Marketing and advertising agencies have embraced specialization to such a degree that how we work is slow, expensive, repetitive and shows disregard for consumers and the modern world.
We talk a lot about media fragmentation in the industry, and we use the complexity of the marketplace to justify why so many agencies exist and why specialist talent is vital, and to safeguard profits. However, this is a smoke screen. In an age when everything is becoming digital, we have made the mistake of arranging ourselves into vertical silos that make decreasing sense. Why structure for print, press, retail, TV, digital, mobile or social when we’re watching TV on iPads, listening to the radio on our phones, reading the newspaper on desktops and buying everything from everywhere?
We went wrong around the year 2000. Until that time, advertising and marketing were quite simple. Even with media agencies spun off in the 1970s and the advent of planning in the 1960s, we had a structure that made total sense. We had PR agencies, media agencies, retail agencies and creative agencies. Around this time, a large client in one market with a couple of brands might have employed a handful of agencies, each with clearly defined roles.
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