The Seven Year Itch
After seven years in the advertising business, my flirtation with the industry has been far from satisfactory. Nonetheless, like good old Indians would like it to believe, I’m working on this relationship and trying to understand this gorgon called Indian Advertising.
But let me warn you, the picture doesn’t look too rosy.
Here are some questions that I’ve tried finding answers to. But no, none of them seem to convince me. Here we go.
1) Why can’t an industry like advertising have a body like NASSCOM or INS which can lobby with the government, regulate remuneration, stop undercutting and make the industry as robust as IT?
2) Why can’t we have one national award ceremony celebrating great creative?
3) Why can’t one agency respect another agency’s work?
4) Why can’t agencies have a pitch fee? (At least the AAAI have woken up on this. It remains to be seen how they implement it.)
5) Why can’t agencies come up with a remuneration system that’s better than the 15% commission or the retainer fee? (If the software guys have done it, we can do it too.)
6) Why can’t agencies stop undercutting?
7) Why can’t agencies do work for clients abroad and spread their net globally? (Again, some skeptics have told me this is not possible because we are not aware of the local idiom abroad. That, I consider is whole lot of hogwash. If that were the case, agencies like W+K, BBH or KesselsKramer wouldn’t have been successful at all.)
Why can’t agencies operate like brand specialists and work like Investment Bankers commanding the same respect? (After all, an advertising agency is supposed to shape the destiny of brands with clients. So how come agencies get treated like suppliers and Investment Bankers like Gods?)
9) Why can’t agencies attract and retain good talent?
10) Why can’t agencies stop pleasing clients with unnecessary speculative work and do 80% more than what is needed, every single time?
11) Why do I have this fear that I wouldn’t find conclusive answers to any of these questions?
on July 17th, 2006 at 3:04 am
[...] Welcome on board Murali Menon. Murali, or as friends call him – P.C. Muralidharan Menon, is a friend. More, he is an ex-boss. In my fledgling years of advertising, Murali, and ex-colleagues far too many to mention, helped me learn the craft that is Advertising. So it was only natural that Murali accept my sincere requests (and the threat of total annihilation) to blog at Chicken Rules, on advertising. And he’s already doing a great job. I am very glad to have him with me. [...]
on July 17th, 2006 at 3:09 am
Great questions Murali. I believe not all of them are unanswerable (double negatives here…note the point your honour)
In particular – Why can’t agencies stop pleasing clients with unnecessary speculative work and do 80% more than what is needed, every single time?
I do think agencies (some of them atleast) work more that what is required. Speculative work is only the icing, in these agencies. I per se don’t have an issue with doing speculative work. It kinda charges up the creative team, and the creatives and the servicing “bond” better in such times.