“East Africa Wired,” and “TV for Tween Boys” among them). Interestingly for business, Mack says, the list “points to the way industries are redefining or reinventing themselves to survive or to fully leverage these power shifts.”

What trends might affect your small business in 2010? Here a subset you might find worth watching (as well as a few I found just plain interesting). The full list is in alphabetical order, below.

1. 3D at Home
3D is the new HD. Having successfully invaded the big screen, it’s on its way to the small screen: James Cameron, director of the new 3D film Avatar, will promote Panasonic’s 3D sets, out next year, which will compete with versions from Sony and Samsung.

See Rest of List

Endeavour Marketing & Media recently spent a week in Knoxville (GO VOLS!) shooting video for one of our clients.  The week after the trip we started the magic of post-production and while we were all very pleased with what we were seeing take form in the editing bay,  that led us to think of what the fundamentals of great video work were (at least according to Endeavour!).  So here are the “Endeavour 8:”

1) Outline – you should start with a very succint brief from the client about their objectives, target audience, distribution points for the video, etc.  THEN, you as the agency get to work with the client adding, deleting and massaging that brief (after all, that’s why they hired you…for your experience).

2) Storyboards – From this client and agency-vetted outline, succint storyboards should developed that will help your actors, camera operators, audio engineers, etc. know how they need to set up.  Can’t tell you how many shoots I’ve been on (before I got to Endeavour) where literally hours were wasted because nobody knew where the next shot was, the lighting was an issue, etc.  I’m a certified scuba diver and we have a saying “Plan your Dive, Dive your Plan.”

3) Scouting/Advance Work - while the outline and storyboards give you a good roadmap, extensive scouting of your locations can make all the difference in the world.  I call this phase, the “smell test.”  Is that conference room the client told you about really impressive or is it a closet?  Does that great outdoor shot, have a highway running right beside it or a neighborhood dog that loves to yap?  Again, scouting these ahead of time can save you time and get you the best shots.  In my former life, I spent 5 years on political campaigns and I worked for one of the best advance men in the business, Rick Ahearn.

4) Scripting – Professional Talent needs and thrives with a script for on-camera or voice-over work.  If you’re interviewing the CEO, a customer, etc. avoid a script like the plague and instead offer an outline of what you’ll be looking for during the shoot.  Non-professional talent takes a script, memorizes it the morning before in the shower and regurgitates it on camera, leaving no room for lateral thinking (don’t even try asking them a question they didn’t prepare for!) or ad libbing.  Some of the best lines we’ve ever put on a reel are off the cuff remarks or “I forgot to mention” type lines.  Give your non-professional actors an outline so they can think laterally about what they need to talk about

5) The Director – having a great Director can make all the difference in the world.  The Director should know what they want from the beginning to end and have the gut to stop and readjust if need be.  Most of all Directors should make decisions and be decisive.  Timid Director = Wasted Time = Inferior Product.  The Director should not be a dictator however.  They should encourage and solicit feedback from the crew during the entire process and then take that data to make the best decisions.  A great Director should also be the guiding force in what they are getting from the talent, helping them find the right emotion, mindset, etc.

6) Post-Production – having a skilled and experienced editor is important, nuff said!  Don’t hire an intern, get a pro.  Focus on the message and not silly little effects, animation, fog machines, etc.  The message is key!

7) Marketing – having the marketing execs in the process is essential to ensure that the message applies to the product, the company, the campaign, etc.

Scalability/Distribution – your audience consumes media and video across multiple mediums from websites, to social networks like YouTube, cell phones, etc.  Make sure your core-video can be sliced up and reformatted for viewing on multiple touchpoints.

We’ll post the video campaign talked about above on this blog later (and our various social networks) so you can see if we hit the “Endeavour 8!”

Later,

Harold Henn

Chief Marketing Officer – The Endeavour