...and marketing firms that seemingly makes them the most resistant to change and new ideas? Isn't this the antithesis to why the clients have hired them in the first place? I experienced this first in the new media world when brands just started discovering online, but now I am with a company that is truly trying to change paradigms in how we think about media and consumer engagement. We not only deliver the hot Web 2.0 topics like consumer generated media and word of mouth marketing to brands but it is funded by the consumer. Let me repeat that... FUNDED BY THE CONSUMER!
We like to talk directly with companies, but I really feel the agency world should be looking at ideas like this so I continue to try. Here's what happens. After dozens of reach out attempts to our friends at the agencies, cold, warm and hot, I finally have a meeting and the feedback is "hmmm… cool idea" .....................zzzz........grass growing.......birds chirping. They have no idea what to do with it. Yes, there are exceptions but I've worked for a world class media company and I've worked at a start-up and the experience is the same.
I know what you are thinking: "Maybe your idea stinks?" But it doesn't. Trust me. Brands get it. You talk to people with a stake in generating revenue or creating real consumer engagement for their company and their eyes get wide when they hear.
I know the pressures of agencies and the slim margins they work on, etc., but I have to think they're not helping themselves by being as inaccessible and as task-oriented as they seem to be.
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