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About Peter Gabany
Expertise
Strategic planning: Objective based advertising, Ad creative, Writing, Photography - buying and making, Illustration - buying, Print, Outdoor, Event, Media, Media Planning, Broadcast, How to select an agency, What the client must provide, Pitching a client / being pitched

Experience
Over 25 years in the business - 22 years operating an agency. Creative direction and agency management.

Education/Credentials
RGD Ontario - www.rgdontario.com
CAAP - ICA
CPPP - ICA

You are here: Experts > Jobs/Careers > Advertising > Advertising > over smart clients

Advertising - over smart clients

Expert: Peter Gabany - 10/26/2009

Question
Hi. Our agency just pitched to a potential client with some advertising needs. Budget $55,000/- a year. All went well, we finished the presentation n all.Then spoke the Chief Managing Director (client)(who went out for a smoke while the presentation was on) that he loved the ideas and wanted to give us the account - but wanted us to do the marketing and sales parts as well - to which i explaied that sale is a completely different job.
He explained, he wanted to give the complete job to one agency as (acc. to him) the ad agency will advertise and send the ad budget but the quality of the ad campaign can be measured by sales only. and if ad agency is give the right to spend on behalf of the client they should also be responsible to the sales, and then he targets that an we were supposed to meet in terms of sale - 1st month - this much, in six month this much... and so on.
The product in not in the market - its a new launch. so i have understood the product but i certainly do not know the quality. I background checked the client - they are, ok, and pay the mmoney on time etc. but till now they are just channel partners of some product and the new product is home service for similar products.
1) i dont doubt their knkowledge on the product coz they have been selling it for long time.
2) quality for support service on the product is a diff thing.
3) support service is on a subscription bases - sales of which i have to take care of.
4) i just a letter from the client saying that - We understand that the initial market pull would completely depend on the communication strategy, media plan and its delivery. Hence depending on the agency's vision and depth in the plan we may like to consider enhancing the budget from the present $55,000 to $110,000.
5) now they want 2 plans, one for each budget.
6) personally i dont think any company can just double the budget just like that. - i guess for this budget he might be banking on me to make sales first.
7) recent clarification - the budget he is telling me includes both advertising and marketing.
8) My agency is a 6 people small agency. we have handled such budgets and higher earlier but only for advertising not marketing or sales targets.
Need a lot of comments and help here. is it a do or not do. if its a do then how should i split the budgets for sales team and advertising.

Answer
Kirtiman,

The slippery slope. You are NOT in charge of the product, it's sales channels, its overall quality or their sales force so you can hardly be in charge of sales targets. And you don't have a stake in the company so therefore how can you be tied to it's overall success?

Looking at this whole thing it seems that the Marketing Manager does not know what he wants or what he needs, but he seems to have permission to have an ad agency so he is determining if you guys CAN DO HIS WORK. This will save his bacon, not yours.

You require a firm hand here. As much as you may wish this work, I would pass on it in a heartbeat. But let us review.

They are in a launch mode for a product.

There probably is a time-line for the launch and an expectation of when it goes to market and even a mini marketing plan that scopes out projections. Correct? If not then what is advertising to do?

You know too that the introduction of a new product to market is not about advertising its about Public Relations. You have got to get into the heads of the consumer why they need to purchase this thing and advertising is NOT going to do that - especially in the short term. iPod would not be close to where it is today without PR. And they would not of maintained their success if the product didn't perform as well as the ads indicated.

If you do know the effectiveness of the PR solution over advertising then you also know the propensity of a fickle media picking up the story is a crap shoot. Unless you can intrigue them with a distinct position or advantage of the product. You have to ask, is this a me-too product, a first to market, a cookie cutter product? Each one of these have assorted strategies to use to best leverage the market. And each one has a corresponding sales result.

And one of the most important questions rarely asked of the client or by the client – do we have the resources to support this launch? Can we maintain demand if successful? All to often companies have a small war chest to go to market but cannot sustain a continued salvo.

I would need to know some detail to offer much more here. To do a marketing plan you need some secondary research (at least) and you need to include the company and where it sits in the marketplace. Can you share that? Are they willing to share that information?

I trust that this is a start to a longer conversation. Please feel free to give me more information. Do not make promises to them and make certain that you are getting paid for your work - it is only fair.

Cheers,

Pete

905-885-9895

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