In-house Agencies Can Get Outside Perspective And Creative Ideas Without The Threat
IHAF’s 2018 State-of-the-Industry (more below)
In-house agencies live their brand every day, they’re immersed in its culture, they get it first hand. However, the in-house agency is at a disadvantage to external agencies in one respect: the thinking can get insular. While external agencies are working on different brands all the time, in-house agencies work on one brand. All. Day. Long. In-housers know they need to bring in outside perspective from time to time, but many don’t want the risks involved in bringing in outside help. Is there an answer? Short answer, yes. Longer answer below.
77% of corporations have in-house agencies.
Can you believe that number? On top of that, in-house agencies are no longer the ugly stepchild of the advertising business. Many of my favorite creative leaders now proudly run in-house agencies, but wouldn’t have been caught dead in one 20 years ago. The great, award-winning creative director famous for leading the “Get out there” work with Royal Caribbean, Jay Williams, is now the Executive Creative Director at CVS/Health. The also-great, award-winning creative director, Bruce Bildsten, who was behind the famous “BMW Films” at Fallon is now the Executive Creative Director at Best Buy. There are many others. In-house is the new black when it comes to creative leadership.
And the work they do is no longer average. I have served as a judge in the In-house Creativity Awards a few times over the last ten years (an In-house Agency Forum event), and can say the work is no longer C or C+ work. Some of it is work any traditional agency would be proud of.
Now, with this explosion of in-house agencies comes different kinds of capabilities. Some just do the “below the line” work, which is a euphemism for the work the AOR doesn’t want to do. Some are more robust, handling all the digital work, say, while the AOR handles the big productions like TV campaigns. But some are full-service agencies within the walls of a marketer, and do it all themselves.
They all know their thinking can get insular and all likely bring in traditional freelance teams here and there. But there’s a better way.
No one wants to go outside for ideas, but sometimes it’s necessary.
IHAF’s 2018 State-of-the-Industry (click to enlarge)
It is more profitable to leverage the talent within an in-house agency as often as possible. You’re already paying them. It is more “pure” creatively, if you will, to leverage in-house talent as they truly understand and have internalized the brand’s idea. It also can be safer to leverage in-house talent, as bringing in an outsiders risks dealing with their agendas to take on more than you’re asking.
The In-house Agency Forum (IHAF) provided me with their most recent “State Of The Industry” report and 30% of external creative agencies see in-house agencies are increasingly a threat to them and less than half see in-house agencies as increasingly complementary to external agencies. I’m sure those numbers are better than ten years ago, but clearly there is some tension there.
That’s why in-house agencies bring in freelance teams frequently. It’s a smarter, easier play. A freelance team can provide temporary creative help, get paid, and then go away. No agenda from a freelance team beyond impressing you in order to get another future gig. A great way to go.
Here’s the thing. Typically these freelance teams are made up of a writer and an art director. They will both charge you day rates for the assignment, which for the sake of argument let’s say is $1,500 per day, per freelancer. So a one week charge would be $15,000 for one freelance team’s full attention. That’s not a small amount of money.
Did I mention there’s a better way?
it’s time to disrupt the old freelance model.
The old freelance model works for many and, if that’s the case for you, great. Stick with it. But consider the following comparison:
With Ideasicle X, you get twice as many creative freelancers working together as a team using our proprietary web application for less than half the cost as traditional freelance. As the Organizer, you can see the ideas the team posts in realtime and react to them. And I can tell you a team of four yields exponentially more ideas in the same amount of time as does a team of two. We see 30-50 ideas (not 4 or 5) per one-week project all nicely organized and nested on the platform for your team’s review.
On top of all that, Ideasicle X is not a threat. It can’t be. You are in complete control over each project. And Ideasicle X does not handle any execution, so we have no interest in becoming, or the ability to become, an AOR.
If at all intrigued, click below to schedule a demo so I can show you personally what IX can do.
as long as we’re talking about in-house agencies…
Brands In Action Podcast interview between host, David Baldwin, and Best Buy ECD, Bruce Bildsten, on what it’s like to go from the agency side to leading the in-house agency. Highly recommend!
Will Burns is the Founder & CEO of the revolutionary virtual-idea-generating company, Ideasicle X. He’s an advertising veteran from such agencies as Wieden & Kennedy, Goodby Silverstein, Arnold Worldwide, and Mullen. He was a Forbes Contributor for nine years writing about creativity in modern branding. Sign up for the Ideasicle Newsletter and never miss a post.