Media and Ad Agencies - It Is Time for You to Get Married

                                               "It is essential that media agencies have more input into the creative brief" said David Kenny, the chairman-CEO of Publicis Group's Digitas

Being media savvy is really important in the increasingly fragmented and diversified media world. There is no fix solutions and creative ideas must reflect media environment in order to work. It is trivial to say it over and over but we can't make campaigns based on closed communication models that seems to be alive in many advertising agencies. I've attended a couple of  meetings where ad agency presented first their great idea and then came up with a couple of slides for media agency - their media recommendation (newspapers and TV), without even giving a thought whether their message can thrive in the given media. Media aren't only about buying advertising space and optimizing reach at low cost. Media are about understanding how and when connect with consumers and establish your brand / message in their lives. Media are about well-thought communication solutions and maximizing your reach via creating social networks or becoming part of them. You can't achieve a success with your great picture and slogan on it that you throw like a bomb on the consumers. Bombs explode and destroy. Media used wisely - connect and build. We, at Vizeum work with connections planning where the starting point is not only collecting consumers insights but understanding human's motivations behind media usage. This is what should drive ideas. Ideas, messages should fit media "personality", otherwise our messages are like bull in a china shop.

                                                                      "Medium is the message" McLuhan

In my humble opinion, it is not about who takes a lead, it is not about who is more important on the client's partners list. It is about COLLABORATION. Both media and advertising agencies are on the same side. It just makes me sad that we perceive each other as competitors and collect efforts to prove who's better. We should reunite our efforts and talents to create unforgettable and effective solutions. We should get married!'

Photo by *Solar ikon*

Tags: advertising, media, collaboration, David Kenny, connection planning