New Media Communications

October 22, 2007 6:55 AM

What advertising / communications agencies have done the best job of evolving into the digital landscape? Why?

I work for a communications agency and we're in the process of building a set of 'new media' offerings for our clients. (By this I mean: SEO, internet monitoring, podcasting, etc.)

What services should we offer our clients and what companies (or most helpful, agencies) are getting this transition right?

Thanks for your help Hive-Mind!

posted by LakesideOrion to computers & internet (2 comments total)

I thought most agencies just bought interactive agencies already proficient in these areas.
posted by bitdamaged at 9:41 AM on October 22, 2007

This is funny: you have more favorites than answers. But this is, in a way, an answer: maybe there are not that many ad agencies which have "evolved into the digital landscape".

From what I know of the ad agencies landscape, advertising is a service industry: you do what your client asks for. And, for now, nobody likes very much what is happening on the Web: neither the clients nor the agencies. Yes, they know that their consumers are moving over there. But that's about it.

Basically, for the clients, it's about knowing what to do. Most of them don't know what to do on the Web, so they ask their agency. And the agency doesn't like what they see, moneywise: although it has evolved into complex and diversified systems, the basic fee of an ad agency is (was) a percentage of the total amount of media paid for a campaign (formerly in the 10 to 15% range). Media being very expensive, ad agencies used to make a lot of money that way.

The problem with the Web is that it doesn't cost that much. To jack up the price of Web communications (and of their fee), ad agencies have mostly resorted to flash animations: it costs money to program, the client see logos flying all over their site and the agency has at least a minimal amount to feed on. But once you have spent $500 000 on animations, there are so many things moving and popping around that you can't add much more. And you have only made $50 000 for the agency. Which is peanuts compared to 10% of a small size tv campaign in the $10 millions range.

So this is where we are now: most clients have full animated websites. The novelty of things moving in 2D is over and consumers don't care. So agencies are moving full tilt into the 3D animation realm or are trying to control viral advertising or are pushing all mass media to do video ads on their website, or all 3 combined (viral youtubery!). Because, you know, they have all made millions with tv, so maybe it's only a question of bandwidth and very soon we'll all push tv on the Web and everyone will be happy again.

"SEO, internet monitoring, podcasting, etc" is fine as long as clients are paying fees and not a percentage of media. It's about exploring a new medium, and everyone benefits of exploration.

But if your question is really about "getting this transition right", I'll leave you with another question: do you think that any ad agency will succeed in shoehorning a "one to many" business model into a "one to one" medium?
posted by bru at 7:48 PM on October 22, 2007