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1. Lack of a cohesive framework for evaluating different types of media: It’s true that there are few established systems that allow a marketer to input criteria into a model and get an integrated recommendation. But that doesn’t mean that different media types with their different measurement systems can’t be reduced to some common evaluation metrics. It takes a new perspective on framing marketing objectives and associating appropriate media metrics. It is hard work, but the results we are seeing as we do this for clients is worth the effort.
2. Media departments are fragmented: We hear this all the time from marketers and media companies that offer both traditional and digital options. The traditional planners are usually in a different department from their digital counterparts. They may be in a different building, a different city or even a different arm of the holding company. And you wonder why media plans aren’t integrated?
3. Media departments are incomplete: The biggest missing piece is search marketing. Few agencies make PPC campaigns part of their media plans, and for many marketers this is one of the most effective options they have. Even fewer view search engine optimization as a media discipline, though it can drive visitors to a client’s website more efficiently than almost any other form of paid media. It’s not that agencies don’t “grasp the Web” as the article proclaims, it’s that they aren’t even trying.

It’s taken our agency about three years to address these three problems, but we know now that they can be overcome. We have learned that it takes a culture that is oriented both to integration and to change. Sadly, many big agencies have neither.

If you have a perspective on this challenge, drop me a note. Or if you’d like to discuss what we’ve learned about what it takes to do integrated media planning, let’s talk.

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The old marketing model was something like this:

1. Start with the objective of “building the brand.”

2. Get an agency to create “the big idea” that would get the brand noticed and admired.

3. Push that idea out to consumers or business buyers through mass media that the agency negotiated.

4. Hope that it worked because existing measurement systems were difficult to link this approach to real business results.

Ad agencies built their business models, cultures and operating processes around this approach. Their profitability improved when they could create a few commercials and run them on TV with a pre-negotiated media buy.

What I believe is called for today is a model more like this:

1. Start with the objective of delivering the business results that are required (acquiring customers, improving conversion rates, enhancing loyalty and repeat purchase…).

2. Build a multi-dimensional marketing system that engages consumers or business buyers with compelling value propositions expressed with great creative placed in contextually relevant media environments that drives them destinations that get them to act.

3. Measure what really engages customers effectively and efficiently.

4. Iterate quickly to optimize and improve results.

This requires a different kind of agency model. One that is more attuned to the role digital media plays in the lives of consumers. One that truly embraces measurement and learning. One that can execute and iterate quickly. And one whose business model isn’t based on media commissions.

That is what I believe. How about you?

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Our firm has taken a very different path and invested in building a strong search marketing team. We are one of the few full-service agencies to be recognized as Google AdWords Qualified. This not only allows us to provide much more unbiased media recommendations to clients, but allows us to do very efficient message and offer testing with quick PPC programs that can then be incorporated into other media activities.

So I’ll ask you, can an agency truly be “media agnostic” without incorporating search in its media planning portfolio?

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Much has been written about the misfit between traditional ad agencies and the new digital world in which we are marketing. They don’t get it. They are too siloed. They can’t kick their dependence on TV. They aren’t adaptable. The criticisms go on and on. And rightly so.

So when WPP decided to create a new agency at the behest of Dell, many wondered if this start-from-scratch approach would work and become the new model.

Torrence Boone, the agency’s CEO,  opened up to the media recently. In Ad Age, he proclaimed, “At Enfatico, we are talking about true integration, everything under one roof, zero legacy, one profit-and-loss statement, analytics, cost efficiency. We’re media agnostic…all of these things provide a much-differentiated value proposition.”

I couldn’t agree more with their strategy. We’ve been at it for almost eight years and clients have embraced this approach. However, I believe Mr. Boone’s challenge is not the strategy, but the execution. Here’s my advice to him based on what we’ve learned by implementing the the “new agency model.”

1. Focus on building a culture of collaboration: This is not an easy task but is essential to the success of an integrated agency. If your people can’t work together, the client might as well work with multiple agencies.

2. Recruit and retain the best talent: I believe this will ultimately be the failure of Enfatico. The best people simply don’t want to be limited to working only on one client, especially one as demanding as Dell. Many of our good people have been highly recruited to join them. We’ve been fortunate that they all have said no. Good for us. A real challenge for them.

3. Develop best practices for marketing in this new era: Simply digesting all the work for hundreds of agencies is an all consuming task for Enfatico. There will be a tendency to establish operational processes based on the type of work that they are taking on (print ads, catalogs, Web banners…). This will ultimately defeat the purpose for which they were created. We have learned over the years that integrated planning in a very complex media world requires new methodologies, not just connecting the dots between exisiting departments.

Mr. Boone, welcome to the new world. It’s exciting. It’s challenging. And if you execute your strategy, you will prosper as we have. Good luck!

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