Everyone in the agency should contribute to new business and one of the best ways to encourage lead generation is through a referral program.
A referral program is one of the most cost-effective and efficient methods for generating new business for small-to-midsize ad agencies. Here are my 12 tips on how to create or enhance your agency’s new business referral program:
Identify the kinds of clients you are looking for and set parameters for qualifying leads (size, niche or category, etc.) so all employees know the kinds of clients you want to pursue.
Make your process simple and easy to understand. Your staff will not be willing to jump through lots of hoops to participate.
Set goals such as getting a 75 percent participation rate or a certain number of referrals per employee by year’s end.
Regularly encourage employees to make referrals. Get in front of them often and present a clear message of how your new business referral program works, why they are an integral part of its success, and what’s in it for them.
As a way to increase the quality of referrals, pay out their incentives in two stages, offering an initial payout upon a referral as well as a second, supplementary bonus if the initial lead turns into a new account for the agency. The “right” reward will depend upon your agency’s size and the size of the new business account.
For initial leads offer gift cards, movie tickets, dinner or non-monetary prizes like reserved parking spaces or a cubicle by the window, or thanking them at a reception with their peers. I would suggest rewarding ALL qualified referrals in some way to ratchet-up participation.
If the referral leads to a new account for your agency, provide a much larger financial bonus or allow employees too earn extra vacation days – with pay.
Be sure to publicly say “thank you” to the person who supplied the lead that generates new business. Make it impressive enough that employees will proactively feed you names on a regular basis.
Teach your staff how to ask for referralsand train them to be better networkers, especially integrating social media into the mix of tools available. You will systematically turn your employees into indispensable brand advocates.
Do a good job of providing periodic status updates. Employees will be frustrated with the lack of follow-up on the status of their referrals.
Continuously find ways to improve the program.
Create consistency. The deeper you draw your employees into the hunt for new business “hunt,” the easier it will be for your agency will stay focused and consistent in generating new business.
A plan is just a plan, wishful thinking, until it is executed.
How many annual planning meetings has your agency gone through the motions of creating a strategic new business plan only to have it fail in its implementation? Maybe next year, instead of focusing so much attention on the plan, use annual planning to create dynamic processes for execution.
“Execution, more so than planning, is the battleground that determines success and failure.”
Experience has taught me that successfully executing a new business strategy requires a system, not a series of diverse projects performed by different parts of the agency. Here are some practical tips for creating a system for new business for your agency:
One person responsible: You will not only need the right person in place to oversee the process, someone who has focus, determination and consistency, the qualities are required for success.
Convert your strategic plan into a game plan that includes Milestone Dates, To Do List, Resources, Assignments, etc.
Set goals that stretch your agency but that are reasonably attainable and measurable.
Determine what is needed to achieve your priorities: People, funding, equipment, space, training/development, etc.
Get organized: Use a program such as Basecamp, an excellent, inexpensive online project management tool to help in the implementation process.
Just start: A lot of time can be wasted if you don’t start somewhere. Identify and focus on the first step. Once you get going, it’s much easier to keep going. Also remember, don’t over think things, keep it simple.
Based on your tasks create a “must work week” schedule. Arrange your work week priorities ahead of time. “If you don’t know and control your schedule, someone else will.”
Be prepared to make changes. This is not an exercise in perfection – Plans give you a road map to our goals, but you have to be ready to make adjustments, based on your experience in execution. Every plan I have ever seen has obstacles. Don’t abandon your strategy at the first obstacle, create “work-arounds”, solutions, even temporary ones that will allow you to keep the process moving. Don’t let anything stop implementation.
Make assignments: clear communications with those who must help with implementation of the various projects is a must. Who is doing what and when. Make sure they know their assignment, due dates and be prepared to prod, poke and push for completion.
Close out completed projects.
Monitor and report progress: Unless there is an ongoing process for evaluating execution, making decisions about it, and closing the loop with the original strategy, the effort fails. Note: I’ve worked with agencies that are bombarded with internal meetings, communications and reports. Keep this part simple, a monthly one-page executive summary of progress and a brief monthly meeting with only the persons that are necessary to review and make changes, will usually suffice.
Periodically highlight successes and celebrate new business acquisitions: This will reward participants and create excitement within the agency.
Incorporate “lessons learned” from accessing your accomplishments into the next year plan.
Please feel free to share additional tips and ideas for creating a system for agency new business in the comment section below
It is absolutely essential that every ad agency have a plan for their new business development initiatives.
I recently spoke to a group of ad agency owners. I was amazed to learn that none of them had a written new business plan. That’s inconceivable to me. If you have no plan you can’t measure what you’re doing, there’s no real strategy behind your new business activities, no focus or direction.
“He who fails to plan, is planning to fail” - Winston Churchill
If you want to build a consistent pipeline for lead generation and new business opportunities for your agency you must have a game plan in place.
Here are my 10 tips for creating a game plan for your agency’s new business:
It might be a helpful exercise to create a SWOT analysis of your agency: it’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats.
Set realistic new business goals. I can’t tell you how often I hear “our goal is to take the agency to the next level,” but they have no clue what that level is or what it looks like. In my opinion new business goals should be obtainable.
If your goal is to double your RFP responses or double your pitches, you also must have the processes in place to handle the additional workload if those things are to come to fruition.
Identify your top category and audience you are going to target. You must have an identifiable target.
Know who is your primary competition and create a strong point of differentiation from them.
Follow the KISS method. Keep everything simple as possible including the plan. A one page plan can easily suffice.
Outline the new business plan through specific strategies: Public Relations, Social Media, Direct Mail, Digital, etc.
Establish benchmarks for the things you can measure. Have a review, update, make changes and refocus your efforts once a month.
Use a program such as Basecamp, an excellent, inexpensive online tool to help implement your plan. Set milestone dates, create an actionable To-Do List for keeping track of who is doing, what, when, etc.
The person charged with new business should be empowered to implement the plan as if this was one of your agency’s client accounts. The new business person must be like a rudder of a ship to keep the process moving in the same direction, no matter how the wind is blowing.
