A couple of weeks ago, I made the decision to attend an all day conference presented by AAAA, "What Separates the Best from the Rest? . . . What the Best Agencies Do Differently". Essentially a day spent hearing about the best practices of agencies in the U.S., including operational, creative, account and business growth related issues. Phenomenal . . . I might add that the same principles that were applied to agencies can certainly be applied to brands and/or companies.
I was impressed with Tim William's presentation, experience and obvious grasp of the subject. Tim is the President of the Ignition Consulting Group in NYC.
I'm so glad I decided to spend the (rather significant) amount of money to participate. About an hour into it, I knew that I'd made the right decision. It was interesting to see what agencies attended and which didn't. If I could list the attendees, I would because I was impressed that they would make the commitment of one full day to improve (or at least hear about) better ways of doing things. A few agencies sent multiple representatives.
I mention all this, because I was just going through my notes. I'm going to share some thoughts here and probably more at another time. I hope you find some of these notions as interesting as I did. There was so much substance that I'm hoping there is benefit in taking some ideas out of context.
“A big problem with working at ad agencies is that management is too often unwilling to stand up for their own people if it means taking on the client.” 74% of Euro RSCG (global behemoth, check out their site's opening animation . . . ) agreed with that principle. What do you think? How about your agency or employer?
"The basic principle of what separates the best from the rest is Owners know that there’s something more important than making money. It's what they do with that knowledge that separates the best from the rest."
As Bill Bernbach said, “If you stand for something, you will always find some people for you and some against you.” “If you stand for nothing, you will have nobody for you and nobody against you” The point obviously being that you can't be everything to everybody! The world’s strongest brands are polarizing. People have feelings, either for or against them, but people are engaged in them.
Appealing to everybody is not a strategy . . . Strategy is a series of trade-offs. What are you willing to be good at?
Some examples of icons that have probably gotten to their position of leadership because of their fanatic adherence to their own guiding principles. For example, design hero Bruce Mau's Manifesto . . . or Strawberry Frog's "Frogisms" (at the home page click "about" > "frog versus dinosaur"). There are others. Too few organizations have sincere principles that guide their activity.
These companies understand that commitment to themselves and how they conduct business is paramount. As long as they stay true to their principles, good things happen. Seems like a simple idea. You have to wonder why more organizations don't have the belief or strength to do it too.
It is the foundation upon which clients are won and the foundation upon which employees are inspired, recruited and retained.