10 Things You Pay for From Traditional Marketing Agencies

In today’s business world, it’s no longer the big fish that eats the small fish; it’s the fast fish that eats the slow fish.

In the same way the information revolution has changed how customers and market share are won, it has also reshaped the old systems that once governed how companies operate and how people work. The future of business is more flexible, faster, leaner and smarter.

This is not just about adopting a telecommuting policy or forgoing the purchase of that expensive copier. It’s about changing how business is done, both in philosophy and in execution.

The penalty of clinging to old business practices is losing clients that no longer can justify bills with unneeded overhead baked into them. As leaner and smarter companies emerge, the old juggernauts who are slow to change are quickly dying.

Marketing agencies

At the top of the scale of corporate bloat are marketing and advertising agencies. While not all industries can shed their physical offices and adopt a virtual model, the dominance of digital marketing coupled with the very nature of marketing’s day-to-day business operations afford these agencies a clear-cut path to modern efficiency.

However, in reality, few have changed. The majority of marketing firms hang on to these old systems of operations, passing on the burden of their expenses to their clients.

The traditional marketing firm still maintains an expensive posture to attract its clients.Why? Most find changing their methods of operations to be just as hard as adapting to today’s Web culture and the new rules of doing business. Too much has changed too quickly. In clinging to old methods – even those of its own self-promotion – the traditional marketing firm still maintains an expensive posture to attract its clients with their lavish offices and costly travel. These companies force work into physical locations, perpetuating the punching of clocks and shuffling of paper, while carrying years of old business operations in the form of debt, all of which must ultimately be paid for by the client.

There’s a reason why marketing companies are dying left and right, beyond becoming irrelevant in the digital age. Today's clients no longer accept invoices inflated by bloated operations, particularly when virtual companies can do more at a fraction of the cost.

The rise of the virtual company

It took time for companies like Amazon, Netflix and Apple to revolutionize and overtake industries that were once based in bricks and mortar. Replacing the physical form was a challenge in reconditioning the mind of the consumer and in reshaping traditional systems, such as fulfillment, customer service and exception handling.

2010 will see the emergence of the virtual company in full force.These initial obstacles were quickly overcome as consumers realized the advantage of lower prices by way of lower overhead, mutually beneficial partnerships and geographical barriers being torn down and giving way to an expanded market. Today, that same virtual model that started strong in the retail sector is being adopted throughout all applicable industries. As a result, virtual companies are growing at record pace.

2010 will see the emergence of the virtual company in full force. The convergence of technology, communication, new service-based companies and systems that meet the demands of companies that no longer carry the burden of bloated operations will allow more companies to work smarter, faster and from anywhere.

As virtual companies continue to refine their systems and clients continue to realize the value in receiving better service for less money, the virtual company will gain strength and overtake the outmoded traditional business models. This not only improves efficiencies but tears down geographical barriers to markets and talent.

As we enter the age of the virtual company, let’s review ten things you pay for from traditional marketing agencies:

1. Facilities

Office space is typically the largest expense on the books for marketing agencies. These obligations range from rented space in a shared office park to owning (and owing for) real estate, freestanding buildings and parking facilities.

Virtual marketing companies shed this expense because the nature of the business simply doesn’t require it anymore. Marketing is digital, and print is dying. All the infrastructure that was once housed in a physical location is now replaced by a range of new digital services. Communication is conducted through e-mail, mobile devices, video conferencing and client dashboards rather than on-site meetings and client lunches, the costs of which are ultimately passed back to the client.

The marketplace demands geographic barriers be removed to hire, collaborate and partner with the best talent in the industry. The virtual company’s employees work remotely within a virtual space that accomplishes anything that a physical location provides and more. They are mobile and available at a moment’s notice to meet with clients. Even remote offices, meeting spaces and presentation rooms can be rented by the day or hour, as needed, so as not to waste money on a fixed building that sits there to house all the bloated systems and conventions the traditional marketing company clings to.

2. On-site employees and physical work systems

For many office-based companies, the days of having people gathered in a building to work is gone. For these businesses, the act of keeping people around was just another form of time card punching, rooted in old systems founded on the demand for people to be present and available to coworkers and customers from 9 to 5.

Happy employees do better work, particularly the ones responsible for great creative work.Virtual companies don’t operate according to fixed 9-to-5 schedules. Instead, their systems and employees are faster, more flexible, working within tighter deadlines and using new, more robust project management conventions.

