Underground Blog

This blog post would be better if only I had more time to write it. But the window I have to write it is now. And I like that. Because it mirrors the nature of a crazy, fun and manic business we chose to be a part of. The “Hurry Up and Wait” state of agencies is something I’ve had to deal with in every culture I’ve been a part of, including my own.

Agency people like to imagine a perfect scenario like so:

Agency creates product. Client approves product. Product goes out into the world. Everything is on time. On to the next project.

Gosh, that was a fun daydream. Now let’s see what happens in the real world.

Rounds and rounds and rounds of tweeking and honing the creative product in the eyes of the Creative Directors, Account Executives, Executive Creative Director, Head Account person, etc.

The creative product gets beaten up more than Rocky Balboa before it even goes out the door.

Then it goes to the client. Client has to take it to their boss. Product sits on boss’ desk for a while. It’s a priority, but there are even bigger priorities to attend to. Agency waits and gets antsy – “Why haven’t we heard from them?”

Hours pass. Days pass. Then…BOOM! Client gets feedback back from their boss and tells agency to change A, B and C before the end of the day.

It’s here that the measure of a creative person is taken. They’ll complain right off the bat with a “What? Now? Before what time? You’ve got to be #$@*ing kidding me with this.”

But then, they’ll settle down, realize that the impossible is actually possible, come together and come back with, lo and behold, a better product than last time.

I’ve seen it happen over and over and over again. It does no good to complain about the pattern or try to wish for a more efficient production path. Instead, we have to embrace the beast, not fight it. And realize that yes, things don’t hit our desks exactly when we’d like them to, but it also gives us an opportunity to shine in the eyes of our client once more. Many of them do realize that the time they have to give us what’s required can be somewhere between tight and insane. They’re not clueless. But they’re also looking for partners who can make them look good in the eyes of their bosses, their peers, their board. The last thing they need is a group of whiners who lecture them by saying, “We could that better if only we had more time.”

We all wish we had more time in business and in life to do the things we want to do on our terms. But the funny thing is, when we are given more boundaries, we find ways to excel within those boundaries.

I truly empathize with any creative person who has to be suddenly brilliant on the spot. It’s not ideal and there’s a great deal of pressure involved with that. I suppose that’s why I’ve always favored teams brainstorming concepts rather than forcing one person or one partnership into their corners and telling them to bring me their deliverables like I’m the king of the throne. When we can be fighting the clock together instead of individuals, we can beat the clock, create a smart solution and go with the flow as our clients need us to be.

There will never be enough time. But we have to accept that fact and consequently set the table for an environment where one writer or one designer can have the reinforcements they need to take on Father Time. This kind of efficiency is good for the individual, it’s good for the agency from a business perspective (hello, we do have to bill sometime!) and it’s good for the client.

When it comes to prioritizing what to do, my friend and colleague Rob Jager from Hedgehog Consulting looks at it this way – “There are 6 things that can be done in a day. List them out in advance and put the least important thing 6th. That way, you don’t feel so bad if you have to kick it to the next day, but make that thing #1 the following day.”

Time’s up. Gotta run.

Explain to me something. Why would you call in an expert for something you need assistance with and then proceed to reject everything that expert says you need assistance with based on customized research, without having an open mind whatsoever?

It sounds crazy. Because it is.

I’m not saying you need to hire that expert. It’s your money, of course, and it’s your right to do what you want with it. Nor am I saying you need to agree with that expert. They’re coming into your world for the first time and could possibly be off on a few things.

But you do have to listen to them. If you can’t honestly listen, you’re wasting everyone’s time.

When you bring in an outside consultant, open yourself up to the possibilities that that firm may bring a perspective you had never otherwise considered. If they’re off, correct them, but remember that other points may have great merit.

I’ll be the first to admit I don’t know everything. But I do know a whole heck of a lot about branding and strategic planning. I’ve been doing it a good long while and I believe I’m excellent at it. Yet I also take great pleasure in learning new trends that shape how we communicate. It’s because I have that passion for listening to findings and voices other than my own that I learn and make other people’s brands better than they are today.

In other words, if I didn’t listen to others, I wouldn’t benefit myself.

I bring this up because research is a fundamental part of what we do. It drives much of our choices and it can uncover amazing insights. The information can come from countless places, whether one-on-one conversations or tons of online data. Without it, we’re just throwing words and pictures up against a wall without much rhyme or reason or, what most people call a strategy. So it’s pretty darn important.

Once in a blue moon, I’m struck by someone who doesn’t believe the research and chooses to only believe their own unscientific opinion. True, not all research is perfect. Perhaps some samplings aren’t just right or too much weight is given to this or that answer.

But when it’s a perspective that might take your brand to a new direction, which can definitely happen based on what research tells us, you owe it to yourself to at least consider the value of that research. Maybe some people do believe it and don’t want to believe they could’ve been going down a better path all this time. Maybe some are just that arrogant.

