I received a link to a You Tube video in a blog post the other morning. While I rarely watch videos at work, something in this caught my eye and I did. That evening my 14-year old son, who's playing in a soccer tournament this weekend, mentioned that his team was pretty good, but were definitely going to lose this weekend. Off to You Tube we went. Soon he was watching this short video. It's often hard to get a lot of words out of a teenage boy, and this was no exception. However, I could tell this made as much of an impact on him as it did on me.
This following was written by Todd Miechiels (click here to view the original post):
More times than I like to admit, I limit myself with glass ceilings and false beliefs about what I am capable of doing. It bleeds over into my professional life as a marketer, both strategically, and from an execution point of view. When I think of myself, I'm never at my best. When I focus on the success of others and look up, is when I'm humbled and pleasantly surprised with what can be accomplished.This clip from the movie Facing the Giants, is a great example and reminder of what we can accomplish when we put our trust in others who want what's best for us. It's also a great lesson that often times the thing that is holding us back is a false belief.
Whether you are an executive or a coordinator, ask yourself, "What are the false beliefs that are holding us back as individuals and organizationally?" What's the "death crawl" that your team needs to suffer through to emerge victorious and stronger as a company and as a person?
Some ad agency CEOs would rather not spend money on a new business prospecting database. So it's not surprising that the decision to do so (or not) often comes down to a choice: spend money on an external resource or use an internally-developed and maintained database.
Before making this decision, though, it's important to consider the health of your internal database. Why? Two reasons:
You might be spending more money building and maintaining it than it would cost you to subscribe to a superior product; or,
You might not be spending enough money on it.
In the first case, choosing an external resource may make good business sense. In the latter, if you aren't spending enough, you'll likely be giving your new business team a resource that's old and out-of-date. They'll have to spend their time cleaning it, rather than generating new business.
Here are some questions to ask and answer in order to evaluate your internal database:
How many companies do you have in it? Are they the right companies, in the right industries for your agency?
How many of the right contacts do you have at each one? What's the average number per company?
What titles do you have? Are they the right titles for your agency? If not, which ones do you need?
What contact information do you want to have at each one (e.g. email, direct dial, proper title, assistant name, etc.) How many of your contacts have that depth of information?
When was the last time you sent an email to everyone in your database? What was the bounce rate? Was it greater than 5-10%?
When was the last time each contact name was telephone-verified for accuracy? How many of the contacts were gone? Was a replacement contact found?
How much do you pay (including salaries and benefits, IT costs, software licenses, etc.) to maintain your database?
What other information do you like to have to assist you in your new business prospecting efforts?
What services do you subscribe to in order to gain access to this additional information? How much do you pay for these services?
Finally, after you have all this information at your fingertips:
What's the total annual cost of maintaining your internal database?
How happy are you when you weigh the accuracy and depth of information of your internal database in relation to what it costs you to have it?
Lastly, be cautious if you hear the argument (internally) that, "We have a really large database that we've built up over many years; therefore, we should use it."
The size of a good prospecting database has no correlation to anything. It's all about having the right companies and the right contacts and contact information.
If you're like most agency principals, you'll be surprised at what you learn. If you have questions when you're pulling this information together, don't hesitate to get in touch.
Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson, authors of REWORK, write: "The original pitch idea is such a small part of business that it's almost negligible. The real question is how you execute."
How you execute your business is critical to new business.
Think about it: How successful will your new business machine be if you have an account management team that continually fails to meet client expectations? If they're missing deadlines, promising one thing and delivering another, dealing with situations poorly, or communicating ineffectively, you're in trouble. I'm sure you've experienced all of these, and can add to the list of ways to cripple a client relationship.
Equally threatening - what if your creative work is weak, off-target, or doesn't meet expectations? Let's say you really need a win to avoid agency layoffs. So, your new business team dusts off work done by a prior creative director. It was award-winning work, "done by the agency", so you're okay with it. However, deep down, you know your creative team isn't as strong as it was. The good news: you win the business. The bad news: you can't deliver on the creative expectation you've set, so you lose the client in six months, trashing your reputation along the way.
In both scenarios, you failed to execute and consequently lost the opportunity to generate new business.
The opposite will be true if your agency is a "well-oiled machine". This represents good execution.
Your new business efforts portray your agency as it really is.
Your account management team continually exceeds client expectations.
Your creative team regularly delivers work with "stopping power".
Communication up and down the two organizations is consistent and effective.
What happens? Most likely, you'll be rewarded with organic growth on existing accounts. That growth will create confidence - that "swagger in the step" that non-verbally communicates to prospects that you're an agency to consider.
