With these three steps completed, the agency account team now has all the information it needs to put together an entire campaign. There are eight components we will look at.
- Creative concepts. This is the approach that will be used in the ads, brochures, etc., to get the message noticed and then acted upon by the target audience.
- Designs, slogans, and copy. When the creative concept have been agreed to, then the art and copy departments can begin to work on the various designs, the slogans, and the copy that will be used based on those concepts.
- Media plan and costs Now that the strategy has been decided upon, the media people can put together a media plan (where and when the ads will run) for the campaign. From that they can figure out the client's cost to advertise the product.
- Cost for creative and production services the art director now has an understanding of what will be needed to put the entire campaign together from the art department's perspective. That means exactly how many ads will need to be designed and if brochures or other collateral printed pieces are to be developed, what that will involve and how much time it will take the art department to produce them. And what materials will be used in the production of the artwork for the ads and collateral pieces. With this information the art director can figure out how much creative and production services will cost the client based on time and materials. (The use of the word materials here is meant to mean not only art department supplies such as boards and markers, but also includes typesetting, printing, and stat costs, as well as figuring in the cost for hiring outside people to do photography or illustration if the campaign requires it)
- Cost for copy services The head of the copy department now knows how much copy will be needed and how much time that will take the department to complete it. Based on that, the cost to produce the copy can be estimated.
- Cost to service the account Once the A.E. knows exactly what the campaign will entail, the hours spent servicing the account can be approximated and the cost to the client can be estimated. Servicing an account involves meeting with the client whenever necessary, supervising art and copy production, print production, radio and television production, and billing.
- Total cost for the campaign All the estimated costs would be given to the agency's financial manager, and a complete cost projection estimate would be prepared for the client.
- Project schedule The agency's production manager would confer with the art director, the copy director, the creative director, the A.E., the media buyer and planner assigned to the account, and the traffic coordinator to put together a production schedule for the campaign. A production schedule breaks the campaign down into stages of development and indicates when each stage is due and who is involved.
Building flexibility and choices into the campaign presentation
During the presentation the client has an opportunity to give the account team some feedback on the campaign elements. If the client does not like the concept, then that can throw a major upset into the whole campaign plan. Revising the concept is one thing, but coming up with a totally new concept will mean that the ad designs and copy prepared thus far will have to be scrapped. It is for this reason alone that the creative people working on a campaign usually come up with several concepts to present to a client and several different designs and copy samples to go along with the various concepts. The designs themselves are generally done in a sketch or idea format. This is, they are not completely polished and finished, since it is extremely rare that a client will accept what an agency presents without changes.
How to prepare and give a presentation
While it probably will not happen until you have been working in an agency for at least a year, eventually you may be asked to participate in the actual delivery of a presentation. Do not let this panic you. Presentations can be a little scary at first, but just like the apprehension you had when it came to your first agency interview, the other interviews became much easier after that. You can take comfort in knowing that presentations are always given by an agency team, so you will not be doing it alone. It is so much easier and even fun to go in excited by the spirit of the work you have created together, and face a client or even a committee of people as a unified and well rehearsed group, and give them your best. In fact, presentations can be a real high in agency work.
You and your team will work very hard for a period of three or four weeks to produce a campaign that is both creative and based on sound research and advertising know how. Then, when you go in and present what you believe is your best work, you get an immediate response which is usually excitement, enthusiasm, and appreciation for your talent and expertise. Even if your agency is not hired, you will rarely experience a negative reaction from a potential client during a presentation. Clients may prefer another agency's approach or prices, but they still get impressed with the quality of the work.
Presentations are one of the most important aspects of agency business because this is how most accounts, especially large budget accounts, are won. But presentations are also very hard on an agency because they require that agency people who are already working to full capacity on present accounts find extra time and energy to do the work of developing a whole new campaign. And all this has to be done without the guarantee that the agency will even get the account. Furthermore, an agency cannot bill a client for the work put into a presentation unless the account is won. And yet, the agency still has to pay its people who are spending agency hours on a potentially un billable project.
But there is an upside to presentations, even if they result in not winning the account. The work and ideas that go into a presentation are never wasted. You will almost always find that there is another client your agency already has, or possibly a new one that is coming right around the corner, whose account would be perfect for these same concepts and creative ideas. It always seems to work out that way.
