Agency/client distrust: A recipe for branding failure
By Oghale Mafuru
As the Integrated Marketing Communications Industry battles to cope with the disruptions and the rapid technological revolution, in the global Integrated Marketing industry ecosystem, one key ingredient to achieving the brand’s marketing objectives is for both parties to be on the same page and mutually agree on how to take the brand from point ‘A’ to point ‘B’.
These calls for systematic and symbiotic client-agency relationships have become more critical to the attainment of the marketing objectives of brands. This has become very imperative as the marketing landscape and the tools for navigating it are so different and require different skills. Oftentimes, distrust or mistrust arises in the client/agency relationship. When this happens, it is a recipe for branding disaster. It is against this backdrop that some industry professionals bare their minds on the subject matter and call for more synergy and transparency in the interest of the brands.
Femi Adelusi, CEO, BrandEye Media who explained that the mutual respect and business perspectives shared by both clients and agencies in the early days of the profession have been drastically changed, stated that agencies used to be regarded as strategic business partners privy to vital information necessary to pivot the brand marketing objectives.
He said:” In my early days in the advertising industry, we had clients who saw agencies as real strategist business partners, who invested in agencies. I have been on trainings on the bill of my clients. We have attended clients meeting with brand managers even though I started my career on the agency’s side. We did workshops together, brand building together, and sat in meetings with sales, activations, research and everyone in developing the plans. We have a full picture and there was a lot of respect for one another.
“That’s how client-agencies relationships were in my early days. Right now, I would say that is not the experience today. We need to get back to the best relationship which is working together with your client as one team. I think that is where you get the best result for the brands” he added.
Also speaking, Ozone Mbanefo, Provost and Founder of O2 Academy, who opined that agencies that have cordial relationships with clients are predisposed to perform better, submitted that a well-informed ad agency will make better ads.
“The client still controls what the agency produces. Why, because the client is still thinking, it is my thing not our thing. The clients are yet to partner with agencies to help make this thing come out well. Because that thinking does not allow agencies to really live up to their full capacities. if clients begin to see that it is all about collaboration and partnerships that we are in together, it is going to help” he said.
On his part, Kelechi Nwosu harped on the value optimization with direct impact on the clients’ bottom line in fostering mutually beneficial relationships where agencies are rewarded for their contributions to the success of the brands.
“There Is a need for agencies to come to the table with more value and measurement. There is a need for clients to come to the table with more appreciation and better payment to improve on things they ought to improve on. They need to understand that when you partner with the agencies, you get the best out of them. Agencies need to be delivering value on what you are paying them for” he stressed.
Meanwhile, several agency leads have complained that some clients are economical with vital information and data about their brands over rising concerns with the security and confidentiality which makes them skeptical to share such information.
Speaking on anonymity, an executive lead in one of the leading beverage companies disclosed that trust is the major factor responsible for the current state of the client-agency relationship which has hampered the effectiveness of marketing activities and the overall performance of brands.
While admitting that brand owners are very cautious not to disclose valuable information especially in a highly competitive market, she stressed that cordial relationship between clients and their agencies is imperative to create memorable and result-oriented marketing campaigns that deliver well on the brand objectives.
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