And they should, because you back it up with results. You execute your business well.
In the last two months, more than 600 North American corporate marketers looking for agencies joined the Marketing Mine community. For any ad agency, this represents a significant marketing opportunity.
Even more attention-grabbing, in the past 60 days nearly $100M of new business has run through the site - with RFP's submitted to agencies by:
a major electronics brand ($20M new product launch review)
a national CGP brand ($30M+ AOR review)
a government agency ($14M+ brand strategy and advertising review)
a number of smaller assignments ($300K - $1.5M+)
How does your agency get a piece of this action? You just have to join, and then choose:
Basic profile. This is a simple directory-type listing.
Pros: Quick, free.
Cons: You come up at the bottom of searches; there's not enough information provided for marketers to choose your agency.
Enhanced profile. This is an expansive listing that features complete contact information, creative work, case studies, white papers, testimonials, client ratings, as well as your client list.
Pros: This is the information marketers want to see; these agencies are generally the ones who receive RFPs.
Cons: Monthly fee.
Full disclosure: Marketing Mine is a sister company to The List. That being said, corporate marketers want a confidential, self-managed, easy-to-use, comprehensive, and powerful way to find new agency partners. This is a site for them.
New business people can now augment their outbound efforts with a site that's working for them while they're working, and when they're not. What's not to like about that?
If your ad agency has or is considering writing a blog, deciding how to spread the word to acquire readers is important: If relevant corporate marketers aren't reading it, the time you invest in writing may be in vain.
Common ways to promote your blog include:
Email marketing
Twitter
Links from your website
This post is a guide to using email as a blog promotional tool.
Your most important decision is choosing between using an internal email list or purchasing a list. There are pros and cons of each:
Your list - pros
You own it.
It's free.
It has your clients and some prospects on it.
Your list - cons
It may be out of date.
It may not include all the prospects you should be pursing.
It may be too small (you need at least 1500 good names to kick-start your blog, and more will get you there faster.
External list - pros
It's the most effective way to increase the size of your list.
The right list will allow you to reach the corporate marketers that exactly fit your prospect profile: by the geography, industries, titles, company size(s), and media spend that are appropriate for your agency.
The right list will be high-quality (i.e. clean), with a low (5%) bounce rate.
Certain list companies will completely update their email list multiple times per year, and/or will offer to correct or replace emails that bounce.
External list - cons
There are few, if any, opt-in lists for corporate marketers.
You'll get what you pay for: low price usually equates to not being able to effectively target as described above, or you'll experience a high bounce rate.
The opt-in question is tricky: to my knowledge, highly targeted, opt-in lists of relevant corporate marketers just aren't available. Our clients tell us they've purchased opt-in lists from many different list companies - and they're universally terrible. We've tried them internally and experienced the same result. I think the reason is fairly simple: the corporate marketers you want to reach just don't opt-in very often. However, that doesn't mean they aren't interested in relevant content.
Your next decision is to choose an email provider. I recommend you look for one with as many of the following features as you can get:
Overall ease to use.
Easily manages opt-out requests and out-of office replies.
Tracks soft and hard bounces, and opens.
Creates browser-friendly, text-friendly, and HTML-friendly formats.
Allows you to test different subject lines to see which ones work the best, with follow-up emails going to non-opens of the first message.
Allows you to easily manage scheduling: days, times, time zones for each send.
Easy, one-click analytics / reports so you can effectively measure your performance over time.
List management features like merge, purge, drip marketing, etc.
CAN-SPAM compliant.
Telephone support - if you need it.
Integration with your CRM system.
Promoting your blog well makes the effort it takes to write all the more worthwhile, and email is a great way to do so.
Good luck, and let me know if you have any questions.
Many of us start feeling sluggish during the heat of the Summer. Prospecting for new business can feel pretty unappealing, and as the clock moves towards 5:00 pm, it's pretty easy to start
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Wonderfactory prototype is an exciting development
published on December 03, 2009
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The common approach to selling marketing services is, "Find their pain, and then show how you can solve it." But, if you only focus on your prospect's pain, you're leaving half the potential new
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published on November 04, 2009
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It's a bit like cutting off your nose to spite your face
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Just because you have a database doesn't mean it's accurate
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published on August 14, 2009
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You may have it if your new business revenue is falling short of expectations
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White paper reveals benefits of good prospect targeting
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Best predictor of job performance is a work sample
published on August 05, 2009
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Input from entrepreneurs on management, marketing and sales
published on August 03, 2009
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As you read this I'll have just gotten off a beautiful kayaking river in Idaho. We planned this trip a year ago. With us are members of my wife's family and very close friends with great senses
Lack of ROI is usually caused by one of four things
published on July 27, 2009
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The single best way to improve results is to measure activity
published on July 23, 2009
Those of us of a certain age remember the Ford Pinto. It had problem: hit it in the rear-end and the fuel tank might explode. This was a rather nasty surprise that drivers wanted to avoid, which
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Why shouldn't ad agencies or design firms launch their own brands?