Additional agency new business articles that may be of interest:
Some simple tips to stay connected and be available for prospects while you are traveling.
Many agency CEOs and those charged with agency new business are traveling a lot these days. I just returned from an overseas trip and it was important for me to stay connected to my own social media new business network.
My on-the-road my basic equipment consists of:
A MacBook 13″, easier to use at airports and lunch counters. I prefer using my Mac when I write even when traveling.
I have an iPad and iPhone (my iPhone is jailbroken which helps with overseas travels and allows me to use T-Mobile’s data and cell phone plan).
I own a T-Mobile aircard/laptop stick but I prefer the Verizon version, that seems to have a much better coverage area. Sometimes it has been helpful that your laptop stick be a different service than your cell phone, when one has weak coverage in a particular area the other may be stronger signal.
Here’s some connection tips that I thought would be helpful to share.
I never know what kind of internet service I’m going to get from one airport, hotel or conference facility. I always carry my T-Mobile air card. I wouldn’t leave home without it.
As a backup for my presentations and other travel information I use Dropbox. It is a free service and I’ve found it to be extremely useful to me when I travel. I can also post large files for others to easily review.
I absolutely love Tripit. I still use its free version which does all that I need it to do. You can easily organize trip details into one master online itinerary. It also will post trip updates through your social networks. When I arrive at an airport, one of the first things that I do is open up Tripit, touch the number for my ground transportation connection and it will automatically make the call. To many other great benefits to list here. But to say the least Tripit is one of my most essential travel tools.
I often have sought out tips from others who are traveling to some of the same parts of the U.S. or abroad for their suggestions. I reached out to Trey Pennington for example. Trey travels often to the UK and provided some great advice. Particularly helpful was his recommendation to add the iPad 3g International plan. I purchased the 50 MB global plan for a recent overseas trip. I only used a small portion of the plan and could have gotten by easily with the 20 MB plan. You can preset the travel dates in advance and have your iPad connection ready to go as soon as you land.
I often use Skype while traveling for video and conference calls. It is free to start using Skype – to speak, see and instant message other people on Skype for example. For very little costs subscribe or pay-as-you go for additional features like call phones, access WiFi or send texts.
I use the Tru global phone service and app to make calls from my iPad to land line phones and to persons who don’t have Skype. Call recipients tell me that the call clarity is great. This tool was great when I made calls from the UK to the US.
I use Foursquare often. It lets others who follow me know when I’m in or near where they are located. For example, I was in Nashville, TN recently, checked into a location with Foursquare which led to an invitation for coffee, a lunch meeting and an offer to drop by one of the agencies for an impromptu meet-and-greet.
I now have This is nowhere near an exhaustive list of tools and tactics to stay connected while traveling. I’m sure others have some additional tools and tips to add to this list. Please feel free to do so in the comment section below.
Update: Shortly after writing this post, I now have the Personal Hotspot for iPhone 4. I dropped my T-Mobile air card service. I upgraded my Verizon cell plan to include the Hotspot service for $20. I’m also able to connect my iPad through Personal Hotspot which allowed me to also cancel my AT&T iPad data plan.
Information regarding new business and social media continues to be the top interests of advertising agencies.
There were over 100,000+ page views for FUEL LINES in the first few months of the year. As signs of economic recovery are on the horizon small to midsize ad agencies, digital agencies and PR firms are even more focused on new business. Because many agencies were late to get on board the social media wagon, they are also searching for social media resources that will help them get up to speed quickly.
Agencies are also in a hiring mode and a lot more attention is being given to best practices in hiring, training and retention of their staff. Lots of questions and interaction regarding new skills needed, particularly when it comes to agency new business.
In the order of their rankings, here are the top 20 Fuel Line articles that generated the most traffic in the first few months of 2011:
If your agency’s social media participation isn’t generating traffic and new business leads, it is important to know why.
How can an agency help a client monetize their social media when it doesn’t have a handle on how to use it for itself? As more-and-more agencies jump on the social media band-wagon, clients are beginning to ask them,“what has social media done for you?”
Gone are the days when an agency can get by “talking the talk but not walking the walk.” Clients will be able to discern between the agencies that truly get social media from the ones that don’t with just a few clicks of their mouse.
100% of our clients are online and all they have to do is take a quick look and they can easily tell that most agencies have no plan with regards to social media. Agencies may have a blog, Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn accounts, but those accounts often hide behind the agency name and tend to be blatantly self promotional with little value to an undefinable audience.
Used correctly, social media makes new business easier not harder. It is an incredible communication’s channel for easily generating new business leads and creating personal networks far beyond your local market.
No traffic + no leads = no new business. Here are 16 signs that most likely indicate your social media isn’t working for your agency:
No social media strategy, no plan. 60% of companies using social media have no plan. I would say from my own experience that is probably true of most agencies.
No clear objective for using social media. The first step in creating a social media strategy for your agency, you MUST have an objective. I suggest it should be for new business.
There is no focus on a particular target audience. The second step in creating in a social media strategy is to identify who you are trying to reach.
A lack of positioning for agencies. The FOUNDATION of an ad agency’s new business program is its positioning. “The common failing among agencies seeking new business is the inability, or unwillingness, to name what they stand for,”Bob Lundin, Agency search consultancy Jones Lundin Beals. Social media provides a great opportunity to showcase how your agencies are different.
Agencies using social media for blatant self-promotion. Credentials and capabilities belong on an agencies website but shouldn’t be the driving force of their social media program. Social media should be centered around benefits.
No integration between blogging, Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn. When the majority of agencies finally ‘jumped into’ social media, they just jumped in with a check list of channels. Yes we have a blog, Facebook Fan page, Twitter account and LinkedIn. But there was no convergence, bringing them together into a single social media strategy.
Agencies are waiting passively for prospective clients to them. If you build it, doesn’t guarantee that prospects are going to come.
