Short Break

The Cog Blog is on holiday until early October. See you back here then!

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One Throat to Choke

A rather strange post appeared on LinkedIn the other day (I bet that’s not the first time that sentence has been written). What it said may not be all that unusual but the medium on which it was posted certainly was. It’s probably best if I don’t reveal the name and company of the person doing the posting (although the person concerned had no such qualms), but here is what it said, in its entirety.

“How many of you work for a company that uses a large, consolidated agency network like WPP? And within that large network, how do you figure out which of the 150 agencies is right for you?”

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The Power of One

I was interviewed in a store the other day. I had just bought a piece of electronic kit, and on my way out I was approached by a good old traditional market researcher, complete with clip-board. He went through his questionnaire. I answered as best I could.

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The Future – You Can Lead a Horse to Water..

When the final blog in the series on the future of media agencies appeared last week, one agency CEO took the trouble to call me to discuss its content. As what he had to say was very sensible I thought I would extend this series to one more blog. For reasons that will soon become clear the CEO wishes to remain anonymous.

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Media Agencies Plan for the Future

Over the last three Cog Blogs we have been banging on about the future for media agencies. Is there one? And what might it be? Today we summarise the issues and propose a solution.

Media agencies have for some time now had the potential to evolve into a position as a trusted strategic advisor to their clients. It’s clear that this is a smart idea. But they face a number of problems and barriers along the way, not least of which is overcoming their natural conservatism in order to embrace organisational change.

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Divide and Conquer: The Future for Media Agencies – Part 3

The last two blogs in this series on the future for the media agency have looked at the stresses between the public, planning led element of the organisation, informed by research and data, and the more private buying element driven (far too often often) by a need to make money for the agency as opposed to doing the best for the client. This final edition looks into how agencies might organise themselves differently for a brighter future.

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