published on July 17, 2009
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Reports point to continued decline, with opportunity on the horizon
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It feels so good to wake up to a headline like this: ...during a presentation this morning Brian Wiesner of Interpublic Group of Cos' Magna, said that the U.S. advertising economy will drop 14.5%
Continuous improvement is a competitive advantage; here's a 3-step process to do so
published on July 13, 2009
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10 steps to win more new business from first meetings
published on July 09, 2009
Too often ad agency principals and new business people approach their first meeting with a prospect as an opportunity to "show up and throw up". I've seen it happen repeatedly over the last ten
Role practice will dramatically improve your results
published on July 08, 2009
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A sales guy from a well known payroll services company has been calling me on and off for months, trying to get me interested in their service, even though we're very satisfied with our current
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Leaders never let their minds shut down, always strive to learn more
published on June 30, 2009
In college, I don't think there was any way to comprehend what a professor meant when he said, "learning is a lifelong occupation". All we wanted to do was graduate and not have to take another
Every ad agency wants to break into a new category. How do you do so when you don't have the experience? How do you avoid spending a great deal of money on a pitch that you have no chance of
I received a link to a You Tube video in a blog post the other morning. While I rarely watch videos at work, something in this caught my eye and I did. That evening my 14-year old son, who's playing in a soccer tournament this weekend, mentioned that his team was pretty good, but were definitely going to lose this weekend. Off to You Tube we went. Soon he was watching this short video. It's often hard to get a lot of words out of a teenage boy, and this was no exception. However, I could tell this made as much of an impact on him as it did on me.
Some ad agency CEOs would rather not spend money on a new business prospecting database. So it's not surprising that the decision to do so (or not) often comes down to a choice: spend money on an external resource or use an internally-developed and maintained database.
Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson, authors of 
If your ad agency has or is considering writing a blog, deciding how to spread the word to acquire readers is important: If relevant corporate marketers aren't reading it, the time you invest in writing may be in vain.
Many of us start feeling sluggish during the heat of the Summer. Prospecting for new business can feel pretty unappealing, and as the clock moves towards 5:00 pm, it's pretty easy to start
One of the "if only we could" wishes of B2C Chief Marketing Offers is delivering highly personalized, one-to-one offers to customers - offers that result in increased brand loyalty and higher
It's really tempting for an ad agency new business person to look at inexpensive data sources (call them "Jigsaw-like") and get enticed by their low-price business models.
How do you measure the performance of your new business team? Is it just number of wins and revenue generated? If those numbers are good, do you know what they're doing well? If those numbers
It may be the result of losing a client, reading a book, article or blog, attending a conference or meeting, or perhaps just having a conversation with someone: every so often an ad agency CEO
I was told a story a few month ago about a salesman and his son. They're not involved with ad agency new business, but their story and the lessons learned are 100% applicable to a successful
Some new business execs shine in their role, but fail to contribute across the agency. In decades past, this "lone star" trait could lead to a successful career as "chief rainmaker", but nowadays
How would you react if you learned today that responding to a prospect within one minute of their inquiry could improve your ability to win new business by 391%? Similarly, if you help your
Many a new business person's blood pressure increases when you start talking about procurement. Frustration is natural when attempts to "persuade the unpersuadable" are unsuccessful - as in trying
My prior 
One of the ways to develop new business bench strength is through a well set-up mentoring program. A protege can learn quickly from a mentor with broad and deep knoweldge of the ad agency. The
How valuable is it to hear directly from three CMOs to learn how they like to be contacted, what you need to know about them before you do, how to pitch, and how smart you need to be about their
Laurie Coots is the global CMO for TBWA/Chiat Day. She's one of the smartest ad agency new business execs you'll ever meet. When she speaks, people listen. Laurie shared her thoughts on how to
If you've ever had a dog, you'll recognize this: talk to them using a certain tone of voice and they'll cock their head to the side and look at you expectantly. They know you're talking to them,
You fly into a strange city. Your flight is delayed. It's raining. You manage to find a cab that takes you to the hotel in a car that's sorely in need of new shock absorbers. The hotel restaurant
For those who attended the 2010 New Business Conference, the annual "Live Pitch Competition" provides an opportunity to participate in or watch a random group of agency new business people prepare
Was your agency able to win new business from 71% of your first meetings in 2008? How about 60% in 2009? That's what one small agency in New Jersey accomplished after being on the brink of closing