Telecommuting is more prevalent today than ever, for reasons that go beyond avoiding the cost of expensive office space. Happy employees are ones that are not trapped in cubicles, hustling through traffic, burning 30-40 hours and hundreds of dollars a month in commuting to a fixed place to do work that can be done anywhere. The fact is, happy employees do better work, particularly the ones responsible for great creative work.

Moreover, work systems based on having everyone in a centralized office all day are terribly inefficient. To see this, you have to look beyond hard costs and expenditures and consider the man hours wasted on meetings, scheduling, water cooler talk, Web surfing – the list goes on and on.

Replacing the physical office environment are proven virtual office management and collaboration systems like Basecamp, video conferencing, cloud computing and mobile Internet connectivity. Most importantly, the philosophy behind the work is based on maximizing project development efficiencies rather than filling up a 40-hour work week simply for the sake of adhering to convention.

3. Utilities

From security systems, electricity, heating and A/C to cleaning and facility repairs, the auxiliary costs of maintaining a facility can be extraordinary. This is an expense that virtual companies leave behind and don’t pass on to their clients.

4. Landline phone systems

In an age where business is a 24-hour, anywhere and everywhere proposition, corporate phone systems are an enormous waste. Everyone has a cell phone, and most working professionals carry smartphones. For many, the superfluous office phone collects dust, and voicemail systems are rarely used. In a time when most households are shedding the costs of landlines in favor of more flexible and leaner mobile options, many businesses still lag behind.

Agencies that continue to operate from a physical facility must pay to maintain and upgrade expensive landline systems, adding yet more extraneous dollars per hour to their clients’ bills.

5. Office furnishings

Expensive offices, conference room tables, desks, chairs, bathrooms, kitchens, interior decoration and even trophy cases displaying purchased accolades are omitted from the overhead costs of all virtual companies.

6. Computing infrastructure and LANs

So many companies still keep gobs of file and printer servers along with data backup systems, server redundancies, uninterrupted power supplies, routers, switches, cabling, internal e-mail systems – the list goes on.

For virtual companies, the idea of a LAN (local area network) has been replaced by cloud computing, with Web-based service providers, project management, collaboration systems, and applications. These systems are accessible from anywhere in the world, offer true collaboration with anyone and are always backed up and protected.

What’s more, project management in the virtual space allows for new and innovative work habits that promote speed, efficiency and flexibility in ways old companies employing old work systems simply cannot keep pace with.

7. Paper

So many of the slow, dying companies we see today still live in an office with paper circulating all the time. Believe it or not, nowhere is this more true than at your local marketing agency. Also included in this paper-filled world are printers, copiers, fax machines, shredders and a never-ending variety of supplies, all in support of paper trails that lead from the office to the client and back again before ending in nicely climate-controlled filing cabinets.

Virtual companies exist in a paperless world, and the best work circles around those that stay in a paper-driven office. The benefits of going (and staying) completely digital are immense. Digital documents are searchable, sharable, versioned, more secure and viewable on nearly any device. The more files that are kept, used and cataloged in digital format, the more efficiencies will increase overall.

8. Support staff and personnel

When agencies pay for an office, furnishings, phone systems, computing infrastructure and everything in between, they also require additional personnel, time and resources to support those systems, including office managers, receptionists, IT staff, cleaning crews, landscapers and security, to name a few. Thus, these already excessive expenses are further exacerbated and passed on to the client.

9. Restricted geographical barriers

If there’s one thing the Internet has brought to the economy, it’s the expanded marketplace. The business systems of virtual companies are not only set up to take on clients without most of the additional expenses suffered by traditional companies but to hire the best talent available anywhere.

Truth is, many marketing agencies are restricted to their local markets. While these firms would in theory jump on a plane to take on a client nearly anywhere, most find in practice that only local clients are cost-effective given the traditional systems still employed.

10. Debt

The result of all of this expense in a world that is quickly shifting to leaner and smarter operations is that this much of the excess is carried forward in debt that comes at a premium paid to a bank in interest. That ongoing obligation is passed to clients along with the cost of all other inefficiencies.

