Above: Would Don Draper & Sterling Cooper have embraced social media marketing?
As more and more marketing directors focus attention on social media, it’s critical that advertising agencies take steps to further educate themselves on what their clients will inevitably ask them for.
Sure, there is some debate whether traditional marketing firms should even be serving social media strategy to begin with, but the fact of the matter is this: Ad agencies have a responsibility to their clients in understanding the constant shift in communications.
The purpose of this post isn’t to criticize ad firms who haven’t grasped social media yet — it’s to explore what roadblocks might lie ahead and how to get past them. If this lights a fire under just one employee at one agency, then I’ll be happy.
Below are some reasons why an agency might be slower to adopt new media tactics. (I spent seven years at a communications firm in my past life, so I speak with a little authority here.)
The existing business model. Many ad firms are based on the hourly rate model, meaning that employees can get judged by an hourly output. This structure places little to no value on the education and immersion hours required for employees to successfully ramp up in social media and best practices. Not only should agencies find benefit in education, they also have to understand that it will be ongoing.
Entrenched roles. In any workplace, it’s easy to slip into a comfortable “category,” meaning you will perform X, Y and Z, and that’s all. Some organizational cultures will frown upon team members showing interest in areas outside their own expertise — they see this is a “distracted” employee. In my previous career, I was interested in a thousand things at once, which surely made for a very frustrated employer. My advice to agencies would be to give your “distracted” team members a long leash on two or three things (but not all thousand).
Applying traditional metrics. Social media marketing initiatives require different definitions of success than what marketers are used to. I’ve heard “We tried it, but it just didn’t work” from agency people, but very few of them established what success was supposed to look like in the first place. We’re very clear on our “What We Do” page that social media initiatives are about listening, conversation and community engagement, not sales or numbers.
There’s not enough time. Trust me, agencies already have their hands full with creative direction, public relations, copywriting, website design and brand-building — necessary roles that won’t be going away any time soon. One option is to make time for it using a forced-march approach. Another option is to bring in a third party to help out. (Some of our best customers are marketing firms!)
Instead of long-winded lecture, I thought it would be more useful to share thoughts from a few individuals at local ad firms that have made a substaintial committment to learning more about social media:
Part of our business model is looking at all of the client’s sales and marketing objectives and matching that up with the best “media” to reach their goals. We recognized its importance early on and quickly organized a team around the discipline. There really isn’t a choice anymore whether a company wants to be involved in social media, it’s out there and if you don’t embrace the change that it represents, get ready to embrace the idea of irrelevance. Social media is here to stay and it’s only going to get bigger.
- Frank Maher, President, Integer Group
We have to acknowledge that consumers are controlling the conversation about brands more than ever and they are doing it real time, online, way faster than you can churn out an ad or distribute a news release. While social media is not the absolute answer to all marketing issues, I think it definitely provides insight into customer behaviors and allows clients to participate in conversations about their brand/product/service on a more proactive and intimate level. We’ve designated a team of specialists that are immersed in all levels of social media. They spend time scouring the web, read books and blogs, attend training, workshops and seminars and actively participate to understand social media inside and out.
- Nicole Torstenson, Sr. Marketing Strategist, Innova Ideas & Services
Social media matters because the marketplace has decided that it does. Like it or not, it’s becoming as mainstream as picking up the phone. This isn’t something that can be studied and understood from afar. You have to just dive in and get your hands dirty. At MMG, we continue to learn by experimenting, sampling, learning from other’s attempts and by collaboration.
- Drew McLellan, Founder, McLellan Marketing Group
If you currently work at a marketing firm (or any organization trying to learn about the social web), I’d love to hear how your company is addressing these issues. Please share your experiences, challenges and successes below.
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