We all know we should ask for referrals. But it's the rare new business or sales person - in any company or industry - who habitually does. Even rarer is finding a company that has
Five year-old hot-shop 
Krista Faron, Lead Innovation Analyst at research firm 
I received two thank you notes in the last month that were different from all others: neither was sent via email. One was an "old-fashioned", hand-written note from a friend. The other was from a
Brent Hodgins of 
When you mention to a new business person that "procurement" is getting involved, the typical reaction is dread. You've built rapport with your prospect, established their need, demonstrated how
True story from a week ago: Midwest branding and packaging agency seeks Midwest healthcare account. Agency gets to the top of the list of prospective partners - before even meeting with the
Today's 
The editor of Wired magazine, last week at the 4As Transformation 2010 conference, predicted that tablet computers will replace laptops. He also predicted a new era for the print publishing
Marketing is understanding and meeting customer requirements. In order to survive, companies must meet their requirements; technology is going to allow agencies to understand customers'
The marketing organization inside many of your larger prospects or clients is becoming increasingly fractured and siloed, creating a big opportunity for agencies to exercise leadership and vocally
There are only a few people in the U.S. who have a broad-based and in-depth view of the proactive new business market, and who can speak to all geographic regions, industry categories, and types
Many smart ad agency Presidents create new business committees with the best of intentions: bring together the best and brightest in the agency who touch new business, give them a mission and
Two days ago I was introduced to a management technique that's widely used at Intel and Google, about which I was previously unaware. The idea is to get everyone in the company focused on the
Most ad agency new business people are competitive, and want to be the very best they can be. What separates the average from the great? The experts from the "wannabes"? I was struck by a section
Every now and then you learn a management technique that's so easy and powerful that you can't believe you didn't know about it before. I learned one of these tactics recently from an 
It wasn't too many years ago that ad agencies used direct mail to generate new business leads. Then, it went out of fashion in favor of email. But, as spam laws and filters have made email less
This is a guest post from Craig Kavicky, Vice President at 
A few weeks ago I wrote about how not to 
The Wonderfactory
Before a prospect can become a client, they have to clearly understand the value of working with your ad agency or marketing services firm.
The common approach to selling marketing services is, "Find their pain, and then show how you can solve it." But, if you only focus on your prospect's pain, you're leaving half the potential new
Small and mid-size advertising agencies can now offer their clients Digital TV services. A low-cost, turn-key solution, which you can offer as your own, is available to drive new business.
85% of buyers of marketing services state they're more likely to purchase from a provider with whom they've established some kind of personal chemistry. This was cited in a white paper I read
To many marketing services providers, sales is the equivalent of checking your values at the door and becoming a slimy salesman. Your mental image is along the lines of getting a prospect to part
You've seen it happen: two members of your team aren't getting along. You've tried to repair the damage, but everyone knows it's there. While everyone tries to cover it up in the pitch, it still
Agencies will do almost anything to get a first meeting with an ideal new business prospect. But once the meeting is secured, optimism often turns to disappointment, and too often it's because the
Knowing what your services are worth and being able to articulate and sell the value to a prospect is a critical new business skill.
This is the last in our three-part Q&A from our reader in Finland, who posed an often-debated question: "Should I thoroughly research my prospects and make fewer calls, or research less and make
Recall that I promised to answer three questions from a reader in Finland. His second question is, "What's the best strategy for a first meeting?"
A reader from Finland recently emailed a few questions, which I'll answer over the next few days. The first is, "When you're selling something as intangible as advertising, how can you close at
Come year-end, we'll see ad agency new business people engage in the annual ritual of getting fired and finding new jobs at different firms.
One definition of karma is "actions that bring bring upon oneself inevitable results". I was intrigued by a recent conversation with Jane, a new business person, who claimed that this was the key
Ad agency clients regularly ask us this question, "What's the best mix of retainer vs. project work?" I think the answer can determine how successful you are at creating a sustainable new business
In a recent 
A recession is a scary time for the person trying to maintain the financial health of the agency.
Those of us of a certain age remember the Ford Pinto. It had problem: hit it in the rear-end and the fuel tank might explode. This was a rather nasty surprise that drivers wanted to avoid, which
A sales guy from a well known payroll services company has been calling me on and off for months, trying to get me interested in their service, even though we're very satisfied with our current
