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On Agencies Adapting for Sustainable Success in a Rapidly Changing
Communications Landscape
By Dan Cohn
Introduction
The siren song of modern communications technology and media
innovation disrupted my charted course as a lawyer, and lured me into the
wildly exciting world of modern marketing. It is a landscape in upheaval,
populated by a new breed of empowered consumers, by brands and agencies
adapting fast to their habits, and by a growing tech industry that adds
impactful new variables to the mix on an almost-daily basis. I have happily
steered toward the front lines of this communications revolution because I
believe there is simply no more exciting field to be in right now.
People are connecting to the world, and to one another in profoundly
new ways. As marketers we must constantly react and adapt to position
ourselves, and the brands we represent, to be a relevant and valuable part of
these evolving communications. The world of marketing has become more
dynamic, challenging, and rewarding than ever before. New agile-minded
entrepreneurial leaders are combining the art of storytelling, the science of
“machine data,” and emerging new technologies, to build and communicate
brands that resonate in a market where attention share—and thus, market
share— is increasingly hard to come by.
In this new marketing landscape populated by brands, consumers, tech,
agencies, and publishers, it is the agency that sits in the most perilous position.
Only the very best agencies will survive, as brands increasingly arm themselves
with new technology, talent, and powerful channels of communication. In
addition to having quickly acknowledged and adapted to the new “converged
media” marketing paradigm, such agencies will have five things in common:
(1) They will have robust monitoring, measurement, and insight
tools.
(2) They will own and access broad and deep channels of
communication.
(3) They will be able to efficiently produce quality brand content.

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(4) They will be culturally connected to the tech startup world.
(5) They will have strong cross-departmental leadership comprised
of entrepreneurial visionaries who have the foresight to see
beyond real-time trends, and the courage to pursue what’s
next.
This memorandum is meant to serve as a statement of circumstance, and
as a roadmap for the sustainable success of a full-service creative agency in a
converged media environment.
The New Converged Media Paradigm
The “interruption marketing model” has fallen at the hands of an elusive
and empowered new consumer who is no longer captive, and far less
susceptible to unwanted messaging than ever before. In its place a new
paradigm has arisen— one that acknowledges the fact that today, the average
person sees some 3,000 brand impressions per day, across a growing mix of
media.i
We are generally familiar with three distinct channels of communication:
(1) Paid Media like TV spots, billboards, banner ads, and experiential
activations; (2) Owned Media comprised of corporate assets like brand
websites, blogs, Facebook pages, etc.; and (3) Earned Media such as news
stories, reviews, word of mouth, and now, social sharing. These media have
begun to converge, and the days when advertising (or Paid Media) necessarily
led marketing initiatives, and could effectively stand on its own, are gone. It is
now incumbent upon marketers to strategically deploy all three forms of media
across what we now call “Converged Media.” Here, all channels must work in
unison to drive a consistent story, look, and feel; and to reach consumers at the
right time, and in the right way.ii
As the consumer journey has quickly become far more complex and
crowded, marketers are now scrambling to position themselves for success in a
converged media landscape that remains fairly new. Brands, in particular,
have a great deal of trouble adapting. They usually have distinct marketing
departments (social, PR, digital, planning, etc.) that fight over budget, and
compete politically. Few have a strong cross-departmental authority that sets
shared success metrics, or facilitates interdepartmental communication. This
creates a huge opportunity for agency partners to help reposition brands for