Many agencies lack appreciation for those that are willing ambassadors for your agency. Zig Ziglar’s statement, “You can have everything in life that you want if you just give enough other people what they want.” His philosophy works well in the arena of social media.
A lot of social media efforts fail because of the lack of value/benefit for the intended audience. Your audience will be your judge and jury as to whether you have an appealing position, post titles that spur interest, content that is beneficial.
A lot of agencies obviously don’t care about anybody but themselves. To successfully build an online community, you must staf focused on the perspective and interests of your prospective clients. You have to genuinely care about their challenges and obstacles.
There’s no SEO strategy for your agency’s social media presence. According to Marketing Sherpa, 80-90% of business to business transactions begin with a search on the web. A CMO survey, 80% of decision makers say they found the vendor, not the other way around. “Content Doesn’t Win. Optimized Content Wins” – Li Evans, search marketing guru
Your agency’s social media ship has no rudder. Getting your staff on the same page and keeping them there is like herding cats. Empower the person charged with your agency’s new business to keep your social media efforts focused and directed.
Followers instead of leaders. Most agencies are still using social media the way the early adopters of social media intended. Instead of pressing the envelope for lead generation and networking for new business. This in no way means that you are SELLING.
A mindset of income first. Just like in our offline networks and referrals, it’s relationships first. People want to work with other people that they know, trust and like.
Attending offline events such as trade shows and conferences without inclusion in your agency’s social media efforts. Social media has transformed offline events and can maximize the personnel connections with prospective clients. Your involvement with blogging, Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn can change your whole experience.
No social media training for their staffs. According to a recent 4A’s and Arnold Worldwide survey, 90% of agency staff say they have to figure things out on their own due to the lack of training.
Additional social media + ad agency new business articles that may be of interest:
A significant paradigm shift has taken place that impacts how ad agencies acquire new business that effects the knowledge and skills new business directors need to make it happen.
“With over 50% of client relationships lasting less than two years and the average CMO tenure 27 months, the role of new business at our agencies is more important and a bigger focus than ever.”
Heather Witalisz, Training Director for Mirren Business Development, recently asked me, “what are the top three things a New Business Director must do to be successful?” As I reflected back on my answer I thought this would be a helpful topic to flesh out a bit more. So here are three things a new business director must do to be successful:
1. Digital and Social Media Savvy
The role of the agency new business director is becoming more complex. People who have done this job well in the past are finding it difficult to find success in this current climate.
According to a recent 4A’s and Arnold Worldwide survey, 90% of agency staff say they have to figure things out on their own due to the lack of training.
Unfortunately this bodes the same for many agency new business directors. You may have to create your on ‘continuing education program’ when it comes to digital. It’s important that you do, because it’s almost impossible to ‘sell it if you don’t understand it.’
Having a working knowledge of social media isn’t even an option any longer for an agency’s new business director. Social media is having a big impact on how agency’s promote themselves and how they are found online by their prospective client audiences.
Here are the ways social media is impacting agency new business:
A paradigm shift for how new business is acquired. According to a recent CMO survey, 80% of decision makers say they found the vendor, not the other way around.
SEO is now a critical part of new business strategy. According to Marketing Sherpa, 80-90% of business to business transactions begin with a search on the web.
An agency blog is a necessary component for marketing your agency.As necessary as it was for an agency to have a Website, it is now as relevant for them to have a blog. It becomes the gateway to the agency and puts a face to it.
The growth of new media mandates agencies participation. Social media is now mainstream, your agency’s credibility is suspect if it isn’t walking the walk, not just talking the talk.
2. Be Empowered to Lead New Business
There’s an old saying that cobbler’s children have no shoes. It refers to the fact that a busy cobbler will be so busy making shoes for his customers that he has no time to make some for his own children. If I had a dollar for every ad agency that has used that metaphor as their excuse for why they neglect their own new business program I could have retired long ago.
It’s time for agencies to give the cobbler’s children some new shoes!
How?
Empower your new business director. Give them the clout and resources to get what they need from the agency as if they are the primary contact person for your most important client. Their projects are not put on the back burner when the agency gets busy. Allow them the time, resources and realistic expectations to build a consistent new business pipeline.
3. Create a Narrower Niche and Appealing Position for Your Agency
The FOUNDATION of an ad agency’s new business program is its positioning. Creating the right positioning is a lot like fishing. A successful fisherman fishes for a specific fish, with a specific bait, the right equipment and he knows just where to fish. He has developed the expertise to land the real trophies.
“The common failing among agencies seeking new business is the inability, or unwillingness, to name what they stand for,” Bob Lundin, Agency search consultancy Jones Lundin Beals
Combining social media with your agency’s niche can become an appealing and powerful positioning. Here are a few examples:
Holland + Holland advertising, Birmingham, AL, through their blog She-conomy: A guys guide to marketing to women, has been invited to 3 national pitches in the past year as a result of their differentiating positioning. That had not happened before in their 25 year history.
The Littlefield ad agency, Tulsa, OK, is carving out a niche through their The One Thing blog: The casino marketers guide to understanding gamers, written by the agency’s new business director, Kelly Fiddner.
MAX Advertising, Atlanta, GA, has created The Matte Pad, Marketing know how for the legal profession, written by its CEO, Tom Matte.
Agencies desperately need an expert/specialist in the mechanics of new client acquisition, someone who has the sole focus and capabilities to bring “life-giving” new business to the agency.
Research shows websites influence 97% of clients’ purchasing decisions.
Your agency’s website is your online brochure, the place to present credentials, capabilities and most importantly your agency’s creative work. Not only is it the place prospects and clients go to learn more about your agency and its services, but it has a huge impact on their ultimate purchase decision.
For professional services firms, “74% of buyers report the service provider’s website holds at least “some influence” over their ultimate decision to buy services from the provider.” – Raintoday.com
An agency’s website provides the opportunity for your prospective clients to look under-the-hood, kick the tires and check out the upholstery on their own timetable.
With well-designed websites prospects should be able to:
Establish capabilities and professional credentials: through professional design, writing, and arrangement of content.
