Work that matters Part 2: What do clients want from agency partners?

Of course clients want great work that cuts through the clutter to reach and resonate with audiences. And if that brings home an award, even better.

But with shrinking marketing budgets, and an economy which hasn’t been the most co-operative over the past few years, many brands have moved towards creating executions that are more “measurable” in nature.

While brand campaigns were once the main path to winning over the minds of consumers, with the fragmentation of media and the shrinking of budgets, many marketers have found themselves creating ads that drive performance, and using tactics which work better for the bottom of the funnel.

During the second instalment of a two-part round table hosted by MARKETING-INTERACTIVE, in collaboration with Shutterstock – titled “Navigating the attention landscape” – marketers argued that the tides are shifting, and more and more are moving away from simply creating promotional campaigns.

One such brand is Accor Hotels. Victoria Sertic, SVP, brand, marketing and loyalty, Middle East, Africa, Turkey and Asia Pacific at Accor Hotels, said the brand is taking the top-end of a full-funnel approach because it believes that’s how there will be a return on investment. This is because the APAC media landscape is undergoing a dynamic transformation, driven by a tech-savvy population and a thriving digital ecosystem.

"We are adapting our content to further strengthen our mix to reach the right audience at the right time. Our approach is to execute a full funnel marketing approach with the emphasis not being on discounting in our key messaging. We do not want to commodify our brands, but articulate our key attributes and the value of our comprehensive loyalty program," she said.

“The content that we're creating is very much at the top end of the funnel. We are creating aspirational social media reels and video content by partnering with global industry leading creators who have a unique following on Instagram,” she explained, adding the tactical campaigns that marketers have become so reliant on aren’t going the extra mile anymore.

Penny Quek, SVP of integrated marketing at HSBC, shared that meaningful engagements that are relevant is what marketers should strive for.

“Branding, tactical campaigns, digital communications, all that are not new to a very savvy audience,” she said.

“So, how do you get into the right place at the right time with the right emotion? We are using data and insights to pinpoint intent along a much more complex B2B journey to identify the right triggers and pivot points.”

According to Stephanie Kennedy, director, growth & essential rest of Asia at Shutterstock data is taking a more prominent stage in creative execution, becoming accessible in campaigns and through monitoring digital consumption. With this access to data, there is an opportunity for brands and creative agencies to collaborate further, especially with understanding who their customers are and what is generating interest.

She added that hyper-personalisation has increased, promising tailored experiences that resonate with individual consumers. However, if agencies are not provided with clear data points, brands might face a challenge of not speaking directly to the user’s needs and desires at different stages of their journey.

Another challenge is standing out of the clutter on platforms (digital or otherwise). As the quest for attention often leads to the pursuit of instant gratification—quick wins that may boost metrics momentarily but could erode brand authenticity over time.

“To navigate these challenges, brands should revisit and rebuild creative relationships with their agencies by sharing broad reaching data points on platforms and content that has been working; giving the opportunity to creative agencies to innovate through creative optimisation and A/B testing,” she shared.

Meanwhile, marketers also need to build on existing relationships with their agency partners to really truly understand each other’s needs. Samit Mehrotra, global brand director at Castrol, said that today the traditional advertising relationship has become tactical in nature as well, but as a client, it is on his radar to forge long-lasting partnerships.

“What I've tried to do is I work with the same agency, and I give all my campaigns to that agency because people working on the campaigns need to know about the brand. I think that is a challenge,” he said.

So, what do clients want from their agency partners?

Victoria Sertic, SVP, brand, marketing and loyalty Middle East, Africa, Turkey and Asia Pacific, Accor Hotels

I’d like an agency with a solution for a wide area. Singapore, for us, is just one market, but we've got so many markets that having an agency with a full-funnel approach, and which can go across markets with the same type of localisation, is key. We're time starved. So, agencies need to follow the brief. And we want to lead and not follow – that's absolutely key for us.

Bryan Tan, president and CEO, Carro

Some marketing agencies, been experts in a certain medium, be it social media or TV, tend to show us ideas similar to those executed for previous clients with a very slight twist. But that may not be as appealing to our distinct target clientale. Coming up with creative and novel marketing ideas will be more exciting and very well received.

Samit Mehrotra, global brand director, Castrol

While big traditional agencies are very strategic, they could afford to have a bit more agility which they could benefit from, as clients would definitely benefit with more agility. As for the new social media-led agencies, while they are very agile, they are selling content and tend to forget that we are ultimately there to sell the brand. So, having a balance there would help.

Alison Ee, director and head of customer and marketing (retail business), FairPrice Group

Maybe the question and answer is: How can agency today bring us value beyond just creative production. I would like to see the agencies we work with play the role of a strategic counsel and bring a lot of great consumer insights which we may not readily know, because we could be just looking to our own industry.

Penny Quek, SVP of integrated marketing, HSBC

I hope agencies can start strengthening their B2B marketing expertise and capabilities and not just rely on the B2C muscles they have built in the past – even if some of the rules apply, a lot of it is quite different due to the complex B2B buying journeys. A lot of marketing agencies might have traditionally focused on the bigger piece of the pie, which is in consumer marketing, but B2B could potentially open up a new revenue channel if they invested more time in understanding B2B clients’ businesses and needs.

Nikee Seah, digital marketing head, IHH Healthcare

They need to be curious about our brand. Keep asking us questions. Don't just “do”.

Shermaine Lim, senior manager, marketing and partnerships, Keppel

In today’s work, we often wear multiple hats within an organisation. It helps for the marketing agency to come in and be the subject matter expert to solve the problem that we can't solve or see for ourselves.

Karen Yew, chief corporate affairs officer, Surbana Jurong

“I hope agencies stay fascinated and intrigued by what we offer. As an in-house team, we sometimes overlook stories because we're immersed in the brand every day. We rely on agencies to stay curious, talk to us, and help us uncover forgotten sparklers.”

Alin Dobrea, head of marketing solutions, ZALORA

Well, for ZALORA, we act as an agency for our brand partners and we have centres of excellence. So, for us, we try to be flexible with our clients, and their existing agencies, and ultimately, also offer the capabilities or set-up structures that we've been building for all these years. I think the challenge sometimes can be finding the right talent and positioning yourself as a trustworthy and reliable partner.