But for me, I felt there had to be more. I wanted to not just advise clients as an outsider but help them grow their businesses from the inside. I took a risk and jumped ship into the commercial world.
There, I got a real taste of business and – after a few years of bluster and bravado – I decided to get serious about it. I undertook an MBA from a B-school that charged me a small fortune and cost me most of my hair. But I loved it; it opened up my world.
I leveraged it to get an interview at a global brand agency that changed my life forever. For the first time in my career, I found myself doing work that was both strategic and creative. It was profoundly interesting and deeply satisfying. I never looked back.
Senior marketers face a dilemma when choosing an external firm to solve their problems: is a firm's fee a good proxy for the quality of their work? The answer is not so simple.
Some firms are cheap. We all know the saying, ‘You get what you pay for.’
Some firms are expensive. That means they’re often out of reach or can only be engaged on really big projects.
The tricky ones are those firms in the middle. Some are great, but most aren't. Most charge a premium, but their work is mediocre. They over-promise and under-deliver. Their work is repurposed from previous projects. They have lots of people on the account but not much experience. Their good people are too stretched, and service levels drop. You suspect they're using your project to hit their holding company revenue targets or get themselves into award competitions.
We know many clients who are caught in a vicious cycle of procuring and managing 'trophy' firms that, in reality, provide little value and big headaches.
We know because we’ve held senior leadership positions at some of those firms.
We’ve seen what happens on the inside of those places: the effects of 'the system' on its people and the work; the things a firm wishes it could tell its clients, but can't.
We know there’s a better way. Don't get caught in the trap of expensive, mediocre firms who are honestly in it for themselves.
Tired of expensive, mediocre work?
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