Establish that your agency is worthy of consideration: through an overview of your services, client list, biographies of staff, case studies that show how you’ve helped clients and a sampling of your creative work.
Establish your agency as an authority: through a clear point of differentiation and expertise, essential elements for creating an appeal and a necessity of winning new clients beyond your local market.
Your agency’s website is the place for:
Press releases – Announcements about new hires, new client acquisitions, awards and other agency news.
Current clients and work experience.
Staff profiles.
Highlight case studies, testimonials, advertising and marketing campaigns.
Resources such as articles, white papers, research findings and presentations.
Agency services. Provide a clear understanding of what services your agency provides.
Show casing your agency’s creative capabilities.
Job postings, staff recruitment highlighting your agency’s culture.
Highlight your agency’s associations such as with the 4As, MAGNET, TAAN or other agency affiliations.
Links to your agency’s social media platforms such as Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter.
Facts about your agency. Provide a link to an easy to print, downloadable PDF Agency Fact Sheet on your agency.
A call-to-action. Provide a path to engagement for your visitors. Include information about first steps for a prospect, such as a brand or market audit.
Contact information. Make sure that prospects know who to contact for new business other than info@.
Remember also that usability is a critical success factor for websites. If yours isn’t easy to use it is a very poor reflection of your agency and prospects will simply leave it. Users are highly goal-driven on the Web. The ultimate failure of a website is to fail to provide the information users are looking for.
A final tip that I hope you find helpful: Businesses that blog get 55% more website traffic than those that don’t.
Your ad agency’s blog can become one of the most important tools for new business.
A blog is certainly the most critical component to fuel agency new business through social media. How? As a powerful traffic generator. Traffic = leads and leads = new business opportunities.
In a survey of business technology marketing executives by the research firm MarketingSherpa, blogs were voted the No. 4 tool for generating sales leads.
Your blog has the potential to create more web traffic than your agency’s website ever could. It can attract a high volume of quality traffic from the pool of prospective clients you are trying to reach.
Here are 5 Ways an agency’s blog can increase prospective client traffic:
1. Search visibility
The right search traffic doesn’t just happen. It will only occur if you consistently produce unique content. Frequently updated content makes search engines very happy.
Blogs are organized to be search engine friendly. With focus you can dominate search terms for your best prospects to find you. Writing focused content to a particular audience will help to optimize your blog quickly. When I want to rank well for something like “ad agency new business” optimizing my blog is much easier.
2. Repeat Traffic
Posting fresh content brings visitors back often. Most agency websites are too stagnant to produce repeat traffic. Helpful content that is reader-centric will naturally attract prospective clients to your site and provide top of mind awareness for your agency without having to rely on an interruption tactics such as cold calling for new business.
3. Click-Throughs from Twitter
At the time of writing this post, I have over 57,000 following my two Twitter accounts, @michaelgass and @fuellines. I’m able to fuel traffic by repurposing over 600 articles through these two accounts. This material gets retweeted often into other people’s Twitter networks and makes my content viral, growing my following and exposing my blog to a highly targeted audience.
If you are using Twitter alone, it’s not a very good tool for new business. But in combination with your blog’s content, you are one of the few providing helpful information for the many. Writing in an ‘evergreen’ style your blog’s content has a much longer shelf life than a Tweet. Twitter used in combination with your blog has the potential of creating even more targeted traffic than SEO.
You can continue to generate significant traffic for old posts, if you are intentional about it. Once the blog content is written, Third party Twitter tools like Social Oomph will allow you to easily create a system to consistently keep your content in front of a large audience with very little effort.
4. Personality
It’s hard to socialize an entity such as your agency. Social media is all about people and relationships. A blog puts a face to your age and allows your personality to shine through. You wont appeal to everyone, but that’s okay. You will have a strong appeal among the prospects who are the best fit for your agency.
A good example of this is Bob Hoffman, CEO of Hoffman/Lewis advertising in San Francisco. Bob’s personality really shines through his writing for his blog, The Ad Contrarian.
I first learned of Bob’s blog through a critical article highlighting his frequent rants about the ad industry, often laced with profanity. I was curious enough to find out for myself and found was intrigued with his writing. Bob came across as a ‘straight-shooter’ who cut through all of the branding and social media b.s. I ended up becoming a fan, as have a significant number of others.
Social media is all about connecting on a personal level. People have a natural desire to work with other people that they know, trust and like. A blog is a great place to foster these initial personal relationships with your prospective clients.
5. Viral Effects
A blog provides content that can be easily shared across multiple social media channels. It can also be repurposed and shared through an email newsletter, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn. You could compile related or the best of your content into an eBook or white paper. Readers will share it through bookmarking sites such as Digg, Delicious or StumbleUpon. You’re return-on-your-time-investment (ROTI), writing content, can be extensive.
Ultimately, a blog can be highly effective and the most powerful and low-cost new business marketing tool your agency will ever use. Provided you know your target audience, have the right positioning, messaging and rich content that is of benefit to those you are trying to reach.
Here are some additional agency blogging resources that may be a help to get you started:
Park Howell, president of Park&Co, a full service agency that specializes in environmental marketing, provides a successful promotional campaign example for how he built awareness for his agency … by promoting its competition.
Arizona is trying to heal the P.R. black eye and business boycott created by its strict illegal immigration bill SB1070. Among other issues, the state is also battling a historic state deficit, lack of investment in education and nearly 10 percent unemployment. As one solution, Park and his agency launched a ‘Buy Local Advertising Campaign.’
“I was honored earlier this year by being named Ad Person of the Year, by the American Advertising Federation of Metro Phoenix. I thought with the recognition came some modicum of accountability for our industry.
So as we close 2010, our agency wanted to take one last stand for the local advertising industry and encourage all of you Arizona companies that are spending your dollars in other markets with other agencies and production companies, to at least consider including local creative companies on your bid list for 2011. And seriously consider the impact your spending can have on your neighbors right here at home, versus spreading your important dollars abroad.” Park Howell
With the philosophy that “a rising tide lifts all boats”, Park&Co is encouraging AZ companies in need of an advertising agency, to give a first look to Arizona ad agencies and also reminding them that for every $100 spend for goods and services at a locally owned business, $73 remained in the AZ economy.
