Collaboration the Key to Choosing Ad Agency
Expert Blogger Ty Montague writes
When Choosing An Ad Agency, Don’t Consider Size; Consider Collaboration
in Fast Company Magazine – @fastcompany magazine on Twitter.
_____________________________________________________
My thoughts…
Clients are always looking for the same thing — how can you make their life easier. Create good work that helps them meet sales or other goals and do it for less. Launch a new brand, product, or service. Build an audience where there isn’t one, etc… As my good friend Curtis Schlough with Brochure Builders says, “Solve their problem.”
Small agencies are often more adept at collaboration on design, marketing, and other advertising or PR issues that benefit the client. While big agencies have greater resources they too rely heavily on specialists and contractors behind the scenes. Often there just aren’t as many layers of middle-men working with a small agency. Of course we all realize that smaller advertising firms will often be willing to do more and bend over backwards for the same account that a larger agency may brush off. The best philosophy for a small agency is “Stay lean, Stay hungry.”
Clients want fast, responsive marketers that make them feel like they are the agency’s ONLY client and that minor miracle of account service is no easy feat for a large agency or a small one. Agency work cannot exist in a vacuum today. Creatives have to be flexible enough to share and explore concepts that benefit the client. This often means sitting at the same table as folks who are technically-speaking — competitors. If you are a small agency like us, you will check your ego at the door and do whatever it takes to find that solution for your mutual client.
Mike Hallaron
www.HallaronMedia.com
The Basics: Twitter terms and definitions
(This re-post is intended as a basic primer for our social media clients new to the Twitter-verse. Once you understand the basic terminology of this social tool, then you focus on how Twitter may enhance your overall marketing picture. ~ Mike Hallaron)
August 25, 2010 by Nate Erickson
SproutSocial.com
The Twitter world is a community with its own language. As a result, you may encounter a variety of terms you may not yet be familiar with, as some of these terms were coined by the users themselves. Cool, huh?
What is a Tweet, anyway?
Any post on Twitter is considered a Tweet, whether a post, reply, link, or a location-update (more on this later). Tweets have a maximum of 140 characters (due to SMS/mobile constraints) and are typically shown along with the username of the individual who wrote it.
Social Media About Trust, not ROI
by Mike Hallaron
HallaronMedia.com
Even when confronted with the inevitable truth that social media have forever changed the marketing landscape for business (it is all around you like the Matrix), I occasionally get confronted by old-school corporate wonks who think they have cornered me with their “gotcha” hook. After we discuss the marketing, and especially public relations value of social media, and services that we can manage for their company, I get the zinger from this guy straight from an episode of “The Office”.
Mike Hallaron Talks Social Media on CBS Radio Business Show
HOUSTON, TEXAS (April 13, 2011) CBS Radio guest host Ken Marsh interviewed Mike Hallaron on 650 AM in Houston recently. The pair discussed social media and how it has transformed the public relations field. Hallaron stressed the importance of defining expectations and creating a strategic plan including measured results before getting started in social media. The Web and the emergence of social channels like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and You Tube has forever changed how big and small brands alike manage relationships with the public he explained. Click the link below to listen to the entire segment.
Marsh was sitting in for regular host Kevin Price of The Price of Business (airs Mon – Fri, 11-noon time slot).
Mike Hallaron is the CEO of Hallaron Public Relations and MH1 Web Design.
