The agency business is a fertile place for creative people. That’s the dream. For the dream to be a reality, the agencies where creative people work must be viable businesses.
Once upon a time, agencies added 15% to their clients’ media buys and called it good, but those days are long gone. Today, it’s all about billing for time. There are innovators seeking better revenue models, but right now, 9.9 of every 10 agencies bills for their time.
Billing for professional services comes with a host of challenges. I appreciate Katie Keating, co-founder and creative director at Fancy in New York, laying one of the problems on the line:
“For us, one of the biggest challenges as a small agency is almost every single thing we do is project-based. And it is nearly impossible for us to project our revenues. We just have no idea.”
Not knowing is a tough position to be in, for any business.
Retainers are another agency relic. Yet, recurring revenue is the key to a healthy, sustainable business. A retainer was one way of securing recurring revenue. There are other ways and it’s up to each agency to find a way. Otherwise, it’s a never-ending chase for new business and that prevents you from doing the work you want to do and are meant to do.
In other ad industry news, you can use…
Crispin Spinoff Spins Off
According to Adweek, Victor & Spoils, the Boulder, Colo.-based shop that once promised to lead agencies toward a new model, went out of business last week approximately nine years after opening its doors.
New Arnold CEO Has No Agency Experience
According to Ad Age, the new CEO of Arnold Worldwide, Kiran Smith, is a veteran marketer—her most recent gig was chief marketing officer at Brookstone. A computer science major who got her start in management consulting, Smith says she brings with her a fresh perspective to a gig that is sorely in need of one.
“What I’m finding is that the biggest advantage I have in this role is that I do not have an agency background,” she says. “What we’re looking to do is to create a model that is serving a modern-day CMO and what I would be looking for as a CMO on the other side was for someone who understood the business issues I was having…”
What’s A Triple Meat Whataburger Liberal?
Whataburger is a Texas legend. The burger chain celebrated it’s 68th anniversary recently.
Whataburger currently operates 820 restaurants in 10 states. Given the company’s stature, and cult-like following, why in the world would Senator Ted Cruz call his Democratic opponent a Triple Meat Whataburger liberal?
According to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, the Senator feels that a Triple Meat Whataburger is bland and unlikeable.
Unlike the spicy ketchup, when Texans unwrap the O’Rourke packaging, they are definitely not going to like what they see underneath. He’s like a Triple Meat Whataburger liberal who is out of touch with Texas values.
The Democratic Party was quick to capitalize and is now offering Triple Meat Whataburger liberal merchandise.