Virtual companies that start fresh, using smart, lean and flexible systems of operation don’t carry years of bad investments in outmoded, expensive systems on their backs. In fact, as traditional marketing agencies continue to lose clients and market share to these more adept modern firms, the additional debt taken on to stay alive will eventually lead to the extinction of the slow, bloated traditional marketing company as we know it.

photos: Flickr: Christ0ff, chrisdlugosz

Tweet, Snap, Share, Post, Pin: Five Creative Ways to Get Your Customers to Do Your Marketing For You

Today’s digital age is also the post-advertising era. Armed with access to nearly limitless data and information, customers have grown disengaged from commercial culture as we once knew it and disillusioned with canned corporate marketing messages.

This is especially true of the latest generation of consumers – the Millennials (aka Generation Y). Encompassing roughly 72 million young Americans, the oldest of whom are now reaching their mid-30s, the Millennials represents the most educated, diverse, technologically proficient generation ever in the U.S., with tremendous spending power that is expected to eclipse that of the Baby Boomers within the next three years.

Another hallmark of the Gen Yers is that they have a strong aversion to "push" marketing and prefer brands that are engaging and already embraced by their friends. According to Christine Hassler, author of 20 Something Manifesto, “Friends are the biggest influencers for Gen Y. If their friends have something and endorse it, that's all they need.”

All of this evidence points to an inescapable fact of doing business in today’s culture of the Web: nothing holds greater sway than word of mouth. If you want to grow – and especially if you want to capture the up-and-coming Millennial dollar – you need the help of your customers and fans.

However, these customers and fans aren’t simply sitting around, waiting at the edge of their seat for the opportunity to promote your products and services. It’s up to you to get the ball rolling by structuring campaigns that reach your customers where they live (i.e., social media platforms) and give them opportunities to share that tap into their motivations and fit naturally with their habits and lifestyle.

Here are five creative ways you can leverage social media to connect with your customers and get them to do your marketing for you:

1. Solicit their stories.

Sometimes spurring your evangelists to spring to action is as simple as asking them to. After all, who doesn’t love sharing stories about themselves?

Everyone can agree that medical supplies is hardly a highly glamorous field. However, Medtronic Diabetes, which develops and sells diabetes management products, has achieved a 2-to-1 return on investment for their entire social media program based on the success of their Share Your Story Facebook app.

Since launching the app in June 2013, nearly 300 customers have shared stories and photos using the app, and over 80% of users have opted to allow their photos and stories to be used by Medtronic Diabetes in other ways. To maximize the mileage they get from this great user-generated content, Medtronic is also proactive about contacting those who have shared their story to participate in photo shoots, video testimonials and guest blogging.

When Steve, a Facebook community member, posted a photo from his 2012 wedding using the app, Medtronic followed up with a request to guest post on their blog, “The Loop,” which the company started as a forum to foster discussion about living with diabetes. Steve happily complied, penning the article “Getting Hitched With Diabetes: The Groom’s Perspective,” which they reposted on their Facebook page.

Key to Medtronic’s success is that they are very specific in the framing of their request. When the company first launched its app, the prompt asked users to share “moments in your life of living well with your insulin pump or continuous glucose monitor,” but they found that the majority of participants would write only one or two lines. In March 2014, they retooled the wording to say, “Share with us your personal story about the pivotal moment you switched to the pump and CGM, and how insulin therapy has helped you focus on the wonders of life,” and they discovered that this more specific request elicited much more rich and detailed tales from their customers.

While you might wonder why Medtronic’s customers are so eager to share their stories, Amanda Sheldon, director of digital marketing and communications, explains: “We know our customers and know that they like to support each other. Our hope that social media would bring this all together was definitely met.”

2. Share the spotlight.

As the relentless onslaught of the selfie has shown us, social media is the ultimate “Look at me!” medium. Tap into your customers’ love of all things me-centric by creating a campaign founded in giving them the opportunity to shine a spotlight on themselves – and on your products in the process.

Clothing brand Free People has come up with an ingenious way to integrate customers' Instagram shots with its website. The company has begun attaching individualized hashtag information cards to its jeans. Customers are encouraged to take pictures of themselves in the pants, tag them either with #myfpdenim or more specific tags for different jean styles (such as #fpanklecrop for the 5 Pocket Ankle Crop or #fpsorbettiedye for Sorbet Tie Dye Jeans). These photos not only appear on Instagram but also on the relevant product’s page on the company's website (after being approved by site moderators, of course) in a special section called "Free People's Style Community."

