Monday, March 30th, 2009
The two big questions that ad agencies are asking:
“How do we price new media and what type of services should we offer?”
Joe Burton, COO of Universal McCann agency, explains:
“Our industry is facing the its most significant change since the invention of TV - the migration to Digital. Digital is unlike any other medium and should not be viewed using traditional benchmarks. The high-volume, low-dollar, high-complexity nature of Digital programs makes it the most labor intensive medium in the advertising industry.”
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Monday, March 30th, 2009
Many businesses that are in trouble are in trouble for a simple reason: they’re the wrong size. A newspaper that only had a few dozen employees would be doing great today. But they have hundreds or thousands of employees because that was an appropriate scale twenty years ago. When I started my first web company fifteen years ago, the idea that you could be successful with six or ten employees was crazy, but today many of the most successful companies have not many more than that. That’s 15,000 fewer employees than eBay has.
It’s tempting to get bigger. But is bigger better?
In many cases, it’s worse, particularly when you can leverage reliable systems that are cheaper and faster and more stable in the outside world.
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Friday, March 27th, 2009
Lately, I’ve been thinking about what television advertising
will look like over the next few years. Although the 30-second spot pallbearers are suited and ready to go, that doesn’t mean video is on the way out. In fact, I think it’s just now getting its wind.
Yes, I realize that sounds ridiculous. After 75 years of massive growth, we’re just now getting started? Yes.
Television is not dying, not even close. It’s growing as fast as ever before.
This sounds like we can relax, use our same old television commercials, and whistle all the way to the bank. But technology is too fickle a friend, and as it has empowered our abilities, now it will empower others’.
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Monday, March 23rd, 2009
Here are two testaments to adjusting and not retreating in order to outlast hard times. Like us, these companies know that confidence is contagious, even our very own homegrown Cessna.
Friday, March 20th, 2009
Tough times never last, but tough business leaders do. In a marketplace amidst economy turmoil, only the bold and tough can survive. What can make you fearless in uncertain times?
Hone your most valuable skills
To face uncertain times, focus on your strengths. Focus on what you do that others can’t and put it out there to your prospects and customers. Assess all your qualities and abilities that got you where you are today. Be fully focused, hone your skills and acquire expertise that is most valuable for your business right now.
Use strengths that make you different
Under extraordinary economic conditions continue doing your work, curtail expenses where necessary and do everything you can to not lose existing business. This strategy will help you weather the storm. If you fail to stand up, stand out, work for something important, you will be out of the business. Use your strengths that make you different and make a difference for your customers.
Find ways to deepen customer relationships
The path to boldness is to build strong relationships so that you are not left alone during tough times. You may reward your customers for their faith in you, your services or products, even in trying times. Invite them for lunch; stay connected through phone calls, networking events and social sites. This is the time to develop customer intimacy and deep relationships to secure your company’s future.
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Monday, March 16th, 2009
“Why would we go backwards now when the industry is generally locking the brakes and cutting spending? We want to send the message that this is a brand that’s moving forward and is active. In a world of bad news and fear, confidence is contagious.”
-Scott Keough, Audi CMO
Monday, March 16th, 2009
Q&A with Miles Nadal, chairman and chief executive of MDC Partners Inc., the world’s ninth-largest marketing communications firm.
Q:
How do you think ad agencies will need to change in order to meet the economic challenges ahead?
A:
The impact of the economy affects all business. Companies are by the day shrinking and they will be much more discriminating about how they deploy capital. Clients will be far more focused on where agencies put their resources — more focused on putting it into talent and spending less on overhead and non-productive costs. Clients will look at campaigns and strategies that produce results in the marketplace. An ongoing theme has been targetability and measurability of impact, of return on marketing investment.
But we have a $600-billion industry globally — no matter what the change is, it’s still an enormous industry and enormous opportunity. If you produce brilliant work, clients will ultimately beat a path to your door.
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Friday, March 13th, 2009
The drumbeat of doom for TV advertising has sounded for more than a decade—DVRs, channel surfing, fragmentation, clutter, the flight to digital media … Jay Leno moving to primetime. Now the recession has even TV’s most reliable moneybags of yore, such as Procter & Gamble and General Motors, yanking big wads of cash off the table.
Yet a funny thing is emerging from the smoldering ruins of what may be the ugliest quarter TV has ever encountered financially:
A growing body of evidence which suggests not only that TV advertising still works, but that it may be working better than ever.
Analyses by people and companies that have studied or made bets on advertising effectiveness for years find no evidence that all of the problems TV advertising faces have done anything to render it less effective at its ultimate goal—selling stuff.
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