From Park & Co’s Extra Cut Blog:
You buy your lettuce locally. Why not your marketing?
“You buy local produce, seek out locally owned stores, and drink local wines. So why go to other markets like L.A. for your advertising? Phoenix agencies offer a wealth of talent, from brand strategy and development to internationally award-winning creative, as well as innovative interactive campaigns and Hollywood-caliber film and video production. And you don’t have to look far …
… So, if you want to buy your maple syrup out of state, that’s fine by us. But if its business-building brand strategy and creative you’re looking for, we encourage you to shop locally by visiting parkandco.com/azagencies. And no worries if you pick another local firm over us. Just tell them Park&Co sent you.”
Park&Co have enlisted support and generated buzz for the campaign through its blog, social media network, email and with print. Check out their campaign through the following links:
Results thus far: Park shared with me that the response to their campaign was 95% positive and within the first couple of weeks of the campaign’s launch his agency had received an opportunity to pitch for new business, a direct result of the Buy Local campaign. By the 4th week of the campaign they had secured 5 new business calls, 3 of them in one day.
As an agency owner, it’s important for to be sure that you celebrate new business successes.
New business is tough. Especially in this economy. Life in the trenches for new business is nonstop hard work and often goes unnoticed. For the well-being of your new business team, it is important to stop, take the time to celebrate each new business victory.
Here are 5 reasons to celebrate your agency’s new business wins:
It highlights the importance of new business keeps your agency focused on it for the future. Reminding the staff that it is the lifeblood for your agency is a good thing.
It creates buy into your agency’s new business process. To be consistent the new business pipeline needs to be a well oiled machine. A process that creates a consistent flow of new business for your agency. One that be measured, tweaked and honed.
It provides an opportunity to recognize everyonewho contributed to the effort. A lot of times the staff doesn’t realize who was responsible for the initial lead, which could have come from your agency’s receptionist or an intern.
It breeds a positive attitude among the staff and creates excitement about the agency.
It builds a reputation that your agency is on a hot streak and draws the attention of other prospective clients. There a natural curiosity that comes to those who break out of the pack of from among their competitors.
As communication’s specialists we often are poor with our own internal communications. So, I thought I would pass on some ways communicate wins so that you staff isn’t hearing about new business just around the “water-cooler.”
Have a celebration with the entire agency.
Provide a monetary payment to the staff member who provided the initial referral.
Build buzz with a press release. Include “appropriate” photos from the celebration.
I shouldn’t have to say it but, don’t overlook communicating new business wins through your agency’s newsletter.
Your website is the place where your agency’s credentials and capabilities should live. Be sure to include your new business wins here as well.
If you would like to share some of your agency’s new business wins, please feel free to do so in the comment section below.
“Consistency is a key component to ad agency new business. Consistency is more important than perfection.”
Your agency’s new business program must be sustainable at the times when your agency is at its busiest. Too often new business development is put on the back burner until existing business decreases and a downturn begins. That creates a roller coaster effect on your agency’s pipeline of prospects which impacts agency income and causes you to accept the wrong type of client, from the wrong pool of prospects which do not fit your agency’s strengths and core competencies.
To be consistent, any agency new business program must:
Be realistically achievable within the culture and resources of the agency
Have a new business director/manager who is held accountable for its execution. If “everyone” is responsible for your agency’s new business, in actuality no one is. But that doesn’t mean that others, particularly agency principals aren’t involved in the process.
Look for ways to simplify your processes. From RFP responses, to new business reporting … always invoke the K.I.S.S. principle.
It may also be wise to outsource some services when possible. For some agencies outsourcing certain aspects of their new business program to services such as Catapult New Business or RSW is the best option. I know of a large full service agency,with their own PR department, that chooses to outsource PR for the agency to keep it consistent.
I say it often, you can’t improve it if you can’t measure it. Be sure to have measurements in place, but again, keep them simple.
Create rituals for new business. If you are responsible for new business, you know how easy it is to get side-tracked within the agency environment. I would encourage you to simply set up a routine in the morning that you do as soon as you wake up. This works so well because what you do early in the day often sets the context for your day. A bad start usually leads to a bad day.
Do the things that you dislike the most first and get them out-of-the-way. It provides me with an incentive to get to the tasks that I enjoy the most.
Stay focused on the process. I’ve learned to maintain a consistency through the ups and downs by paying attention to the processes that I’ve created for new business. This makes me less prone to distractions and knee-jerk reactions. I know that if I consistently work the new business program that I have in place the results will come.
Use simple reminders. I use reminders, either on a sticky-note, my computer DeskTop, pop-up alerts, to keep me on course throughout the day. I know what I want to achieve by the end of the day and I use a variety of tools to help keep me keep me on track.
Celebrate successes. New business is tough. Especially in this economy. Life in the trenches for new business is nonstop hard work and often goes unnoticed. For the well-being of your new business team, it is important to stop, take the time to celebrate each new business victory.
Used in the right way, Twitter can be one of the best social media tools to be used to generate traffic and leads for your agency’s new business.
For the past 3 years Twitter has been the leading traffic generator to my Fuel Lines blog. It definitely needs to be part of your agency’s overall social media marketing strategy.
The following are seven of my personal tips to help make Twitter more effective for your agency’s new business:
Don’t be afraid to use Twitter differently from the way it was originally intended to be used. Twitter is more of a broadcast tool that most would admit and current research validates. Treat it as a broadcast tool through reach and frequency of your content marketing efforts and generating the best return on your time investment by repurposing your content through tools such as Social Oomph.
In addition your own blog’s content, be sure to supplement your Twitter posts with resources from others that are of help to your target audience.
Pay-it-forward. As others are so kind to publicize your content, also help to promote theirs.