This brilliant campaign succeeds on two levels. First, by designing a platform that turns their customers into models, Free People has created the ultimate indulgence for the selfie-aholic. Second, they overcome an obstacle that has plagued e-tailers since the concept was invented, which is giving shoppers the confidence to make a purchase without being able to see, feel and try on the product in person. But now, through the magic of Instagram and social sharing, Free People empowers potential buyers to see how a pair of jeans looks in real life. Win-win!

3. Give to get.

Sometimes, you need to be willing to give a little bit in return for the great promotional juice your customers are providing to you. Often brands use contests as a way to motivate fans to snap, share or post in exchange for the chance to win a prize.

However, prizes certainly aren’t the only way to incentivize your followers. An even better way is to share your time and expertise. For example, Zappos – a company that has built its reputation on providing exceptional customer service – has created a forward-thinking Instagram campaign that is the perfect marriage of its trademark service and customer engagement.

Capitalizing on the popular #OOTD (“outfit of the day”) hashtag – which has more than 23 million images attached to it – the online retailer has launched a pilot program for a personalized shopping service called NextOOTD. When a customer posts a selfie with the hashtag #nextOOTD, a Zappos stylist will comb through their Instagram history and respond with personalized shopping recommendations catered to their unique style.

This campaign is social media engagement at its very best. First, it’s easy for customers to participate in. By building on the already familiar #ootd hashtag, it’s a natural extension of a well established habit for Instagrammers. Second, it’s personalized: this concept of selfie shopping allows Zappos to interact with people like a human, not a brand, which is exactly what every company should aspire to do on social media. Finally – in perfect keeping with Zappos’ mission of delivering happiness – it’s a great way to surprise and delight their customers, especially the type of selfie-wielding fashionistas who are most apt to use the #ootd hashtag in the first place.

4. Bank on bloggers (and other influencers).

Here’s an interesting fact for you: Research has shown that one-fifth of the consumer population is composed of key influencers who impact the purchasing activities of 74 percent of the population.

Chief among these influencers are the legions of bloggers and vloggers who have masses of dedicated followers hanging on their every word. If you can put these prominent opinion-pushers in your corner, you can turn the power of word-of-mouth marketing up to 11.

Blue Apron is a new start-up subscription service that delivers meal kits – including pre-measured ingredients and recipe cards – in refrigerated boxes on a weekly basis to its members.

According to Ken Fox, one of the company’s investors, Blue Apron’s target market is comprised of “People who like to cook at home but don’t always have time for shopping,” and their hope is that these people “discover the ease of cooking with Blue Apron [then they] start to do it more often, and to get their friends and family members into it, too.”

And who could fit that profile better than mommy bloggers – specifically Katie Bower of the hugely popular blog Bower Power? Katie has nearly 15,000 followers on Facebook and more than 25,000 on Instagram, so needless to say, there is no lack of moms (and other busy women) who identify with her and look to her for great ideas and advice. And as it so happens, Katie also recently gave birth to her third son, so she has no lack of demands on her time.

For the price of a sponsored post, Blue Apron reached all of her followers in the form of a glowing review written with Katie’s trademark candor – along with a series of fun images depicting the process of receiving the box, unpacking its contents with her adorable boys, preparing the meals and enjoying the dinners together as a family.

The end result is a testimonial that is 100 percent authentic – and 100 percent more effective than anything the company could have said about itself in a perfectly polished ad campaign.

5. Create a marriage of mediums.

All of this talk of social media posting, hashtagging and sharing begs the question: how can you take advantage of your fans’ promotional activities to reach a broader audience that includes those who don’t follow you on these networks?

The answer: integrate your social media campaigns into your traditional marketing efforts. Case in point: Ben & Jerry’s wildly successful #CaptureEuphoria contest.

In 2012, Ben & Jerry’s tapped into its Instagram community (which at the time numbered 120,000+ strong) to cast the starts of its latest ad campaign. The company invited fans to post photos tagged #captureeuphoria that they felt depicted intense feelings of joy. From sunsets to wedding photos to cute dogs to beach scenes, these user-submitted snaps were collected into a special gallery on the company’s website.

One interesting thing you’ll notice about the contest: there was no requirement to feature the company’s products in the photos. Rather the idea was to associate the emotion of euphoria with the experience of eating Ben & Jerry’s ice cream – very clever indeed.

At the conclusion of the contest, more than 25 shots were selected and featured in hyper-local media in the winners’ hometowns in ads that popped up in locales ranging from billboards to buses to neighborhood bars.