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marketing success. But of course, agencies must understand what it takes to
truly excel through converged media.
The interplay between media is fluid but essentially looks like this: (a)
Analyze all forms of earned media to gain insight into what is resonating with
the target audience. Those insights then inform (b) where to amplify with
respect to paid media, and (c) where to innovate with respect to owned. Then
(d) seed new content through owned media, which serves as the foundational
platform upon which earned and paid will grow. Perhaps this does not sound
too difficult or complex, but just think about what will really be required for
agencies to succeed at scale.
The Keys to Agency Success
1. Monitoring Earned Media in Real Time
Of the three forms of media, earned is the hardest for brands and
agencies to control. And yet, peer commentary is the strongest influencer
along the consumer decision-making journey. iii
Social has exploded the
inventory of earned media, and it has become both more challenging, and
more important to measure, monitor, and process what people are saying
about brands— especially in real time.iv
As a result, thousands of new tools have emerged to help us get a
handle on what’s being said about our clients. And every day, more emerge.
I’ll discuss the importance of being “culturally connected” to the tech startup
world below. For now, sufficed to say, agencies must have the tools to
monitor earned media in real time; and smart and curious people to process
and extrapolate insights from the data collected.
Understanding what is being said about client brands in real time
underpins the agency’s ability to quickly react with content and paid
amplification that resonates with the audience, and strengthens clients’ brands.
“Departments of Measurement & Insights” should be measuring not only
success against existing KPIs, but also monitoring earned media vis-à-vis the
broader social conversation. And then they should be regularly providing
valuable insights to the rest of the agency/client team to drive future action.

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2. Controlling Broad and Deep Channels of Communication
Over the past few months, much has been made of the “creative
publisher” model now being leveraged by companies like BuzzFeed and
Fortune. These publishers are assembling in-house creative teams to develop
original content for the brands that advertise with them. They have a
compelling value proposition:
“You’ve come to us because we have a large audience that you’re
obviously interested in reaching. Well, nobody knows our audience
better than we do— we’ve got huge data on what resonates with them.
So, with one big fat media buy, we’ll give you not only our audience
and channel of communication, but also creative services that will
generate content that engages the consumers you’re after.”
While I doubt that these creative publishers will replace the agency
within the ecosystem of converged media marketing (as some have
suggestedv
), I do think that agencies need to take note of their presence, and
adapt accordingly. It’s important for agencies to develop their own broad
and deep channels of communication through agency-owned properties, and
exclusive relationships with strategically-aligned publishers and influencers.
Who are the most popular publishers amongst audiences the agency
regularly targets? Become that publisher’s in-house creative agency. Who are
the most influential bloggers and celebrities in the agency’s key markets and
verticals? Forge deeper ongoing relationships with them. And agency-owned
channels of communication must be nurtured into valuable properties of their
own. An enormous following on social media, and an active blog that is
constantly hosting new and valuable content, adds substantial value not only to
clients (who may leverage them for their own content) but also to agency
branding efforts.
3. Efficient Production of Quality Content
“Content is king.” It’s become a cliché that most modern marketers are
tired of hearing, as it’s all anybody seems to talk about these days. But, it’s
true. As media channels have exploded in number, brands are struggling to
populate them with engaging new content. Whereas a brand used to generate
content for just one or two traditional media campaigns per year, now they

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have to power communication with an always-on consumer across a massive
media landscape.
The content itself is of a different sort than the industry is used to. Most
of the additional content brands now require must be real-time responsive—
which means efficiently produced in terms of time and cost. These adjustments
to content production have proven to be one of the biggest pain points for
brands and agencies transitioning into converged media. Of course, the
bigger the challenge, the more valuable the solution!vi
Agencies have begun to adapt in one of two ways. Either they (1)
develop a newsroom style production studio, and populate it with a new breed
of talent. Or, they (2) access a network of freelance artists, journalists, and
production companies, and crowdsource content that is then vetted internally.
The first solution is the one being employed by most agencies today. It
is expensive and tough to execute because it usually requires new
infrastructure and the integration of a different sort of “creative” into the tribe.
While most agencies will ultimately need to make this financial and emotional
investment to thrive, the second solution is probably a better way to start.
The second solution is a fairly new concept, and nobody has really
begun to execute it at scale (although Contently is quickly gaining traction and
visibility). To be clear, this involves what I’ll call “curated crowdsourced
content” or “3C.” In this case, the agency assembles (or acquires) a large
network of qualified freelance content producers, and then outsources creative
projects to that crowd. The overhead is lower, and the quality of content
sourced from hundreds of pre-qualified providers is wonderful (see
GeniusRocket.com for a good example of 3C execution relating to video).
It is important to remember that to achieve sustained success in a
converged media landscape, agencies must offer clients agile and adaptable
content strategies built for real-time engagement. While the 3C solution is not
optimized for real-time the way in-house production is, it does provide a lean
pilot and foundational program for building out in-house scalable content
capabilities down the road.

