Courage (And Clients) Under Fire

A few weeks back the Australian  Marketing Institute held their 2nd anuual Advertising Showdown with teams of marketers given the challenge to handle the marketing for a hypothetical merger between the Crows and Port Power footy teams. For the record, the team from Black Sheep won the challenge, (knocking over teams from Fnuky, Adelaide Media Club and a student team from UniSA) but it was some of the closing comments from business and marketing strategist, (and one of the judges on the night), Ron Dent that raised the most eyebrows. We caught up with Ron to find out what all the fuss was about.

He warmed up by telling us he was "a bit disappointed in the level of creativity on the night, and in particular by the student team. Here was a chance for the young guns of the industry with nothing to lose and a bit to gain, to be outrageous Ron said, but they werent. After upsetting that particular apple cart, Ron decided there were more apples and more carts - mostly in the form of ignorant, gutless clients (our words, not his) - to upset, explaining clients usually "get the advertising they deserve".

His thoughts included the following reasons why clients often get rubbish advertising:

1. Clients often dont understand their own business or their brand. (And by brand, he doesnt just mean their trademark, but what goes on between the consumers ears when they think of the brand.)
2. Clients dont always understand their market positioning properly. And it wouldnt hurt to let their consultants help them establish that.
3. Marketing does not equal promotion. The promotion part of marketing is only the tip of the iceberg and many clients havent taken care of all their marketing "stuff".
4. And finally, our personal fave, is the other poor input from clients, is courage.

Clients have a dog, and try to bark themselves Ron said. They dont encourage or demand creative solutions - and Im not talking wanky creative, but effective creative solutions. Clients often arent bold enough and dont know enough about their businesses or marketing, even if they have qualifications, and dont have a feel for their brand. Whoa Ron, tell it like it is man! Were with you 110% of the way on this one. OK, so theres no such thing as 110% but you know what we mean. Oh, and one of our favourite bits was when Ron explained how the average clients approach gets them budget driven, client driven, bean counting solutions. Classic. And at AdTown we coudn't agree more that these aren't the kind of solutions that cut through an increasingly noisy marketplace when the first rule of the communication model is to get the consumers attention.

Now, before we all get too smug blaming all those dickhead clients for all the crap work out there, its worth remembering we still need to deliver the goods and give clients something worthwhile (and "non wanky") to approve. But as Ron pointed out, client courage is an essential ingredient for advertising success. Having all lamented at various times "if they only had a brain" and "if they only had a heart" about our clients, presumably then the zillion dollar question is, in true Wizard of Oz fashion, how can we help our clients make smarter and more courageous decisions?

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