Why You Need a Killer Marketing Strategy for Your Advertising Agency
There’s an often-referenced notion in this industry that says creative agencies - while excellent for their clients - have a branding problem themselves. However, speaking with three of the biggest network agency’s brand building experts, it becomes clear that a killer marketing strategy is vital for rising above the noise as an agency, attracting the right clients, and ultimately, for growth.
Discussing the challenges facing agency marketers today, and how their respective creative networks have succeeded on a global scale, LBB speaks with Jeremy Miller, global chief communications and marketing officer at dentsu, Gareth Jones, SVP, global marketing director at VML, and Donna Tobin, global chief marketing and communications officer at DDB Worldwide, who will be departing DDB in October.
‘We Aren’t the Best at Advertising Ourselves’ - A Myth?
“It’s an outdated misbelief peddled by ad execs who are behind on their sales targets,” says Jeremy, explaining that “an army” of people work on marketing behind the scenes at an agency the size of dentsu. On the other hand, Donna and Gareth agree that the adage does have some roots in reality for some, acknowledging that creative businesses are likely to prioritise resourcing clients’ needs.
“In other instances, it may be because leadership has made a choice not to make agency marketing or PR a priority, or perhaps they are not willing to invest in a structure that can handle it effectively,” says Donna.
Despite having different outputs and challenges to the creative teams, Jeremy says there is an equally intense amount of work to be done, and that the client work and marketing are better viewed as two sides of the same coin.
“Promoting work not only supports the brief, but is a powerful promotion of agency capabilities too,” he explains. “Often agencies and networks go the extra mile to gain the headlines for campaigns in the interest of both their clients’ and their own business. Press coverage, viral fame and word of mouth for campaigns benefits everyone, not least for award submissions.”
Gareth holds a similar opinion, highlighting the importance of agencies ‘practicing what they preach’ by investing in the kinds of innovative and unexpected marketing they aspire to create for their clients. “I don’t think enough agencies realise the value of marketing themselves in this way.”
Why Sell the Agency as Well?
“At the core, we are all in the industry of building brands and fuelling business growth,” says Donna. “So I think it’s important to ensure we are also focused on building our own agency brand to fuel growth and fame.”
Gareth explains that this philosophy is key to attracting clients, who will also want equally great work that helps grow their own businesses. “But they also want an agency that has purpose, invests in culture and nurtures its employees,” he says. Beyond showcasing an agency’s capabilities and values, he adds that creating a brand and building an effective marketing strategy helps agencies differentiate themselves in the marketplace - a point that Jeremy also feels strongly about.
“Just like the brands that we serve, an agency’s biggest challenge is differentiating itself from the competition and winning market share,” says the dentsu global chief communications and marketing officer, highlighting how 30 years of consolidation and acquisitions, corporate splintering, technological innovation and changes in consumer behaviour has shaped the landscape. Now, the global networks, mid-sized challengers and agile independents alike have to stand out through their own unique value and scale for clients - “differing combinations of culture, strategy, talent, data and technology.”
“The agency’s communications and marketing strategy is therefore absolutely critical in communicating those points of difference to a wide range of audiences, in order to drive growth,” he adds. “These include not just the C-suite of client brands, but the broader marketing teams, the procurement teams, the industry analysts and press. And, of course, the talent that exists both inside and outside the ad industry.”
Of course, reminds Jeremy, marketing an agency goes beyond the work done to build fame. Sometimes it even requires keeping the agency’s name out of the press altogether. “Whether it’s to avoid pitch leaks, manage confidential or sensitive talent news, or to keep click-bait out of the press, the team plays an invisible yet crucial role.”
Tricks and Challenges
Both Gareth and Jeremy report that getting all the required approvals and investment for an ongoing marketing strategy - both internally and from clients - can be, in Gareth’s words, “tricky”. He says, “One of the key challenges lies with getting permission from clients to talk about the great work you do for them. Promoting your creative accomplishments via awards, articles in trade publications and marketing campaigns is a great driver for new businesses.”
But while there can occasionally be roadblocks, Jeremy shares that “the large majority of clients” do want to celebrate the work with the agency. “Our challenge as a marketing team is to build a measurement framework which shows the connection between this showcase of work and driving tangible business outcomes.”
Another challenge that Gareth notes is in standing out from the sea of agencies who are “increasingly making identical claims” about their services and work. “It’s getting tough to attract the right kind of clients in a market defined by consolidation.”
With so much noise, Donna says that an agency’s focus needs to be on “creating and delivering content that is innovative, informative, entertaining, emotive, and easy for recipients to digest.” Ensuring the content connects with each platform’s audience in relevant ways is just as important, so DDB constantly assesses the performance and effectiveness of its marketing initiatives, adjusting as needed.
