digital marketing

Advertising Agencies, Nerds And Digital Marketing

February 11, 2019 By Peter 1 Comment

This is a post about advertising agencies and the ongoing move to digital marketing and as a result, the need for more nerds. In this case, I mean a single-minded person that is highly focused on a technical field, like mobile advertising; programmatic media, database marketing or, well you get it. Stick with me on this one.

There is some personal history here and yes, the name dropping is important. I am trying to make a point and can use all the help I can get.

History

I “discovered” digital marketing in 1994 when I came home to the U.S.A. from Saatchi London where no one had a computer on their desk. I returned to work as Business Development Director at Saatchi & Saatchi Advertising New York and as it turned out, it was my 16th and last year at the agency.

My eventual move out of advertising was stimulated by my discovery of and fascination with the new world of interactivity via CD-ROMs and a life-changing conversation I had with Ted Leonsis who, at that time ran Florida’s Redgate Communications. Redgate was very early digital agency founded in 1987. I found Ted through the 4A’s Michael Donahue another early digerati (you could say this word then without cringing). Using my Saatchi credential, I met with Ted and he told me two very interesting things. One, his company had just been bought by America Online and two, this advice,

“Get the hell out of advertising, it is going to die. Move into digital.”

Well, after the meeting I did two things – one a mistake and the other, the smart one: I listened.

The mistake was that I didn’t buy America Online stock (its stock rose 600 percent in 1998). Had I, I might be sorta near (well, kinda near) where Ted wound up. Today, he is the owner of Washington D.C.’s Capitals, Wizards and Mystics. [Read more…] about Advertising Agencies, Nerds And Digital Marketing

What’s Your Smart Guest Blog Pitch?

January 23, 2019 By Peter Leave a Comment

I’ve done a fair amount of guest blogging on advertising and marketing industry websites to drive my awareness within the advertising agency market. Based on this experience, I strongly recommend the guest blog opportunity to my agency clients and give them both strategic and tactical methods to amplify their messaging on OPW – other people’s websites.

As you might suspect, how one delivers the guest blog pitch is critical.

To start, these are the core objectives of the guest blog (care of Neil Patel):

Positioning yourself as an authority and well-known name in the industry. (This is especially important for an advertising agency that wants to get in front of a specific target market that reads their large audience industry blogs.)

Getting exposure (traffic) back to your website.

Building backlinks to your website.

An Incoming Guest Blog Request

I recently received a request to guest blog on my website. I believe that the incoming email provides a teachable moment. Here is the email from Piyuesh Modi of Amsterdam + Bangalore + Melbourne’s PagePotato Digital Marketing.

Hi,

Hope you are doing great.

I was searching on relevant influencers talking about content marketing and stumbled upon your blog
http://peterlevitan.com/the-history-of-podcasting-9181/

Being the co-founder of Digital Marketing agency and sketching enthusiast, I have tried to put my sketching skills to use and made sketch notes on topics related to content marketing. The attachment has one example and this has many more
https://pagepotato.com/content-marketing-doodles-sketch-notes-piyuesh-modi/

Entrepreneur.com and YourStory.com have found it interesting and went ahead to publish them (the links will take you to the published blogs). This made me think that content marketing readers are finding it useful. Since I saw that your blog is already helping a lot of readers, I thought it would be a good idea to reach out to you and offer my content marketing sketchnotes FREE for use in your blogs or in your social media.

I am not expecting anything in return for this. However, if you choose to share it with your audience, it would encourage me to keep doing this 🙂

Moving a step further, if you have any valuable fresh content, then I would also be interested to share with my audience.

Thanks,

Piyuesh’s Guest Blog Pitch

Let’s break down Piyuesh’s guest post ‘pitch’. [Read more…] about What’s Your Smart Guest Blog Pitch?

Stats From Google

December 13, 2018 By Peter 1 Comment

Google Stats: Desktop vs. Mobile vs. Tablet

I always find my website’s Google Analytics interesting (those are mine over there).

How does your website look on mobile? Does it sell the agency in that small window?

I am also surprised (well, not really surprised) at how few agency leaders, management types, look at their stats. And adjust.

[And then wonder why the leads are not pouring in.]

What Ad Agency Clients Want

November 19, 2018 By Peter 1 Comment

The Client Need-Scape = What Ad Agency Clients Want

There is no single type of client. But, most clients want a similar array of attributes and deliverables from their ad agency. From an agency business development perspective, clearly enunciating that you understand the client need-scape, the what ad agency clients want from you, is critical in the early stages of your marketing.

So, What Do Ad Agency Clients Want?

I believe that although clients range from “I want to be cool and plugged into the culture” to “I need measurable incremental eCommerce sales”, they all have at least these three core needs. These are the needs that you must address in your outbound and inbound ad agency business development program.

Here’s my list. Your mileage may vary. But, I bet that you have to hit all or some of these points sooner or later.

The Need For Results – Think ROI

Many ad agencies lead with the ‘we are creative’ story. As an ex-agency owner and client, I fully understand this lead point. This is, without question, a key requirement for virtually any client that is trying to get there marketing noticed and break out of their competitive pack.