In addition to Twitter being a broadcasting tool, it must be utilized as a networking tool for you to have success. Content helps build awareness but it is up to you to turn awareness into relationships. The efficiency of these kinds of online networks should be all that is need to motivate you to participate. People want to work with other people that they know, like and trust.
Use third-party Twitter tools like CoTweet and HootSuite to minimize your time and maximize the effectiveness of your Twittering.
What you learn to do for your agency can be used for your clients. There are a multiplicity of benefits from your involvement.
To provide you with further help in using Twitter for new business here are 20 of the most popular post:
Shift Your Ad Agency’s Thinking to Stimulate Creativity, Spur Innovation and Create Enthusiasm for New Business.
A lot of small to midsize ad agencies have chosen to take shelter during the recession, but that strategy doesn’t provide any creative stimulation for ad agency new business. Perhaps the better strategy would be to dramatically shift your agency’s thinking, spur innovation and enthusiasm by setting some challenging new business goals.
I owe inspiration for this post to a recent Stephan Shapiro, a well-known business innovation author, speaker and consultant. In a recent article, , How Goals Enhance Creativity, he said,
“… businesses are driven by goals, how can we leverage them as a tool for enhancing creativity? One way is to use stretch targets. REALLY stretch targets.
What if they set a target of growing by 50% a year? It might have a fundamentally different impact on the organization.
That level of growth is unprecedented. It will certainly stretch the way they think. A 14% improvement can most likely be attained through conventional thinking. But a 50% growth target would require some breakthrough thinking; radical ideas.
The future gives them the present, rather than present giving them the future.”
4 Ways Goals Can Enhance Creativity for Ad Agency New Business:
Shifts thinking. Instead of being reactive, it provides a proactive approach to generating new business. A shift from defense to offense and getting your agency out of its hunkered down, bunker mentality.
Stimulates creativity. I have never liked setting unrealistic goals. To me they are meaningless. But I do embrace robust new business goals, that will stretch and challenge your agency’s creative thinking to attain them.
Spurs innovation. Most agencies are not good in creating a consistent new business program. They are always busy. Client work comes before their own. But, there are solutions to these types of challenges, always a “work-around” if you will take the time to figure out an innovative solution.
Creates enthusiasm. Big goals can be the spark to generate a spirit of enthusiasm. A rallying point for your beleaguered troops. These may seem like the darkest days your agency has ever faced but in reality this could be the greatest of times for growing your agency. You will NEVER have another opportunity like this in your lifetime. These times present the perfect conditions for small to midsize agencies to shine.
Relevant and valuable content will attract a clearly defined and understood target audience.
Content marketing is an overarching term that involves the creation and sharing of content for the purpose of engaging your prospective clients. Educating your potential clients results in building your agency’s brand awareness and recognition as a thought leader and industry expert. The primary objective is lead generation for new business opportunities.
Here are 6 steps for using content marketing to attract prospective clients:
First, define your target audience
Second, determine what are their marketing and advertising challenges, “what keeps them up at night”
Third, create a blog as your central communication platform that becomes a repository of information, “a one stop shop” that provides consistent solutions, rich helpful content
Fourth, continually measure how well you’re doing and adjust as you go
Fifth, “Jump start” your blog’s traffic, accelerate its growth by repurposing content through other social media channels such as Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn using third party tools to that help to make the process easy to manage and time efficient.
Sixth, now, what you’ve done for yourself, do for your clients
Tried and true best practices and tips can accelerate your agency’s success with social media and keep it ahead of the competition.
Having a clear objective from the get-go is important. I would suggest that you use social media as a big part of your agency’s new business program. Social media can provide a sustainable, affordable and focused program for networking and lead generation and also a great return on the time invested.
I recently received this note from an ad agency president that has differentiated his agency using social media,
“We just landed a significant project with Coca-Cola purely through our sustainable marketing niche. The best compliment we could receive was when they said our price was waaaay more than the next bid, but given our background in green marketing and sustainability, that it was worth the extra investment. Finally, a value over price purchase. Love it.”
To be successful with social media for your agency’s new business, here are 6 tips:
Identify and address a specific target audience. Face it, most agencies are afraid to put their stake in the ground and even identify who their target audience. You would never recommend a marketing campaign for a client without first identifying who they are trying to reach.
Lead content and conversations with benefits. Social media helps agencies to talk in a new way. To discard the past agency speak for a language the resonates with their audience. That is focused on what are the benefits for them. “You Can Only Get What You Want, If You Help Enough Other People Get What They Want” – Zig Ziglar.
Differentiate from your competitors. You wont win any significant business by showcasing how you match up with the rest of the agencies. You must unlevel the playing field. Set yourself apart. What would give a company reason to fly over hundreds of other agencies, across a number of states, to do business with your agency? Social media provides a great opportunity to for your agency to stand out.
Become a specialist instead of a generalist. Our world is becoming more and more specialized. I had to have surgery a few years ago. My personal physician recommended a neurosurgeon practicing at our suburban hospital. My choice was one of the leading neurosurgeon in the country who happened head up the department of neurosurgery at an academic medical center less than 30 miles from my home. A CMO’s job could be very well on-the-line with the choice of an agency. If I were in their position, I would be choosing a specialist rather than a generalist. Wouldn’t you?
Create appeal. One of the great benefits for using social media for new business is the instant feedback from your audience. It allows you to easily test your message an hone your appeal.
Earn positioning as a “thought leader.” In less than 3 years, social media has created an international awareness for my personal brand among my best target audience. I have clients from coast to coast, so far this year I spoken in over 43 cities, traveled over 43,000 miles, recognition from some of our national trade publications and advertising associations. All of it through social media. What has worked for me and can also work for you and position you as a thought leader to your prospective client audience.
Some additional tips and best practices for using social media for your agency’s new business:
An ad agency’s new business pipeline isn’t something you can just turn on and off. It needs to continually flow, constantly generating leads.
While there are different approaches to successful agency new business development programs, they are made up of some common building blocks. The first secret to a new business program is getting started. The second secret is developing a new business program that your agency can consistently execute and sustain.
