What Do You Think - Should We Bring It In-House?

This is the age-old question that commonly surfaces at least once a year if you’re sitting client-side – wondering if bringing your campaign work and media buying in-house would be better. 

When frustrations get to a fever pitch and communication breaks down, that’s when you think about firing your agency. Or when you look at the invoice in front of you that needs to be paid for external marketing support, knowing you didn’t hit your objectives for the month; that’s when you maybe throw your hands up and think you’d be better off managing your campaigns and media buying in-house with your own team.

'Trust me, been there - done that.'

I’ve spent as many years client-side as agency-side. I’ve hired and fired agencies, and agency-side I’ve won and lost clients & business. The frustration that can mount when you sit client-side, is that you don’t have 100% visibility into what they are or aren't doing on a daily basis, and who is ‘really’ working on your business.  Or maybe you know who’s working on your business, and you’re not impressed.

I’ve asked for more senior account managers when someone junior was put on my business when I was sitting client side. I was begrudgingly given someone at a higher pay grade with more experience, but I know my agency wasn’t totally happy about doing it. I didn’t want to feel like I was training their junior employees when I needed someone who could be one step ahead of me, or at a minimum; someone who could keep up with me. 

As we all know, it can seem like - but is never utopia sitting on either side of the fence. Client side you feel at the mercy of your agency or agencies, to have your best interests at heart. Those agencies that did things and brought me ideas and opportunities that I hadn’t asked for, I kept longer than those that did just the minimum to keep my business. When it seems and feels like your agency team is on autopilot or asleep at the wheel, they might be.

Unfortunately, sitting client-side; what can seem like a lack of attentiveness on your business, may simply be the reality that your agency team is spread too thin and are working on multiple pieces of business simultaneously. This is typically the case when fees are too low for the work that's required to achieve superior results.

The individuals assigned to actually get the work done on various accounts are many times more junior and still learning the finer nuances of campaign management, media planning or media buying; because more expensive, experienced talent would break the financial model. The level of training, support and engagement that they get from their management team will have a direct effect on your campaign performance.

The other challenge that has only become worse over time, is the financial model that agencies have morphed into with either percent media or FTE payment terms. This has turned the art of media buying into a commodity. The lowest cost agency provider commonly wins the RFP; only to find the business up for review in two to three years. High levels of service and performance are difficult to maintain at today’s low agency margins. Brands and clients want performance metrics to be hit, while procurement wants the lowest costs.

It was thought that technology would make media planning, buying and campaign management easier and more cost efficient for agencies to handle effectively. Unfortunately, the complexity of multiple channels, platforms, and technology options; has made the role of almost every agency media planner, buyer, or campaign manager – a quagmire of constantly changing and emerging options and information. It’s a constant race to keep up with algorithm changes, technology advances, and emerging platforms; not to mention the nuances and complexities of their client’s business. And in some cases – juggling details and KPIs for multiple clients.

This model is fundamentally broken, which is one reason why turnover rates tend to be high at most agencies. The fear of losing a client constantly looms over the head of the agency and account team. Increasing fraud and lack of transparency into media buying, placement and performance throughout the media buying ecosystem exacerbates the situation.

Unfortunately bringing the work in-house client side is not typically the ultimate solution. Having been on both sides of the table, it’s a fulltime job staying on the leading edge of the latest options in the market for media placement, campaign optimization best practices, algorithm changes and technology options to maximize media investments and performance. Companies that don’t specialize in media buying and campaign optimization best practices, aren’t in the best place to take on this responsibility to bring it in-house. They also don’t typically have the industry relationships that agencies have with key media partners.

A hybrid arrangement is many times the best solution to get the highest performance for your marketing investment. If you’re client side, having someone on your team who’s previously worked agency-side can be a huge plus in managing the agency to get the most out of the relationship. In addition, part of my motivation for developing and launching Blockchain4Media; is to help both media buyers and brands spend their budgets the smartest way possible.

Finding an agency that’s willing to put ‘skin in the game’ is an ideal situation. Agencies that are willing to put their compensation on the line in exchange for managing your strategic and tactical campaign execution, are hard to find. One agency that has proven highly effective at this is Vuja De Digital. They’re willing to put ‘skin in the game’ in that they have no hourly rate, no set fee, and their compensation is tied directly to their performance in meeting objectives.

You’ll typically get more experienced talent and more proactive initiative with your campaign management when an agency’s compensation is tied to their level of performance. You also have a much higher probability of hitting your KPIs when you’ve got a performance media partner with the same objectives as you. 

Now that I’m not sitting on either the agency or client side of the table, you may think it’s easy for me to be a backseat quarterback. However, at this point in my career; I’ve got years of experience across the marketing and advertising continuum in multiple roles, agencies and companies. If my perspective can shed light that helps an agency, client, individual marketer – or the industry, shift in some meaningful way toward more effective relationships, expectations, working arrangements, and meeting one another’s needs – it’s worth my time to share my perspective. 

?Advertising and marketing are here to stay, and are only getting more sophisticated and complicated. However, it's safe to say that almost nothing we do is life threatening, unless we’re not taking care of our own health. Whether you’re agency, client or even vendor-side – remember to stop and smell the roses. As I used to tell various teams and individuals who have worked with me throughout my career, ‘do your best, and remember - we’re not saving babies from burning buildings.’ So if you make a mistake, don't get down on yourself, just try not to repeat it - learn from it and move on.

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