If a client calls us, we can be out at a moment’s notice and get it done. I’m always ready. If you’re running away from the future, man, you’re going to get caught up in the past. I’m driving into work this morning, and had a couple things that just kind of crossed my mind, just from the week that I had. I guess wanted to just, I guess, do a rant about it, so here it goes.
This week I met with Marketing Directors from two different types of businesses, two different industries, and it’s just amazing to me on how much control some of the Marketing Directors have. But they don’t know a whole lot about what they’re doing. I kind of equate it to someone saying they’re a great surgeon, but they’ve never performed surgery. And I feel like it’s always like a confrontation, like a stand-off, whenever an agency and a Marketing Director for a company gets inside of a room together, instead of just saying, “Hey, let’s partner up, or let’s figure out better ways that we can make this work, or we can make this relationship seamless and perfect.”
And at the end of the day, the goal is results, but it’s always like an adversarial relationship, or it’s almost like antagonistic, like how much do you know? How much do you know? Who knows more than the others? And a lot of times it’s always like the Marketing Directors don’t want to get their feelings hurt; but in my eyes, I just think it’s silly.
I think it’s almost like a fear of loss of possession, if a Marketing Director invites an agency in. To me, this is the most asinine thing that you can do by giving your agency the cold shoulder. Your agency can be that company who helps you get ahead. That company that helps you get that next raise, that company that makes you look like a rock star. And it’s almost like you’re building your cabinet, because, normally, a lot of companies they have one person or two, or even three people inside of the Marketing Department, where an agency may have ten to 15.
So at the price of one employee, you can hire, you know, or the salary of one employee, you could hire an entire team. So, you know, as a business owner, it just doesn’t make sense to me, and I used to fault the Marketing Directors, but now, I think it’s more the business owner’s fault, and here’s why. I know there’s going to some people that say, “Well, that’s not right.” Well, here’s why I think, for some reason, it’s part of the business owner’s fault, because you are the ones writing the checks. If you’re writing the checks and you’re paying for something that you don’t understand, then you don’t know your business.
You don’t have to be a marketing expert, but you need to understand exactly what the people you’re paying, are doing. And not all the time is it the marketing agency that screwed you over. Sometimes it’s that same person that’s in your building who you call a Marketing Director that just doesn’t know a whole lot, they’re the ones screwing you over. So that’s something just to think about right there. And it’s just a couple minutes rant, just based on the week that I’ve seen, and just some of these Marketing Directors how they’re reading the article, they get a buzz word, a headline, and, automatically, they’re a marketing expert, because they’re read a few articles, or they listened to a couple podcasts, when they’re not practitioners.
It’s like, you know, for us, when I say us, I mean a lot of different marketing agencies, we practice marketing. We practice marketing the same way a lawyer practices law, and the same way a doctor practices medicine. And in our case, it changes so fast, it changes with technology. And that’s nothing against their profession, but our profession needs to be respected too. Not just anyone can jump in a seat and say that they are a Marketing Director. Not anyone can just jump in the seat and say that they know creative.
So I just want to challenge all the business owners if you’re listening to this for your Daily Development, you think about the next time you put that marketing director in the seat, you need to understand what they’ve done, not just what they’ve worked. Because I’ve seen Marketing Directors for companies who worked in radio, but they were a Promotions Assistant. And all of a sudden they’re a Marketing Director. Then when the agency comes in, they have a problem with the agency, because the agency knows tons more than they can; but instead of utilizing that agency, as a partner, you look at them as an adversary. That’s your Daily Development.