As you create a new business plan for your agency you should think in terms of “what is sustainable when our agency is at its busiest”.
Many well-intentioned plans are often derailed by success. When the agency starts to get busy the new business program is put on the back-burner. This creates a roller coaster effect for new business. Your new business pipeline often takes 3 to 4 months to begin generating leads so it is very inefficient to turn it on and off like a spigot.
Often, when your agency is beginning to get busy with new business, it is the best time to step-up your efforts. What agency wouldn’t want to be in the position of being able to turn away business. To be more selective of the type of client accounts your agency is willing to accept.
To be consistent, any agency new business program must:
1. Be realistically achievable within the culture and resources of the agency
Set realistic goals. There are a lot of agencies, when asked what are their new business goals will say, ”we want to double in size” or ”we want to take our agency to the next level”. This aren’t realistic goals unless you have a plan and that plan will be dependent upon what resources of time, personnel and budget that are available for implementation.
2. Have a manager who is held accountable for its execution
If everyone is responsible for your agency’s new business then no one is responsible.
Someone must be accountable, have the authority and ability to drive it. There’s a lot of pushing, prodding and poking that must be done to keep the new business program working. Someone must be responsible for keeping it focused and on track.
3. Top management must be intimately involved in the process
No one in the agency feels the pressure to succeed more than the agency principals. Like it or not, they are the face of the agency. Their involvement is important for new business and they shouldn’t shy away from this responsibility. To maintain consistency, new business, must be a priority in their daily responsibilities.
Mandate that your agency has an integrated new business plan. Unbelievably, 62% of agencies don’t have a planned new business effort.
Define your agency’s positioning. This is the starting point for any ad agency new business program. It is a fundamental prerequisite for small and midsize agencies. But it is also the place where most agencies where most fail. Positioning is everything.
Choose a target audience. This will not deter your agency from still obtaining “other” type of clients through your personal networks and referrals within your local market, but it will go a very long way to creating awareness, appeal, differentiation and focus for your agency’s new business program. It makes new business so much easier when you do.
Resolve to stay the course. New business efforts are relational and take time to come to fruition.
It’s time to un-level the playing field. To have success with social media, agencies need to fly a differentiated social media flag.
Small-to midsize ad agencies tend to constantly promote how they are alike rather than how they are different from other agencies. They tend to look and sound just the same.
When agencies gave up fighting against the social media tide and decided to dive in, instead of using this new communications channel to showcase how they were different, they ended up just following the lead of others. Once again positioned as a generalists instead of a specialist and following the “safe-way” rather than the “smart-way.”
I had hoped that agencies would have learned this lesson by now, “if you try to appeal to everyone, you will appeal to no one”.
Having spent my entire advertising career in new business, I know first hand the financial pressures small to mid-size agencies are under. I understand their reservation for not wanting to focus to narrowly on a target audience or discipline. I know all of the excuses for not wanting to drive a stake in the ground and define themselves for who they are. But agencies are missing a grand opportunity.
Social media provide agencies to boldly declare who their target audience truly is, what their points of differentiation are. Social media allows agencies this freedom without fear of ”throwing the baby out with the bath-water.” It provides favorable, acceptable conditions for the agency’s principals to fly their differentiated flag proudly without fear of missing “other” opportunities that use to come by way of their personal networks and referrals.
Agencies tend to look and act the same because they merely have a check list of social media tools and platforms to prove their participation. But their social media practice has no strategy, no connection to a particular target audience, no demonstration of how they are different. Merely showcasing that they are a bona-fide member of the global social media community.
Here are my 5 tips for flying your agency’s differentiated social media flag:
Create an agency blog for a specific targeted audience. If you don’t, it will lack focus and be nothing more than mishmash that has no flavor , appeal or audience.
Have an objective. I would suggest the objective to be using social media for your agency’s new business pipeline. Inbound new business leads through content marketing that positions you as a thought leader to your best prospective clients.
Remember that social is about people. I would strongly suggest that you don’t incorporate your blog into the branding of your agency’s website. Give it room to breath and grow on its own. Let your agency’s blog be a reflection of key persons within the agency instead of trying to socialize an entity. You connect with people online the same way you do offline, but online you can efficiently reach more people over a much broader geographical area. People want to work with people that they know, trust and like. Social media provides you with this great opportunity to network.
Don’t be afraid to use social media differently than the way it was intended. Some social media purists act like Barney Fife and may threaten you with”citizens arrest,” but there is just one social media rule for you to keep in mind, there are no rules! This is still the wild, wild west.
Never lose your marketing mind when it comes to social media. Remember that it is just another communication’s channel. I have had much better success working with the agency “baby boomers” and their getting up-to-speed with social media than younger staffers who understand this new communication technology but they lack the experience in marketing and advertising. Don’t be intimidated. It’s not as hard as it may appear to get your marketing mind around the social media space.
A command center (often called a war room) is any place that is used to provide centralized command to determine the best course of action.
Every agency needs a “new business war room”, a place within your building that is organized for and focused on nothing but new business.
Usually the new business person is the “odd duck” of the agency. Why? No one else likes doing what they have to do, which is to sell the agency. But it is amazing at how quickly the new business director can get roped into almost everything but agency new business. Endless meetings throughout most days with no time left for execution of the agency’s new business strategy.
When I served as the VP of new business for the BOHAN agency in Nashville, we were fortunate to have our own space dedicated solely for the purpose of new business. We often called it our New Business War Room, because this was the place that we were able to focus on the lifeblood of the agency’s new business efforts.
No matter the size of your agency, I would suggest that you designate an area just for the purpose of agency new business. Here are some of the features, equipment and arrangements we had for our new business area that may spark some ideas of your own:
Multipurpose Room:
Comfortable seating for about 15 people. The chairs were on rollers and could be easily re-arranged or moved entirely out of the way.
Not a typical conference table, but two tables that could be set apart for workshops, focus groups, etc. A large whiteboard, flip-chart, a large bulletin type display board. This provided us our own space where we could keep visuals of on-going new business projects.
