How to brief an ad agency? Part 2

Factor 2 - Giving a coherent brief

Half the job is done by giving a coherent brief. The reality is many of the clients wax eloquent as they are in love with their offering. The agencies struggle to separate the brief from the chaff.

The best way to start is by giving the agency a tangible fact sheet. Send the agency back to mull over it and come back for a qualitative discussion.

What should this initial fact sheet contain, preferably in an A4 sheet? 

• Product definition

• The market for it - demographic, geographic or any relevant segments

• The players in the market -

• Your product's differentiators -

• If possible, your indicative budget -

If the client can’t put this down in B&W, it’s unreasonable to expect the agency to comprehend the task at hand.

Many of the big spenders do have a defined brief template. It’s the SMEs, who are not familiar with agency-handling, need to start the relationship with such good practices.

The exploratory kiss is an indicator of exciting things to follow. (OK...That’s another proven advertising device...to bring an element of sex and whet the appetite)

SreeRam is a Chennai based marcom professional.
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How to brief an advertising agency - Part 1

Choosing the ad agency

The relationship between The Client and The Ad Agency has many phases like any relationship - Wooing, Romancing, Marriage, Children, Mutual Dissatisfaction, Resigned to Status-quo or even Divorce.

What one has to accept is, it’s a dynamic relationship, due to the presence of many variables like Competition, Change in Client's or Agency's priorities and People shifting on both sides.

Having said that let’s move on to factors to consider in "Choosing the Ad agency"

Factor 1- "As a Client, am I exciting enough?!"
An agency works hardest when the Client is at its aspiration level. The aspiration can be either in the Billing Volume or a Creative Challenge.

A mature ad agency will still consider a small startup's account if the Client's product is intriguing enough. It also gives them an opportunity to try out their maverick ideas, which will in all probability be wet-toweled by a big client, set on his strategy.

The Client has to look at his Business Volume and the Product profile while choosing an ad agency, and ask "Do I bring excitement to this relationship?!"

SreeRam is a Chennai based marcom professional.
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HOW TO WRITE A PRESS RELEASE WHICH GETS PUBLISHED

• GIVE HEADLINE MATERIAL -
" 22 year old girl kicks the shit out of 3 eve-teasers at Nungambakkam "
Now compare it with "KravMaga is popular in Chennai."

• Remember the publication is looking for NEWS, which will interest its readers. So give headline material the journalist can build his story upon.
• ( … and get an opportunity to slip in the info you want to convey. :-) )

• GIVE A SYNOPSIS UPFRONT

• Remember journalists are always running against deadlines. Especially those in dailies.
• So start with a bullet pointed Executive Summary, which captures the salient points in less than 150 or 200 words. Most of the experienced journalists can immediately churn out a good story with this synopsis itself.

• DONT WRITE A COMPANY PROFILE IN THE GUISE OF A STORY

• Don’t C&P the "About Us" from your company website. It’s an immediate put off.
• Make the story relevant to the headline. 

• CUSTOMIZE TO THE PUBLICATION'S PROFILE
Slightly reword the story to suit the Publication's profile.

• General Interest - " 50 million computers infected with SreeRam virus"
• Business - " 60% PCs of corporate India infected with SreeRam virus"
• Life Style - " Are you spamming? SreeRam virus targets your mail box. "
• Teens - "Beware! Torrent downloads come with SreeRam virus."

• HAVE GOOD MANNERS

• Don’t mass mail a general draft to every journalist in your address book. Address them by name and send individual mails.
• Don’t be bossy - “PFA our press release as a word doc. Kindly Publish". Remember the DELETE button is a few cms away. So, at least give a synopsis in the body of the mail and then inform the journalist that the story is in the Attachment.
• Please don’t attach 20 MB high resolution images as a zip. If you are attaching pictures, take the trouble to optimize them to say 10 cm width @ 300 dpi., preferably in CMYK.
• Send large files separately after getting the consensus of the journalist.
• Wherever possible, follow-up with a phone call or email.
• And for Dog’s sake rum a spll cheque.

SreeRam is a Chennai based marcom professional.
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The Stress of Social Media "Presence Management"

The "nowness" of social media presents a 3 fold challenge -
* Over-whelming - too many streams of activity
* Expertise - constantly evolving technology
* No control - Anxiety extrapolates when one is not able to contain the response from the audience. 

Add to this the traditional factors like -
The worried management - since negative feedback is in public domain, and one can’t wish it away 

Social media is a twin-edged sword. To avoid self-inflicted injuries the company has to -
* Have a well planned response strategy, with an inbuilt escalation mechanism
* Maintain a participative tone in all communication
* Provide perceived or real transparency
* Retreat without ego to minimize damage 

The responsibility of "Presence management" should be with a person who
* understands Web 2.0 nitty gritty
* possesses marketing acumen
* relates to visual and text components of creative inputs
* and an aptitude for Public Relations.


SreeRam is a Chennai based marcom professional.
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