The biggest challenge for a global network like DDB, however, is in creating a foundational global strategy first and then ensuring each region and local market has the flexibility to customise it. Refusing to subscribe to a ‘one marketing plan fits all’ model, Donna emphasises that flexibility is vital, with each region and office’s strategic needs being fully considered, and constantly pivoting with daily changes to the industry and business needs.
“Importantly, we are constantly taking the pulse on what’s working and what isn’t,” she says. “We also must balance and service the needs of our clients and ensure the work we do on their behalf will bring them the business growth and fame they expect. Then, it is up to us as marketing and PR/comms leaders to amplify the results, keep refining our stories, and create buzz when and where appropriate.”
Creating great work for clients - and amplifying the results - is key. So the trick when building a marketing strategy, says Jeremy, is to not “out-creative your creative”. With the client-facing teams working tirelessly to develop ideas and respond to rapidly shifting trends and industries - “often fundamentally shifting society” - he says that it’s difficult and unnecessary to compete with that as in-house marketers.
“Our best strategy is to let the work, and the talent behind it, speak for itself, putting them on a pedestal where clients can judge for themselves if that type of work, and those types of outcomes, and that team of creatives, could be what they need to overcome their own brand challenges.”
Where to Begin?
“There are two fundamental requirements to building a great [marketing] strategy – know yourself and know the market,” says Jeremy. It sounds simple but in a global network, with thousands of people across hundreds of countries, serving clients in dozens of sectors, it can quickly become complex.
For the dentsu marketing chief, everything “must be shaped by the clients the agency seeks to attract and the work it wants to be known for.” But as these change over time, so does the overall business strategy of the agency, and therefore the marketing strategy must echo these changes. So, he believes the marketing team should double down on the agency’s consistent set of core values. By understanding and championing the company’s people, culture, ethics, capabilities and vision, he says these distinct strengths help the company form an influential and authentic voice.
“A great marketing strategy needs to begin with a clear vision and mission, a strong understanding of the brand’s DNA, and a solid understanding of what the business goals are,” agrees Donna. “It’s equally important to shine a light on what is unique and proprietary to the brand to ensure all messaging is differentiated in a very cluttered marketplace, and have clear KPIs to assess effectiveness.”
Similarly, Gareth says that originality, along with authenticity, is what turns truthful communication into great marketing. “If you are an agency looking for new clients, find what makes you different, decide who you want to tell and tell them in a way that captures their attention, makes them listen over the noise and compels them to do something.”
“We should also remember that an agency’s audience is not just clients,” says Jeremy. “Marketing should also seek to build pride and engagement amongst talent, as well as attract new talent from both within the industry and further afield.”
Building an Image
Agencies in the past have often been defined by the brands they work with - becoming known as the AOR for a specific brand or experts in a certain field or medium. However, with many brands becoming in-house self-marketing powers themselves, and fewer long-term or exclusive client relationships than in decades gone by, there is a question to be asked about how an agency defines its image in the industry today. Are agencies focusing their marketing in a more brand-agnostic way, highlighting the philosophy and talent over work and clients?
“Rather than being known as the agency which is an expert in X or Y, we’re taking a step back and seeing the challenges for what they are,” says Jeremy. “Most are rooted in the need for change, which goes deeper than a simple ad campaign for a specific product. Agencies need to emphasise their ability to think outside the box on behalf of clients, integrating specialisms and cutting-edge capabilities that may sit outside of the original brief.”
Gareth believes that agencies have always sought to market themselves as brand agnostic, describing a rich and varied roster of different clients as “the life blood” of a creative business. “This is how you attract the best talent, keep your employees happy and ultimately deliver the best work,” he says. “Agencies often have a piece of business they are most famous for, but the best way to grow is through client diversification, tackling new creative challenges and pushing yourself in new ways.”
According to Donna, the thing that DDB will always be known for, at a foundation level, will be its ability to deliver effective creativity that emotionally connects - a philosophy based on the wisdom of founder Bill Bernbach. “As time goes on and we evolve, how we express our positioning and brand strengths may vary slightly across the globe,” she explains, “but our DNA and creative philosophy should ideally always remain consistent.”
Likewise, while Jeremy acknowledges that dentsu’s history defines it to some extent, he says that the agency’s philosophy instead centres on “delivering transformative creativity, an unfair advantage through media and a highly personalised experience for client customers.” He adds, “The challenges that clients face today and the sheer speed at which culture and customer habits are shifting, means that we’re as much defined by the impact that we can generate for clients now, as we are by past work.”