Large flat screen TV, wireless Apple keyboard and presentation remote, Apple Airport, DVD player and sound bar.
Work Room:
Equipment and materials to create customized notebooks, presentation-leave behinds, RFP covers and special delivery boxes.
A collection of agency work that was well organized, that could be easily gathered and customized for a specific prospect.
Storage for agency collateral materials, new business direct mail pieces, printed agency newsletters, prospective client gift items such as hats, shirts, pens, thumb-drives, etc.
Files: Hard copies of previous RFPs, new business intel on current prospective clients, materials from prior pitches.
New Business Server:
On our agency’s server, we had a designated area for new business that was password protected. Only a limited number of staff persons had access. It included:
RFP resources: to help with new RFP requests, we had all of the previous RFPs broken down into sections such as Experience, Staff, Billings, Case Studies, Processes, Client Lists, Work Samples. This made the RFP process much easier.
New business intelligence on prospective clients: current news, press releases, staffing info, current work, agency relationships, etc.
Intelligence on competitor agencies: client lists, news updates, press releases, staff changes, etc.
Electronic prospective client data base, a collection of prospective client data from sources such as The List.
Electronic samples of the agency’s creative work and a system to add new work consistently.
Web-based microsites for prospective clients, specific to certain areas such as healthcare and leisure products. Two of the agency’s core strengths.
Downloadable Agency Fact Sheet and Agency Brochures that were specific to certain prospective client groups.
Offices:
Quiet, comfortable, individual offices, designed for long hours, for the entire new business team.
Nice common areas for collaborative discussions.
Our own kitchen area with bar seating. A nice plus for prospective client meetings as well as meetings for our our agency staff.
Our offices included a large balcony overlooking the city of Nashville, where we also entertained prospective clients, after hour drinks, grilling, etc.
Having our own space on a separate floor of the agency allowed us to stay rifled focused on new business. Making calls, gathering intelligence, cultivating and engaging our prospects. It was amazing the amount of work we were able to do.
Systems were in place to keep us in the loop of the new creative work and we had consistent communications with our staff regarding the efforts of the new business team working on their behalf. We still participated in the monthly and quarterly meetings but avoided being brought in for a lot of the daily meetings that went on in one of the agency’s other four conference rooms.
I hope this can serve to help spark your own ideas for creating a space for your agency’s new business. Be sure and share some of your best ideas us.
Your agency’s new business program must be sustainable at the times when your agency is at its busiest.
To often new business development is put on the back burner until existing business decreases and a downturn begins. That creates a roller coaster effect on your agency’s pipeline of prospects which impacts agency income and causes you to accept the wrong type of client, from the wrong pool of prospects who do not fit your agency’s strengths and core competencies.
Definition: con·sis·tent
adj = able to maintain a particular standard or repeat a particular task with minimal variation
To be consistent, any agency new business program must be “realistically” achievable within the culture and resources of the agency.
A lot of agency’s, when they start thinking about new business, are doing so when they are not busy. They should create a new business program that is sustainable when they are at their busiest.
7 tips to find time for ad agency new business, when you are at your busiest:
1. Have someone who is held accountable, who will also keep others accountable for the agency’s new business process. If “everyone” is responsible for your agency’s new business, in actuality no one is. But that doesn’t mean that others, particularly agency principals aren’t involved in the process.
2. Look for ways to simplify your new business processes. Your agency’s new business program should shut down or even slow down just because you have a couple of RFPs that have a short turn-around period or even if you have a significant new business pitch that week.
For all of your agency’s new business activities such as RFP responses, direct mail, phone calls, social media marketing, etc, always invoke the K.I.S.S. principle. It isn’t rocket science, so keep everything simple so that it is sustainable even during your agency’s peak periods.
3. Keep reporting to a minimum. I know of some agencies that overburden the person that is charged with new business with lots of detailed reporting on the persons daily or weekly activities. Don’t hold them accountable for the activities, hold them accountable for results. In the end that is what they are judged on anyway.
4. Keep meetings to a minimum. Don’t tie up your new business person(s) with meaningless meetings.
When I served as VP of new business for a regional ad agencies, we moved our new business staff to a quiet floor of the agency that no one else occupied. We didn’t get roped into the plurality of meetings that were being held throughout the day. This kept us out-of-site and out-of-mind so that we could stay focused on generating results for new business.
5. Create a support group. Involve junior level staff, interns and/or persons working remotely to carry out a lot of the “grunt” type new business work. There are many activities that don’t make financial sense for a new business executive to be doing on a daily basis. It isn’t smart business for their time to be used for some new business tasks.
6. Outsource services where it is appropriate. An example of a service that could be outsourced could be the agency’s prospective client database. A lot of agency’s tell me about their data base of prospects. But most of the time, this type of a database is just a bunch of names and contact information gathered from lots of different efforts and sources. But there usually no one that is maintaining and updating the data because of the tremendous amount of time that it takes.
A midsize ad agency, outsourced their own PR for new business, even though they had a PR department. They found that outsourcing the service provided more accountability and consistency. “You can be sure it’s no accident that some agencies get more ink and air time than others. It’s because they have an intentional, ongoing effort to get their names in the marketplace, and they have made PR a priority” - Don Beehler, PR Consultant.
7. Maintain focus. Part of the excitement and also frustration of working within the agency environment is that it face paced and constantly changing. But this kind of environment makes easy to get sidetracked and wastes lots of time. And it will happen particularly if your new business program lacks focus.
To have focus, it is imperative that you create a simple new business plan and ritualistically work it. It must be the person responsible for new business to keep it headed in the right direction. Strategic, not reactionary. Plan the work and work the plan. It is that simple.
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MICHAEL GASS
Welcome to my blog, FUEL LINES: The best business development tips, tactics, practices and trends to help ad agencies, PR firms and digital shops create a more clearly defined focus and differentiating business strategy.
Click here to listen to my experience using social media from an ad agency new business perspective, BlogTalkRadio interview conducted by Trey Pennington
Posted by Michael Gass 
