– Agency owners often sell a dream to brands and pass off the work to inexperienced account managers and junior workers.
– Many brands are unaware of the quality of work being done by agencies and rely on them because they lack the expertise themselves.
– The author aims to be an outside resource to help both agencies and brands understand how to drive success and improve the broken relationship between them.The key action item is to seek an outside resource, such as Jon as a Service (JaaS), to help both agencies and brands better understand how to drive success and improve their relationship.The agency owner sells a brand on a dream and then passes the work off to an account manager with little experience. The account manager coordinates the team and communications with the brand, but the work is being completed by mostly junior workers who lack experience. The brand accepts the work because they don’t need to do it themselves. The agency has to pass the work off to cheaper labor in order to maintain their margin. However, the question remains: is the work any good? Most brands don’t have a clue, which is why they hire an agency in the first place. Agency heads are skilled at “delegating” and believe they can manage themselves out of day-to-day operations. However, what’s missing is the ongoing learning component that is necessary for the entire team. It’s impossible to build a business and teach people how to do the work at the same time. There simply isn’t enough time in the day. Just look at all the people with less than 5 years of experience who have started agencies since 2020. In most cases, the head of the agency doesn’t have the necessary experience to provide ongoing learning and strategies because they’ve never personally run a successful brand themselves. I’ve discussed in previous posts why smart agency owners should just build brands instead. They rely on the idea that they can sell the clients and then find people with the skills to service the accounts. The whole process is like a mini pyramid scheme, focused on ensuring that more brands come in. They start with 90-day contracts to begin the clock. The best agency heads are excellent at selling the dream. However, brands often forget that an agency cannot succeed without access to a brand’s existing assets, products, reviews, and market presence. The best agencies simply create Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs). However, sometimes the SOP is just a cover to show that they are organized and have done research before deciding on an approach. The brand may think they know what they are doing, but the agency just hopes that the brand already has product-market fit. I’ve found this to be the case with every agency I’ve ever worked with. Every. Single. One. I’ve also reviewed a lot of agency work, and most of it isn’t great. Most of the time, the success is due to the brand’s products, not the agency. This is where I want to drive change. My goal is to be an outside resource that can fix this broken relationship. I want to be resource for both agencies and brands to better understand how to drive success. This is why Jon as a Service (JaaS) was created. I’ve been fielding questions from both sides for years at this point. Both brands and agencies need an outside resource that understands business, the entire business, to help them navigate success. Not all products are going to be rockstars with great unit economics and massive gaps like never creating email flows or running ads. Interested? Learn more at Ecom with Jon #marketing #JaaShttps://www.linkedin.com/in/jivanco