Advertising Agencies: Sitting Ducks

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Your client just left. You just lost the account. You feel like a sitting duck. Just slightly vulnerable. Has this ever happened to you? Artwork courtesy of Michael Bedard.

The TRUTH is, "NO ONE EVER QUITS WHEN THEY'RE MAKING MONEY." Would anyone care to share some of their client's exit strategies? I'll bet the truth is stranger than fiction.

General Mills History Repeats Itself

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Not long ago THE BREAKFAST OF CHAMPIONS lost. Positioning the brand as non-descript and generic "WHOLE GRAIN" rather than race-winning "WHOLE WHEAT" caused the brand to become delisted at major chain grocery and drug stores across America. But it reduced costs to employ non-descript whole grain. Now General Mills is rolling out the same campaign again, only last time it was one brand. Now it is all. Investors. You do the math. By repositioning Wheaties as WHOLE WHEAT again, I increased Wheaties distribution 24% and won Advertising Age Magazine's Annual Award as The Year's Best Repositioned Brand.

The Gaurdian of Product Differentiation

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The Calle School for Product Intelligence
Guardian of Product Differentiation
http://www.callecompany.com/

Subject: Product-based selling-solutions solve all marketing problems

(Los Angeles) - You can’t power up brands with advertising if they’ve been fed a consistent diet of day-old-data-salad[1] for years. You need our Disruptive Consumer Intelligence®.

To go from average brand to breakthrough in less than six weeks, accept our invitation! Get the 100 Hidden Product Dimensions® That Strengthen Any Brand’s Positioning Strategy Forever.

Switching agencies won’t power up your brands. It just needlessly upsets people who were doing their best when what they really needed was the knowledge to take your business to the next level. Switching agencies also won’t power up your brands because agencies don’t want you to have better ideas. Crafty Chairmen realize that Clio’s are the glass beads that impress. There’s no need for substance when bling will suffice. Agency execs know that if you actually had better ideas, you could then sell more of your product for less money. And what advertising agency wants that? But the truth is, if you switch agencies the required homework will still go undone. Who wants to pay for homework? It’s hard enough just to get clients to approve production budgets. Penny wise and pound foolish, brands subsist, year-after-year, on meager diets of day-old-data-salad.

Consequently, you don’t have to look far to find marketers who shoot from the hip and don’t do their homework. That’s what sent Crispin Porter + Bogusky to detention when they hit their dead end with ConAgra. Don’t act surprised. Not doing your homework is wide spread. You don't do it either. “There are plenty of smart, talented, successful people who are able to take their business only so far because of the limitations of their vision and leadership.”

Switching agencies, jettisoning brands, constant promotions, licensing, products unpopular in the face of changing consumer preference, the need for product placement, the ceaseless media pursuit of consumer ears and eyeballs and more are all signs that your company does not know what truly motivates consumers about your products. How much more profitable would your company be if it could get your brands off the artificial life support that has kept them going the past thirty years? In all that time, your company has not figured it out. We can differentiate your product so that consumers come looking for you. Schedule a meeting. Find out more. Reply today

[1] Day-old-data-salad is made with any combination of gathered and measured data.