Agency 2.65 - Now Driven By Sales


As the media marketplace is changing, which agencies are changing with it?

Here are two:

Anomaly is doing great things with a new business model with their clients - sales driven, skin-in-the-game equity and all that - see a recent Business 2.0 article here. Not only are they getting partially compensated by increasing their client's sales, but "Anomaly is selling an all-in-one package of services for advertising, product design, strategic consulting, and technology licensing."

Another agency with a good reputation for the "post advertising age" is Story Worldwide. Below are some compelling points about the new marketplace, from Story's site...

BUT FIRST - Make sure you have had a good drink of the Kryptonite flavored Kool-Aid by reading Bob Garfield's Chaos Scenario 2.0 - the PDF of the Ad Age article is here. More sobering insight on this is here by my mentor-to-be Jeff Jarvis / BuzzMachine. Key line, "That horrible crashing sound you hear is a gravy train derailing."

Here is the writing on the wall:

78% of advertisers feel traditional television advertising has become less effective in the past two years

-Source: Association of National Advertisers (ANA) and Forrester Research Inc., study of national advertisers, March 2006

69% of Americans would pay money for products that help them block, skip, opt out of or avoid advertising and marketing messages

56% avoid buying products that “overwhelm” them with advertising

54% say they resist being exposed to advertising messages


-Source: National telephone survey of 600 adults conducted February 2005 by Yankelovich

50% of the money earned by the advertising industry comes from messages that reach either the wrong audience or none at all

-Source: The Economist

33% of all direct mail is thrown away without being opened; and nearly 60% is thrown away without being read

-Source: World Advertising Research Centre (WARC), 2004

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Now is a relevant time for one of my favorite quotes:

The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: The unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.

-- George Bernard Shaw