Let’s Talk About Agency Relationships

Written By Ted Grigg

The Direct Marketing Association asked me to lead a discussion group on this topic some time back. So I reluctantly agreed thinking the attendees would be clients searching for better agency relationships. Such a topic rarely got the kind of attention other DMA issues did in my opinion, so I expected my group out of nearly 8 other more interesting topics would languish on the side due to low interest and poor attendance.

But to my surprise, my session was the best attended! And what was even more surprising was that the attendees were primarily vendors seeking guidance on how to sell their products to advertising agencies.

So within 5 minutes of launch, my prepared comments were scrapped and we discussed agency relationships from the suppliers’ perspective.

They were asking about what titles and what individuals in agencies were most responsible for influencing the client sales. Were they production managers, traffic managers, account executives, account supervisors? And the answer to that question was yes.

As with any business-to-business sale, there are purchasers, influencers and end users. And rarely do they lie within the same individual.

But my advice was to treat agencies as you would any client. Become a student of their problems, then set out to solve their problems.

Don’t focus on your capabilities. Focus rather on the kinds of problems the agency faces. Time pressures, the ambiguity of evolving strategies, needed research to understand the clients’ problems --- all the while looking at the client problem from an eagle’s perspective and sharing the agency’s discomfort. Then you are ready to demonstrate how your capabilities fit the problem to be solved.  

As we got deeper into the discussion, it became clear that vendors have clients just as clients have customers. And we are all selling our services and products to people with problems.

So we need to focus on the solutions we bring and not the capabilities.

What other things could I have said that would make vendors more successful in selling to agencies, consultants and advertisers? Where are they missing the boat?

Ted Grigg
What Ted does best is increase response by beating controls, applying multiple channels to target markets, profiling customer databases and generally improving sales results using deep direct marketing principles. Regard Ted as your personal “think-tank” for your direct marketing planning and strategy development. After analyzing several hundred million dollars of direct response testing in all channels, he brings with him the knowledge accumulated from seeing what tends to work and what does not. Having worked on both the agency and client side of direct marketing, Ted understands the unique challenges faced by agencies and their clients. Agencies need to sell themselves and deliver sales results. And clients not only require results, but need ideas they can implement while focusing on tracking response using a relational database. If Ted brings nothing else to the table, by profiling customer databases and creating response propensity models, he quickly becomes the clients’ expert on their own customers. His formal training includes a BA from Abilene Christian University and two years of graduate work at Texas Tech University. For a national direct-to-consumer insurance company, Ted developed a revolutionary direct mail format that beat most standing direct mail controls for this company. He also generated more profitable business for this firm by expanding compiled list circulation of less than 10% to more than 30% of total direct mail circulation within a year. (Insurance business generated by direct mail demonstrated higher persistency than customers coming from other media such as print and DRTV.) Ted’s plan and implementation of Medicare lead generation campaigns for over 60 regional and national HMO/PPO organizations combined multiple channels that surpassed some sales projections by as much as 60%. Additional industry experience over the last 30 years includes B2B or B2C for finance, securities, home security, healthcare, insurance, manufacturing, government, technology, nonprofit, retail, transportation, communications, and multiple categories in the services industry. As the founder of Wyse Direct (a division for Wyse Advertising in Cleveland, OH), he successfully launched and branded a new technology product for Seiko-Mead by supporting a nationwide sales team with a predictable flow of qualified sales leads. While a VP of new business development for the Grizzard Agency, Ted acted as the direct marketing strategist who refocused the agency’s culture to attract new commercial and fundraising accounts. At the time, Grizzard was essentially a direct mail fund raising production operation. His leadership and team building effectiveness prepared Grizzard for the eventual Omnicom acquisition and Grizzard’s successful integration into Omnicom’s large group of advertising agencies. An independent DM consultant, Ted continues to write numerous articles and conduct webinars on direct marketing techniques. He also wrote The HMO/PPO Marketing Plan — A Step-by-Step Guide publishing it through Executive Enterprises in New York City. During his youth, Ted was raised in Lille, France with his missionary family attending French schools becoming fluent in reading and writing French. Away from the job, Ted is a computer geek, blogger and science fiction buff!
http://www.dmcgresults.com
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