The New Business Dingo

Large organizations across the country hire advisors and consultants of all kinds to make better informed decisions on the purchase of products and alignment with partners. Some might speculate, this also offers a certain degree of ‘distance’ should the decision end up being an unfavorable one.

For many years now, larger companies (typically with ad spends greater than $20M) hire agency search consultants to help them select an agency.
Typically these search consultants are provided with a brief by the company, detailing the rationale for the search, the type of partner they’re looking for and of course may include a couple of their favorites.

The problem for many agencies is that the allure of winning one of the relatively large pieces of business from a search consultancy run pitch often overshadows the very sense of who they are.  In today’s economy, being a generalist will be the death of your new business efforts, especially with a search consultant. Put a stake in the ground, be a specialist, and know your audience.

Tim Williams, author of ‘Take a stand for your brand’, makes several points including;
• Define the core competencies of the agency — what you do best.
• Go beyond thinking about category experience to defining what audiences you know best — one of the most interesting ways to define your brand.
• Articulate how your agency is distinguished by what you think, not just what you have.
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A few recent quotes from search consultants;
“The common failing among agencies seeking new business,” says agency search consultant Bob Lundin, “is their inability or unwillingness to name what they stand for and market themselves on distinguishable differences.”

“Be clear in how you’re positioned – culture, capability and competency”.  
Lorraine Stewart Rojek, The Rojek Consulting Group

 
Tips to stay relevant to search consultants:
• Define your agency brand and make it true to your past, present and future aspirations
• From searches conducted in the past twelve months, design a list of the most relevant consultants to your organization.
• Register your agency with each consultant (some have an online portal like AgencyCompile)
• Set up meetings with those consultants that make sense, and be sure to get some face time at the new business conferences each year.
• Have a ‘cheat sheet’ for each consultant about your agency that includes:
          Think of our agency when…
          Latest and greatest creative, campaigns, solutions
• The old fashioned calls and voicemails to build upon the relationship; provide tidbits and updates.
• Be sure to make the ‘cheat sheet’  available on your Website

A list of agecny search consultants can be found here:
http://www2.aaaa.org/pubs/resources/consultants/Documents/agency_search.pdf