9 Comments

Very interesting. Thanks for posting.
bibi @ bibigallery
2009-11-16 20:40:55

steve henry speaks very wisely.
simon
2009-11-17 15:45:52

I found comment about the absolute misery in the industry interesting. Not that I have any experience yet, but after two internships and working the past year at an agency, I'd say that is my observation as well.
Paul
2009-11-17 17:56:15

Interesting stuff.

Agencies and clients have to change. No doubt. And how to 'communicate' has to change. No doubt. And they have to work better together. For sure.

The thing that bothers me is that there's not much mention of going beyond advertising into partnering with clients to build their brands through creative problem solving and real innovation e.g. creating better, more relevant, more useful and even more sustainable products, services and experiences.

For my money, the rest (advertising) is icing on the cake. If you haven't got something worth talking about, no amount of brilliant communication is going to sustain that brand.

Maybe a different way to look at the issue?
Tom Farrand
2009-11-18 18:28:18

The most interesting take away from this video is the proposed solution that agencies and creative people “have to do everything”. But what exactly does that mean?
 
People who have been trained in design, typography and image assembly are suddenly going to become PHP, ActionScript, and social media experts?  Writers are going to become FinalCut effects, video and FLASH animation experts?  And the account service team is going to develop expertise on SEO, PPC, blogging and organic search results ranking? And with all the meshing and merging of silos and point capabilities and skills, who is conducting the creative orchestra with the right level of competency and fluency to ensure that an idea is worth pursuing?
 
What’s more, if that is where we are headed, what is the business case to develop this inter-fluency of skills that will deliver an ROI of increased compensation for having created this capability?
 
The one thing that has become increasingly clear with the digital devaluation perpetrated by Adobe and technology is that one omni-present trend has been accelerating: the more you learn the less you make.
Paul Pruneau
2009-11-19 02:53:32

Interesting conversation but very cock heavy! Were there no creative female voices available?
Chris Beaumont
2009-11-19 09:52:40

Having sat through this video I am left with the feeling that all agencies represented at the table lack one basic ingredient and in my opinion this is the case in the agency business at the moment. Strategy based on client engagement and the engagement of their customer via advertising. The real issue is one of Clients, its brand and its customer market language and its customers market availability/accessibility. Sites like FaceBook, MySpace, Beebo et al are simply new routes to market new mediums to exploit. If you look at the demography of these sites it is interesting that FaeBook is turning off younger subscribers because their Dad is on there now. I keep seeing tons about Twiter and other community media but in truth these are all new and unproven vehicles. What I mean by that is, take TV we've got program sponsorship we've got Air time ads and we've got In paper support off to a tee. Is it working, does it work still? Then take press and even leafleting down to brochure and other below the line. Surely the whole opportunity comes back to strategy at he Agency. The agency selling the client a strategy and this require bravery at the sharp end the Account Director end, the guy or girl who has to sell this new idea/pitch. What I have just heard and seen strikes me as one persons opinion. Surely this business is the ideas factory, ideas and concepts are what we all buy into. We are a buying public of habits, types and brands. Everyone I know seems to be a label affiliate. Surely this is all about life style and if so Agencies should be tuning in to life style activities and creating concepts based on that design. Design, the creation of great ideas that sell, married to great copy and then delivered via the right medium this is all it takes. Not much really?
Mark Alford
2009-11-19 09:59:43

An interesting discussion thanks Patrick and Creative Review for the insights.

Its really interesting to hear how things have developed since I made the switch from big agency tv advertising to more dynamic video/brand work.

I agree with the sentiment that in the big agency world the heart is being sucked out. I was sad the other day to hear that a former agency has gone from 350 staff to 140 this year with most of the amazing creative talent left setting up pubs in devon and refocusing on the more important things in life. However from the perspective of a small set used to looking for opportunities that ad agencies typically overlooked this period is seeming to be somewhat of a gold rush.

Clients are realising that the money they were putting through to their brand guadians and keepers of the keys to a tv audience nationwide are no longer quite so significant. Any brand now can create its own tv channel now and in the next 3-5 years the line between tv and internet will blur even further. The changes in technology in video for example, the ease with which wireless and remote working can actually help you build more efficient ways of working all lead to the fact that big clients can trust small producers to do a quality job without the overheads and staff costs of big london agencies.

Now this isn't just the opportunity for me to say how I'm happy for others losses, I'm not. The key here is moving forward our industry needs to keep focused on engaging, relevant and inspiring content which drives response from its audience. We need to be creating creative which blurs the line away which used to keep ads resigned to ad breaks. We have the opportunity to be creative engagers not just creative interupters... and as the Gunn report shows agenices like Goody Silverstein, CP+B are on the ball with that kind of work.
Ashley Pollak
2009-11-20 18:31:05

advertising has to become musical. TV content needs to be mashed up, put to music and have advertising tell us an "unconscious story".

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4UyaTolq_3U
mashed UP TV
2009-11-23 14:52:33

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