5 Tips to Get the Most Out of Your Creative Agency

Creative Agency Success-O-Meter

I’m biased. Having spent about 2/3 of my career on the creative agency side, I tend to look at the business world through an agency lens. I have seen many well-intentioned clients ruin what could have been great projects and end up disappointed. And, during my tenure in the corporate marketing department of a large enterprise software company, I even fell victim to some of these mistakes myself. The good news is that these disappointments can be avoided. Today I’m going to share my observations about 5 tips to get the most our of your creative agency. For the sake of this article, I’m mostly talking about marketing/communications/advertising projects such as videos, print, design, and events. However, I believe that these 5 tips could easily apply to a variety of client-vendor projects.

1.  Provide a single project leader

Creative projects are subjective. Everyone has different tastes and biases about the world. The challenge you run into when managing a creative project for a large organization is an unlimited number of opinions that don’t align with the objective of the project. Opinions are fine, but the problems occur when those opinions come into the project mid-flight and are not aligned with the original goal of the project. People may react to a style, image, or creative choice in a negative way without realizing that these decisions were made based on pre-production work that defined the project’s audience and objectives… or maybe were based on budget constraints. Bringing stakeholders in to the process midway or late in the project is a recipe for delays and unnecessary cycles. If you, as the project owner, know who will need to give final sign-off before the project can be completed, it is important to get them involved early in the process so that they can understand how the creative decisions map back to the project’s objectives. It is also important to assign one person to collect input and feedback from the team and distill it into concise notes for the agency. Asking 10 people on an email thread to reply with their thoughts is very inefficient and potentially confusing to your agency. The project owner should be willing (and have the authority) to respectfully push back on feedback that does not match the project objectives. Having a single point of contact and ultimate decision maker on the client side ensures that your agency has clear direction and does not have to worry about the politics or hierarchy within your company. This ultimately leaves the creative agency free to spend more time making your project great.

2.  Be willing to take some creative risks

I have worked with a wide variety of clients in my 25+ years working at different agencies. From this experience, I know that the projects that get my team excited are the ones that are new, fresh, and take some risks. I’m not necessarily saying that every project has to be groundbreaking. However, I am saying that very few projects need to be outright boring. So how do you introduce some out-of-the-box thinking to a risk-averse organization? Much like the previous tip, it is important to clearly define the objective of your project. Some objectives open themselves up naturally to creative thinking. One technique I have found effective is to pull creative ideas or methods from one industry to another. For example, if you are doing a project for a financial services company, think about projects you have seen or done for other industries that will be unique to financial services. I have observed that industries generally tend to stick within a certain style and tone. So looking outside of your industry for inspiration can be effective. I also encourage people to look at what’s going on in culture. Are there social phenomena taking off or new styles of video, design, or event experiences that are becoming popular and might enhance your project? The key thing on this one is to have an open mind and be willing to pitch a few “out there” ideas to your internal team before you default to the “same-old-same-old”. And, if you do end up going the conservative route, at least you know that you explored all of your options.

3.  Communicate in a collaborative way

This is one that my team talks about all the time. As a client you may not realize how hard your creative agency is trying to please you, but we are. One of the simplest things you can do to encourage your agency is provide positive feedback before you start listing all the things that are wrong with a work in progress. I’m not saying that you have to coddle the agency or can’t provide constructive (or even negative) feedback. What I am saying is that email is not great at conveying tone, so sometimes if you just start into the changes without giving a high level opinion, it’s very hard for the team to know if they are moving in the right direction. A simple “Overall this is looking good but…” or “I like the progress so far” can go a long way for your agency’s moral around the project. Trust me on this, an agency that is positive about you and your project is much more likely to go the extra mile than one that feels beaten up. If you can view your agency as a partner rather than a vendor, they will view you the same way and the project will benefit greatly. Also, keep in mind that different feedback at different times within a project might benefit from different methods of communication. What works well as a bulleted email list might be even more effectively communicated with a phone call or an in-person meeting. Finally, remember that the faster you provide feedback to your agency, the less time they spend waiting.  If your goal is to get the best possible project you can within your budget, effective communication can help you get more value out of the dollars that you and your company are spending!

4.  Strive for simple messaging

Over the past 25 years, I have seen a very clear and steady trend toward simplifying content. This could mean producing a 90 second video instead of a 3 minute video or releasing an infographic instead of a white paper. This could mean hosting a series of local roadshow events instead of one huge customer conference. With so much media competing for customers’ attention these days, simplifying your message and delivering it in “content snack” sizes are sure fire ways to catch and keep attention. So, many times I quote a project to a customer that begins as a sharp and clear message only to have a committee of people begin to interject suggestions, details, and superfluous messaging that muddies the waters. The original clarity is lost and you end up with something that tries to address everyone but really addresses no one. The other piece of this puzzle is brevity. Keeping things short and sweet leaves your audience wanting more, which means that they are more likely to follow your call to action.

5.  Set realistic expectations

Years ago when I worked on the “client” side as a corporate marketer, a vendor told me that there is GOOD, FAST, and CHEAP and that I could only have 2. It might sound cliche, but in my experience, that adage usually rings true. The number one thing that you can do to help keep your project’s cost down and quality up is start early! Waiting until the last hour to begin a project can hinder the entire process and while it can be done, you are going to end up paying more in dollars and stress then you would if you kicked off the project sooner. That said, I understand that sometimes these last minute projects can’t be avoided. When they are necessary, I try to be sure to set clear expectations with my client about how they can help us succeed. As a creative agency, I strive to only do GOOD… actually, GREAT work, which means FAST and CHEAP are the 2 remaining variables that we can play with. FAST means more expensive and CHEAP means looser deadline. Providing those realistic expectations as both a client and agency is the key to a strong working relationship which, in turn, delivers the best projects.

In writing this blog, I came up with more ideas and tips that can help you get the most from your agency, but in the spirit of “simplicity” I’ve stuck with the five that I think are the easiest to implement and provide the biggest returns. If you have any other ideas to get the most out of your creative agency, please share in the comments.