However, just saying that your ad agency is creative is simply not going to cut it. After all, being creative is a highly subjective point (like, how do you prove this to a wide range of clients – yes, awards do help) and even worse, being perceived as creative can be fleeting. Yesterday’s creative agency is quickly replaced by today’s. This happens every year. Remember when Crispin Porter + Bogusky was the hot shop?

Having a results-oriented – think ROI – positioning or just a serious and clear agency brand statement about meeting this need is a must have in 2018. Marketing is a tough game.

CMO’s come and go based on their sales success.

Procurement departments want measurable returns for less.

CEO’s want increased shareholder value and to make their performance bonus.

Owners want more cash in their pocket.

Therefore, address these results-oriented needs and pain points. At issue, is understanding your target market’s or brand’s definition of positive results in your marketing will be a bit tricky. Tricky? Yes, because the definition of results will vary by client type.

Some clients just need more qualified leads. Think B2B.

Some need measurable sales. Think eCommerce.

Some just need more targeted digital traffic. Think the travel category.

Some want engagement. Think fashion brands.

Some want to improve their image. Nike anyone?

Regardless of the type of results – clients want to hear you talk about how you know that they know that you will deliver a high return on investment. Need an example of a digital agency that gets it? Visit HawkSEM and see how they immediately message ROI. Of course, they are a type of agency that can put ROI right in your face. But, you get the idea.

Last point. Ad agency leaders worry about inroads by marketing consultancies. They should. Why? Well, one point. These guys fully understand what the ad agency client’s want… Here is a direct quote from McKinsey’s About Us page.

We help our clients make significant and lasting improvements to their performance and realize their most important goals. With nearly a century of experience, we’ve built a firm uniquely equipped to this task.

You Have To Understand The Client’s Business And Industry

Prospective clients want to know that you understand their market, consumers and competitive landscape. They do not have much time for your education. [Read more…] about What Ad Agency Clients Want

Your Ad Agency Name And Getting Found

October 30, 2018 By Peter Leave a Comment

Your Ad Agency Name

I am about to make two points. One is about the value of an ad agency name. The second is how to get future clients to find, notice and love you.

How is your ad agency name doing for ya? Is it memorable? Does it create some brand power? Does it describe what you do? Does it just sound ‘cool’? Does it help grow your agency?

Frankly, I do not think that a name matters that much. Sure, it probably shouldn’t be too complex, or too cute (though many are very cute) and it should be memorable in some way (there are, after all, 4,000 plus “agenceis” to choose from.)

By the way, head over to my two-part post on how to name your agency (or even help a client with their name). This post has been read over 31,000 times. Crazy!

An ‘Ad Agency Name Generator’ = Borrowed Interest To Get Found

I don’t know about you, but I get a few emails a month from people asking me if I take guest posts on this blog. This week I got a request from an ad agency name generator. I said no – but I like the website.

The ad agency name generator. Actually, it is called Business Name Generator. Like most automated web-based generator tools it is kinda fun to play with. That said, it could actually offer you some (LOL) branding ideas.

I played with the tool and came up with a few names just for you should you want to rename your agency or need a fresh one for your new gig. Here are a few for inspiration or just laughs.

I got to these random names by searching on: “ad agency”…

Poke
Woop
Velocity
Surge
Gorilla
Rogue
Tiger
Kick
Quicksilver
Ricochet

OK, I’ll stop (and, yes, some of these are already in use). Hey, go play.

Drive Traffic

The Business Name Generator tool is interesting since it is really a website designed to sell domains – not ad business names. The Name Generator is just a smart traffic generating hook. The website also has these other name generators: Blog Name Generator; Podcast Name; Startup Name; Product Name, etc. to target people looking for these other names. Of course, hopefully, once they find the name they’ll go buy the URL.

I love the idea of using a list, or relevant resources or some other form of bait to get people to pay attention to what you are selling.

A ‘Leadership’ Idea

No question: a clear way to own a marketing or brand category is to look and sound like the leader. The right name could do this (maybe not.) Blogs do this, kinda. Well, if you can actually break out of blog-subject-clutter and are willing to commit to single expert subjects. However, this takes a lot of time to get traction.

A suggestion… Build the go-to data-driven category directory – possibly a stand-alone website/microsite. Become positioned as a leader that is the category information resource. This acts as a nice magnet.

Consider doing what tiny Growth Supply does. This simple information website delivers “All Free Tools For Entrepreneurs and Startups”. This directory get views — as a result, it has a very high USA Alexa ranking at 152,734 vs., for example, the New York agency Barton F. Graf at 348,470. By the way, what is your ad agency rank?

Think about your agency and a resource tool. An ad agancy brand that actually owns a category via an information resource a can rule.

What could it look like? Build a database marketing / brand category / industry directory & resource that lists:

The ultimate resource for news on database marketing
Industry news websites.
Industry events. Global and regional.
Industry awards.
Related ‘ marketing idea’ websites.
Review websites.
Industry research – primary and secondary.
Category advertising history websites.
And, on…

Keep it up to date with new listings. There is something new every week that a brand might find interesting.

Pay an intern to do this ‘fill in the blanks’ work.

Become THE resource… a resource that gets shared.

A brand that actually owns a category like database-marketing can be the ultimate resource.

Just food for thought.

By the way, I have a resource list – and it gets viewed and shared: The Big Advertising Agency Resource List.