The Art Of Account Management: Why Grace Moran Is a Proud Yapper
Grace Moran is an account director at Coolr who has worked across various accounts during two years at the agency, including Lidl, Burger King and Dreams. With a passion for making innovative social-first content, her recent work includes the award-winning Save Another Way (…the Lidl Way) campaign.
LBB> How did you first get involved in account management and what appealed to you about it?
Grace> Before Coolr, I was actually working as a social media manager, which is another way of saying “jack of all trades”. Social media managers are responsible for everything when it comes to social, from creating the ideas and writing copy to presenting to the client, posting the content and community management.
When I came to Coolr, I moved into account management and really haven’t looked back. It’s so rewarding to be able to work with incredible minds across various teams – design, strategy, creative, studios – and provide them with a brief and guidance that leads to work that both the client and we as an agency can be proud of.
LBB> What is it about your personality, skills and experience that has made account management such a great fit?
Grace> I can still remember the feedback I had in my first performance review as a junior social media manager: Grace is hardworking, passionate, organised and creative, but she talks too much. At the time, this knocked my confidence hugely and made me withdraw at work.
However, what I’ve realised since working at Coolr is that it’s actually a great asset! Being able to communicate clearly and personably with lots of people is one of the most important parts of the job – this ensures that your team understand the brief and feel comfortable asking questions, but also puts you in a great position to build a strong and meaningful relationship with your clients. I’ve never been more proud to be a yapper!
LBB> What piece of advice would you give to someone just starting their career in account management?
Grace> Make yourself an expert on your client – you need to know the brand inside out. After all, every team in your agency, from strategy to design, relies on your brief to do their job. You need to ensure the work ladders up to what the client really wants, so you need to be capable of thinking like them.
LBB> Thinking back to some of your most challenging experiences you’ve had in your career, what do you think tends to lie at the heart of the more tense or difficult client-agency relationships?
Grace> A strong client-agency relationship relies heavily on both parties listening to each other. In the past, I’ve worked with clients who are completely unwilling to hear our opinion as their agency and social experts – this can be disheartening for the whole team and make it hard for account managers to ensure the best work is being made.
Likewise, I’ve seen agencies deliver work that’s repeatedly off-brief or ignore client feedback, which can also create tension and a lack of trust. By paying attention to each other’s opinions and needs, you can overcome those tricky periods and pave the way for a more positive relationship.
LBB> And what are the keys to building a productive and healthy relationship?
Grace> The most important thing is to just be yourself. Your client isn’t a corporate robot – they’re human just like you and will see through the fakeness if you’re trying to play a role. Take an interest in your clients beyond just the work and dial back on the jargon to build trust and comfort. Once you feel like you can talk about yourself, you’ll feel more confident with the difficult conversations too (and so will they!). And if they follow you on Insta, always follow back – that’s when you know you’ve made it!
LBB> What’s your view on disagreement and emotion - is there a place for it and if not, why not? If so, why - and what does productive disagreement look like?
Grace> You have to be able to disagree, both with your team and your client. Often, this is where your best work comes from! Clients don’t hire agencies to just say yes all the time – we’re there to challenge and push the creative too. Being bold and brave is often key to success for brands on social – we’ve seen this at Coolr with brands from Lidl to Burger King – but this can be scary for clients.
Having said all this, you also need to be selective about what you want to fight for. If you constantly disagree with your client on every little thing, it can look like you’re not listening or you don’t understand the brand. In account management, compromise is often your best friend.
LBB> Historically, account management has been characterised as the mediator in an adversarial client and creative relationship - what do you make of that characterisation, is there any nugget of truth in that or is it wildly inaccurate?
Grace> I do think there’s some truth in this. Creatives are understandably precious about their work and often want to go big and wacky, but it’s my responsibility as an account director to ensure that the ideas fit the brief provided by the client. Likewise, clients can be cautious about going too far creatively and in these instances, it’s also important to back the work you’re presenting. You wouldn’t have shown it to the client if you didn’t believe in it!
LBB> These days, agencies do so much beyond traditional campaigns and as account management you’re pulling together creative, experience, data, e-commerce, social and more - and that complexity can often be mirrored on the client stakeholder side too? What’s the key to navigating (and helping the client navigate) that complexity?
Grace> As an account manager or director, it’s impossible to be an expert in everything – especially when your agency specialises in social! However, by working closely with experts at Coolr, as well as with the other specialist agencies assigned to the account, you can build a good base level of knowledge that allows for strong cooperation and combined recommendations.
LBB> What recent projects are you proudest of and why? What was challenging about these projects from an account management perspective and how did you address those challenges? What was so satisfying about working on these projects?
Grace> I’ve been working with Lidl since June and can confidently say that it has been the most rewarding experience of my career, both from a client relationship perspective and in terms of creative opportunities. I’m lucky to work with clients who really understand and trust Coolr’s perspective as their social agency and this has led to the most exciting project I’ve ever worked on: Ode to Christmas.
This TikTok campaign was certainly challenging to turn around – there were very short timelines and complicated contracts and legalities to iron out regarding licensing songs, signing up talent and shooting parody content.
However, the key to success here was over-communication. We were updating the clients constantly to ensure that they felt involved in the process and this meant that we were also able to guarantee prompt feedback and minimal amends. The campaigns has now been nominated for multiple awards, which is testament to the great work and collaboration of agency and client!