“I’ve been doing this for a long time and I’ve received good business from Audience A so I don’t know why you’d suggest Audience B.”

First of all, if your brand was hitting it out of the park, we wouldn’t be having this conversation. So clearly, you’re not connecting that brilliantly with that audience or you wouldn’t need my help or the help of someone like me. Face up to that.

Secondly, the audience you think is your primary audience may actually be your secondary crowd all along. You can have more than one group your brand can resonate with.

Thirdly, economies shift, people get older, tastes change and priorities alter. If you’ve been doing the same thing toward the same group of people for a very long time, chances are good that you haven’t adapted while your competition has.

With that in mind, all I ask of you is this: Come to the table willing to say openly that your brand needs help. Be able to admit that. Let the expert in to share your issues and challenges. The more you can let those walls come down to show that consultant where your faults are, the better off you’ll hopefully be in terms of a solution that’s more customized to your needs.

And on the day that that consultant comes back through your door with a customized solution, listen to them. If an objection starts to build in your mind, just wait. Listen. Because if they’re speaking to the perceptions of the people who can help shape your brand – your audience – I know you won’t dismiss those perceptions blindly and quickly.

When disgraced former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich was reaching the height of his scandal, his top notch defense lawyer resigned in frustration, saying, “My clients don’t have to agree with me, but they do have to listen.”

Of course, I’m sure you’re a profoundly more respectable person than Rod, but you can see sometimes that being in the company of non-listeners is not good company to be in. You don’t have to agree with people like me. But if you’re going to work with people like me, you do have to listen.

It’s easy to get so caught up in the business of doing business that you forget something awfully important — without you, there is no business. Yes, clients require your services, which is vital to success. But your own company’s brand needs to grow and not just your clients’ brands.

I fell into that challenge recently and with a lot of client work, I’m not complaining. But I should have posted much more often than I have in the last couple months, which I’ll try to remedy going forward with much more frequency. Blogging isn’t just an outlet for me but it’s hopefully a good way to help people out with thoughts on brand strategy. It’s who I am. I’m an admitted brand geek. And I need to be talking about it a lot more with the world. So thanks for bearing with me during my short time away and I’ll try to never be that long between posts again. Looking forward to conversations on how you’re positioning your brand for the economic recovery — hey, did I just stumble into my next post? Looks like I’m getting my momentum back.

Dan

“What makes us different? Our company is focused on people, our clients and our staff.”

Wow. That is different. I’ve never heard that before from anyone.

I just came across one of these “About Us” sections that could literally be any company in the world. But what makes this particularly strange is that this company actually did have some very good things to tout. They were named to two different magazines for the quality of their workplace environment…and yet, this valuable piece of info was buried many paragraphs down where it could be potentially missed.

Sometimes I think companies are reluctant to talk about their culture before they talk about their services because they think the potential client doesn’t care. Not necessarily. If I know your amazingly collaborative culture correlates to greater teamwork and focus that ultimately benefits your clients in the form of, say, greater customer service (and you can provide specific examples of this), there’s a benefit to that client.

Of course, in this particular instance, the “About Us” was front-loaded with blanding instead of branding. Every company has a point of difference. And you sure don’t want to leave the credibility behind that point of difference until paragraph 8 of your “About Us” section.

“I wasn’t CC’d on that.”
“Did you send me the latest file?”
“My Spam filter might have snatched that up by accident.”

Ah, internal miscommunication. I don’t know if anything can hold a company back more than that. It’s mind-numbingly frustrating when you don’t have all the necessary parties working in unison within your four walls. And e-mail doesn’t solve the problem like some would think it does because there’s always someone who missed this or that e-mail. Well, I’m proud to say I’ve found something better that, while it may not remedy such a problem, will definitely help matters.

Recently, we bought a tool for our agency that provides tremendous value to our clients as well as our own internal communication called Basecamp. If you don’t know what Basecamp is, you should go to 37signals.com and check it out. Basically, it is a communications tool that helps everyone within the company and clients get on the same page in regard to messages, documents, video and more. From an internal standpoint, sometimes Intranets are intended to perform this way, but they just don’t work out quite as well.

WIthout sounding like a spokesperson for 37 Signals and their product, let me just say that Basecamp is very simple to set up, you can set the number of projects you have in the system or have unlimited projects (we do). Plus, it goes a long way toward collaboration because the people involved on the project can make their own comments on the file in question. There’s no more “I didn’t see it” in regard to the file because once you log in with your own username and password…you see the latest version.

I can’t forgo e-mail because, well, that isn’t practical for the rest of the world that uses it. But if the world all at once decided to communicate via Basecamp and social media tools like Twitter/LinkedIn/Facebook, I could definitely make that work.

Check out Basecamp at 37signals.com and let me know what you think.