Ensuring Your Global Network Isn’t Worlds Apart
“Driving consistency in how the brand shows up is one of the biggest challenges of the holding company environment,” says Jeremy. “You can have the best strategy and a killer value proposition, but if it isn’t applied through communications and marketing in a consistent way, it could lose the impact entirely and fall flat with clients. Couple that with the fact there are most often multiple agency brands in the mix, and you have a potential minefield to navigate.”
Having recently launched a new global go-to-market brand for dentsu, Jeremy shares how the team strived to build buy-in across all offices from the start, by collaborating with creative leaders around the world. This process drew upon multiregional and multicultural beginnings, while giving a healthy nod to dentsu’s roots in Japan and 123-year history. “This collaborative approach gave the brand a much higher chance of internal adoption because our own teams could see how their peers and colleagues had helped shape it.” A similar approach was taken by IPG’s agency network MullenLowe for its global rebrand last year.
“Over and above gaining buy-in, you must of course ensure everything is underpinned with the basics,” adds Jeremy, pointing to the importance of centralised materials and templates, learning opportunities about how and when to use the brand, and the freedom for local offices to showcase their own identity and strengths.
“We call our DDB global network a ‘federalist network’ which allows our individual brands to express themselves in localised ways that best reflect their capabilities, regional, and cultural nuances,” says Donna. For her, these localised expressions of the agency’s DNA should be “natural offshoots”, derived from a clear understanding of what makes it unique.
“I’ve always thought the difference between language and accent is a good analogy for how to maintain a consistent brand and tone of voice across multiple regions, countries and offices,” says Gareth. “If everyone in the agency knows what they’re saying (i.e. they are speaking the same language), then it doesn’t matter if they are using different accents. To put it another way, if the agency brand is simple, strong and single-minded, it doesn’t matter if the agency offering comes to life slightly differently based on location.”
Killer Agency Marketing in 2024
In addition to publishing research and thought leadership - like the bi-annual AdSpend report, CMO Navigator series and Consumer Vision 2035 deep-dive - Jeremy says that dentsu’s new ‘Innovating to Impact’ global brand proposition truly came to life at Cannes Lions this year. And the festival was also a significant priority and stage for DDB’s marketing strategy in 2024 too.
Both networks ran extensive digital campaigns on social media leading up to this year’s award show, featuring their top work on their websites and platforms like LinkedIn. DDB even created a dedicated Cannes hub landing page with an inspirational note from president and global CCO Chaka Sobhani, a spotlight on DDB’s Cannes jury members and a calendar of DDB thought leadership panels throughout the week.
In Cannes, dentsu set up its Beach House, designed with the agency’s new visuals, and its CEO and CCO hosted a keynote in the Palais. Meanwhile, DDB held events at a branded apartment and organised 12 press meetings and 18 thought leadership opportunities, including three in the Palais.
“The results of DDB's 2024 Cannes marketing campaign increased traffic to the website to all time highest levels in the network’s history,” says Donna, “It increased the time visitors spent on the website consuming content, increased followers on LinkedIn, Instagram, and TikTok, and saw double digit increases in social media engagement and impressions across all DDB Worldwide social media handles, creating awareness and strengthening the DDB brand.”
Jeremy says that dentsu now has more than 1.3 million followers on LinkedIn and “engagement rates that many consumer brands would be proud of.” He adds, “This success allowed us to launch a series of content products including a monthly newsletter, Noted, which has amassed 300,000 opt-in subscribers and is now held up by LinkedIn themselves as a best-practice example. Add to this a regular podcast on innovation and monthly vignettes of ‘dentsu-jin’ (people) and we’re making great ground in ensuring dentsu is top of mind.”
A Killer Marketing Strategy Has Never Been More Important
“Agencies must toe the line between demonstrating a deep understanding of today’s immediate brand challenges, providing foresight on what is around the corner, and communicating a compelling point of view on trends,” says Jeremy. “And all while providing total clarity around its value proposition and service capability - no mean feat given the pace of change.”
For dentsu, its central promise to clients is to innovate in impactful ways to drive outcomes, which now forms the main pillar of its marketing strategies. But none of this is possible, adds Jeremy, without a great team to deliver it. “dentsu’s marketing teams around the world work day and night to bring the strategy to life while collaborating hand-in-glove with our business stakeholders. I might be biased, but I am pretty sure we have the best team in the business!”
“It takes innovative and creative thinking,” says Donna, “a lot of championing, and at times, a lot of ‘chasing’ - especially across a large global network. It seems like a huge miss to not do for our own brands what we inspire our clients to do for theirs.”
But when the industry is seemingly becoming increasingly homogenised, making it harder than ever to put your head above the rest, Gareth concludes that “it’s never been more important” for agencies to be bold, and aspire to stand out from other agencies through their marketing efforts.
“Differentiation leads to awareness, which in turn translates into revenue and ultimately, growth.”
