Making a case for the small ad agency

In these days of the incredibly shrinking or even non-existent advertising budget, aren’t advertisers better off with small- to medium-sized independent agencies as opposed to humongous multinational organisations?

While multinationals continue to offer offices in markets across the globe, merged media clout, access to creative talent in various countries, globally aligned accounts, and upper management based in the advertising capitals of New York, London, and Tokyo, just to name a few, they also require, nay demand, more than what a local or regional advertiser is financially able to afford.

Not all advertisers can be a Coca-Cola, Nestle, Unilever, Procter and Gamble, Nike or Adidas. Their advertising budgets are derived from revenues coming from franchises all over the world.

What if you’re simply a relatively successful brand fighting it out, tooth and nail, in a steadily more and more competitive local and regional market? Would you jump onto the multinational bandwagon — hey, I can be a big spender, too – or take the more practical, more gain for less strain, more intimate and potentially longer lasting relationship with a small- to medium-sized independent agency?

The venerable advertising industry publication, Ad Age, quick to spot a trend, started the ‘Small Agency of the Year Awards’ a few years back, celebrating the best among the small wonders that have emerged to take on the giants.

David Baldwin, founder of the Small Agency of the Year for 2012, said “The coolest thing in the world is being named Small Agency of the Year by Ad Age.” Later on, he added, “The second coolest thing is the amount of doors that immediately opened for us — some good, some we made a conscious choice to close after a polite “No”.

Being a David amongst Goliaths in this industry can be an intimidating prospect, yet small to medium agencies enjoy more leeway in how they operate on a day-to-day basis.

First off, there’s minimum to no red tape. Small agencies are often headed by people who simply love advertising, period — creative directors or account directors who have been disillusioned in a multinational supermarket, and just want to get back to what they had before — fun!

As in ‘wear whatever you want, listen to whatever you want, behave however you want — as long as you’re able to produce amazing work and be able to sell it to clients’. If you’re an unconventional client, always on the lookout for fresh creative output, and not really moved by whether the agency’s home office has given these ideas a committee nod or not, then this set-up could be perfect for you.

Then, there’s the issue of independence. Some clients actually prefer the quick tempo offered by smaller independent agencies, where decisions do not have to float down months later from Mt Olympus in New York or London. The iron grip that most multinational organisations have on local partners can be so suffocating on the agency’s staff, and simply ridiculous to most local and regional clients.

A local agency, and not just a local affiliate, can easily make decisions without needing anybody else’s permission except their own management’s. Creative ideas are grown in-house, and executions done without the interference of a regional creative director or an executive creative director to be flown in from somewhere, adding a few more months to the process. As well as expensive re-shoots, when deemed needed.

A multinational agency can have over 300 people walking its corridors, most of them unaware of the others’ existence since they hardly have any day-to-day ‘facetime’ with them. Teams only work with each other and no one else, in what can only be termed as insular and could result in many ideas turning out to be similar, and eventually brand the agency as a boring one-idea shop.

A client walking in on this atmosphere of fractured internal relationships and absence of team interaction, can feel lost and unimportant. While having a smaller partner can create a closer, more personal relationship.

If you’re a practical client with production and distribution costs always at the edge of your conscience, where would you rather be? Playing golf with a multinational or getting down to real business with a smaller independent?

The writer is the CEO of Venture Communications.