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4. Develop a Cultural Connection to the Tech Startup World
It seems that every day emerging communications technology throws
another ball at us marketing jugglers; or alternatively, takes a ball away. In
either case, it is incumbent upon us to become adept at handling these
sometimes game-changing variables. As I mentioned earlier, transitioning into
the world of converged media has become a major pain point for brands, and
many have turned to new tech, so-called “software stacks,” to address the
challenges.
The bustling tech start up world is not going away. And while its power
and unpredictability can seem threatening to agencies, like an expert judo
player, agencies must learn to use tech’s awesome power to their advantage.
This requires more than just performing due diligence. Agencies that are
culturally connected to the tech startup world will have an enormous
competitive advantage over the next few years.
This connection is best forged through deep partnership relationships
with incubators and work spaces like General Assembly, WeWork Labs,
Fueled Collective, and Projective Space. Some leading agencies like
Wieden+Kennedy have already established their own incubator programs,vii
and many, like 360i and OMD, have departments devoted entirely to
“emerging technology.”viii
Agencies should commit to becoming culturally connected to the tech
start up world. Everyone at the office should know who the new players are
almost immediately after they arrive, and a few people should be walking them
onto the field. If everyone isn’t reading Mashable and TechCrunch on the way
to work, they ought to have a digest waiting in their inbox when they arrive;
and they should want to read it. If they don’t, marketing may no longer be the
right field for them. And a few agency employees should actually be working
alongside tech entrepreneurs, so that these start ups and their friends become a
part of agency culture, and vice versa.
Cultural connection to the tech start up world means assuaging a heavy
burden for brand clients. In all cases, the agency alleviates the brand’s need
to devote a huge amount of time and resources to remaining constantly
informed. And in some cases, the agency may even be able to offer clients
exclusive access to emerging tech before it comes to market!

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5. Powerful Visionary Leadership
It is no longer business as usual in marketing. To thrive in this rapidly-
evolving converged media landscape, an agency must have strong leadership
that buys into the new paradigm, and does the often-difficult work of
recalibrating the organization.
Collaboration amongst departments has never been more important
than it is today, and a genuinely “integrated” full-service agency is well-
positioned for success. To be truly integrated requires strong cross-
departmental authority consolidated into a single person. This chief media
officer must manage the converged media cycle. He or she must deeply
appreciate the confluence of paid, earned, and owned media, and the
strategic interplay of this triumvirate. Moreover, as real-time marketing
capabilities eventually become baseline competency, the agency’s that thrive
will be driven by leaders with the foresight to see beyond real-time trends, and
the courage to pursue what’s next.
Conclusion:
The converged media landscape is still largely unsettled terrain, and fast-
acting agencies have an enormous opportunity to carve out a substantial new
space for themselves. At LeadDog Marketing Group we have acknowledged
this new marketing paradigm, and taken steps to quickly adapt. The future is
bright for agencies like ours that have the courage to charge ahead, and keep
pace with a rapidly-evolving communications industry.
i
http://articles.latimes. com/2012/jul/08/business/fi-ct-digital-ads-20120708/2;
http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=56750
ii
http://www.altimetergroup.com/research/reports/how-brands-must-combine-paid-owned-and-earned-media
iii
http://blog. nielsen.com/nielsenwire/consumer/global-advertising-consumers-trust-real-friends-and-virtual-strangers-
the-most/
iv
http://www.digiday.com/agencies/agencies-reshuffle-for-real-time-hbr/
v
http://www.digiday.com/brands/5-ways-brands-are-cutting-out-agencies/
vi
http://adage.com/article/agency-news/weber-shandwick-sets-unit-capitalize-content-marketing-craze/240564/;
http://www.mediabistro.com/prnewser/edelmans-insights-expert-explains-the-new-content-marketing-model_b61594
vii
http://www.wk.com/incubator
viii
See 360i’s ever-growing “Emerging Media Group” and OMD’s “Ignition Factory”