The New Business Dingo

You wouldn’t ask a Jackaroo* to provide legal advice, so why do agencies continue to force fit account managers into new business roles rather than hire trained professionals?

It’s no secret that most people fear that black box on their desk when it comes to using it as a new business tool, especially ad agency account people who’ve been tasked with the role of new business due to their recent decline in billable client hours.

Making cold calls to prospects can be terrifying to someone used to calling clients for more tactical or diplomatic reasons, negotiating copy and creative changes.
These are not trained new business hunters, and shouldn’t be expected to be overnight. Of course there are numerous sales tools and programs aimed at helping through a transition, but in most cases it’s a temporary fix to a larger organizational growth issue.

Top Five Reasons to consider your options:

1. Life Blood
New business is the lifeblood of any agency, and must be valued throughout the organization as one of your top ‘clients’, providing the best resources, the best creative and the best strategy toward it. This includes the best arrow-head to implement the agencies new business program.

2. Heart
Account people simply won’t put their heart into it, no matter how much they initially believe they will. You shouldn’t buy into this collective optimism. At the end of the day, they are going to be forced out of their comfort zone, resent you for putting them into that position and you may end up losing a great account person.

3. Forced Fit Hiring
You’re creating a forced fit role, a big no, no from my experience – ask yourself, “would I hire this person for this job”? Typically the resounding answer is “NO”.
New Business (Sales) is a whole new ball game, one in which they’ve typically never been trained for, and are offered little to no resources to build from.

4. Opportunity Cost
The potential opportunity cost alone should be reason enough to consider other options. Add to that the time, energy and resources expended in training a forced fit always being more substantially more than initially planned.

5. The Cobbler’s Son
It’s sometimes a hard pill to swallow, making the investment in either bringing on a new business professional or outsourcing the role to an organization, but ask yourself the same question you ask your client’s every day, “How much are you willing to invest to grow?”

So what are your options really?
There are numerous resources to review when evaluating this business challenge, but in my experience it normally falls into one of the following baskets; you pay a recruiter, you interview and find the right candidate, or you begin to evaluate outsourced options like Catapult. Both have their place and must be evaluated like any other business decision, by obtaining as much information as possible to make an informed choice.

*Jackaroo - (or Jillaroo) a young man (or woman) gaining practical experience on a sheep or cattle property, to acquire the practical skills needed to become a manager of a property or station.