However, fundamentally, clients do not buy you for the things you deliver. They don’t even necessarily need these things! Creative services are out there in abundance, they are everywhere. All the client has to do is reach out and pick the nearest company that comes to mind, top of their google search or whoever gets in touch with them at the right moment. There are many, many agencies all vying for the same business.

So then, how do you compete?

The reasons someone will pick you over the competition are purely down to the value you bring them and the problems you can help them solve. That’s it. All client buying decisions are based on those factors.

When you shift the conversation more towards value and specifically the true value you offer people, there is a huge shift in the power of these conversations.

So, armed with this information how exactly do you communicate that value? How can you position yourselves in the minds of your clients as the right and only solution for them?

This is where a campaign driven approach to business development comes in. When you focus on two or three key areas of expertise that you offer and are able to communicate those clearly at scale – then you will start to get noticed.

This means giving away some of your time and even more of your value. That might sound counterintuitive but it is not. Because when you start to be of use, of value and of genuine interest to people, then suddenly they want more. Crucially they’ll be prepared to pay for it. So, campaign driven business development is one of the most effective things you can do to grow as an agency.

It will help you to stand out and scale up. Rapidly.

Interested in finding out more about campaign driven agency growth? Book one of our ‘Rapid Growth’ workshops by getting in touch, we’d love to hear from you.

The post How campaign driven business development will grow your agency more effectively. appeared first on The Client Key.

We tackled real world agency growth challenges and worked through them to give attendees suggestions to implement in their business. It was great to bring people together into a physical space again, something we have all missed hugely over the last 2 years!

Ending with a glass of wine and an opportunity to network with fellow attendees, the session was a massive success. We plan to keep this momentum going throughout the year with more physical workshops for agencies.

We are currently running an ongoing workshop called ‘Rapid Growth for Creative Agencies’. This is a free to attend digital workshop tailored to your business, providing you with practical tools to implement into your own agency.

Interested in finding out more? Get in contact with us, we’d love to hear from you…

#ANewWayForNewBusiness

The post Agency New Business Workshop appeared first on The Client Key.

Yes there are some short term challenges in terms of Covid restrictions but they won’t be there forever.

The barriers to entry are lower than ever before and agencies can open in new markets with minimal costs and time investment. In this article we are going to look at some of the ways we can support your agency internationally, helping you establish new clients and setting up offices in international locations.  

Understanding your market: Picking the right market is critical. There is no point trying to be in several locations at the same time, unless you have the size and scale to make this a reality. It is better to understand and focus on one market first. 

Focus on the Mega Projects: There are a huge number of mega projects in the world that drive business for creative agencies. Whether it’s sporting events such as The World Cup or cultural events such as Expo 2020. I visited Expo last week for a client and the sheer scale of creativity is incredible. Many of our clients have won business in the preceding years running up to these events. The next World Cup and Expo are already being planned. What could your agency do to target business in these (and other) mega projects? 

Cultural Differences: Each market has it’s own specific differences and nuances that must be understood. Winning business in New York or North America is a very different process to doing it in Dubai or The Gulf! Spending time getting up to speed on the sensitivities and cultural details will stand you in good stead. Things don’t happen overnight either. A long term and patient approach is required, which takes a committed board or agency owner(s) to see things through. 

Growth plan: When going into any new market you will need a clear plan for growth. What are the steps you need to take to secure business? How can you do it in an effective and lean way? Most SME creative agencies do not have FTSE 100 budgets when it comes to international expansion! I have watched many agencies burn through 2 years worth of business class travel, to China for example, with precisely zero to show for it at the end. Getting bang for your buck and spending carefully is essential. 

Foundation clients: Ideally, having 2-3 foundation clients can help provide a springboard into new markets. Those can usually be won from base camp – before you take the plunge and invest significant sums in travel and a new office. This is a very effective strategy that has worked for lots of our agencies. 

On the ground network: Build your on the ground network as quickly as you can. Get to know the key players and major prospects in a specific city you may be targeting. There are lots of resources via British Embassy teams and the DIT (Department for International Trade). There is a well developed infrastructure on the ground, all over the world, to help you. Tap into those services and get to know people locally. 

Office: This will probably be the final stage in the process, taking the plunge and opening an office. It may take a while to get to this point, if you build up business and your client roster beforehand. Being able to say “we have an office here” or “we’re about to open an office here” is a very powerful signal to prospective clients and it goes down very well. A satellite office with a simple presence can often be enough to start with.   

In summary, there has never been a better time for SME’s and agencies to expand abroad. The technology is there to support you and there are less barriers to overcome. The political and economic link between many countries and the UK are a major focus on government agendas. Markets such as North America, The Middle East and The Far East are all very hot for creative companies.  

The UK creative sector is revered around the globe. Whether in music, arts, fashion, film, events or createtech it’s one of the things we do best. Now is the time to take your creativity out there to the world!  

Rob King – The Client key: A new way, for new business 

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The Client Key has decades of experience in successfully growing agencies, production companies and creative organisations. So, in this article, we’re going to share some of our core ‘truths’ in agency new business.

We hope that you’ll find them useful and relevant to your agency!

1) Strategy is paramount

Do you have a new business plan? Where is your next client coming from? How does your sales team operate? Not having a clearly defined road map for growth will slow you down hugely. Most agencies try to do things organically without a clear process and rigorous implementation of the new business function.

2) You need rainmakers

Rainmakers are the people who consistently win you business. They genuinely know how to engage clients and do whatever it takes to get them over the line. They operate instinctively and it’s in their DNA. Sales and new business comes naturally to them, and often without any formal training – they just know how to do it. Who are the real rainmakers in your business and have you got enough of them? Do you celebrate and reward them? Does everything fall squarely on their shoulders, or do you help them share the load?

3) Your brand proposition alone will not win you business

There are many people who believe in ‘win without pitching’ via a well-defined brand proposition. Namely, that if you communicate your agency value well enough, clients will automatically choose you without a pitch. Very, very rarely is this ever true. This single thing will not win you business. Yes, it’s important to have a clear and well defined brand proposition, that clients engage with. But forget the idea that on its own this will win you work – it won’t! Very rarely do clients ever single source major pieces of business without entertaining some kind of pitch. So…

4) Get good at pitching

Pitching is not a dirty word and ‘win without pitching’ is dead. Clients are duty bound to carry out their due diligence and entertain multiple conversations before placing a significant piece of business. They might know who they want to work with but 95% of the time they still have to run a pitch. Successful pitching is an art form in itself. So, get good at it! Learn what their major success factors are before you say yes. Learning how to pitch more effectively is the one of the single most important things you can do to grow your agency.

How to pitch!

5) New Business is the only building block for success

This is what separates the great from the good. The ability to put new business and sales at the heart of your organisation. It’s not great creative work (although yes, of course, that’s vital) it’s your ability to go out and sell that creative work. When you can embed this idea, across everything you do, your agency will grow, very rapidly.

6) Your clients might be further away than you think

Creativity is in demand all over the globe. The UK creative sector is among the best in the world. Through technology it is now easier than ever before to work with international clients. Are you doing this in your agency? How can you open up new clients in different markets more effectively?

Finding new international clients

7) There is ‘A New way, for New business’

You are operating in a very crowded marketplace so your ability to stand out and differentiate is vital. The Client Key helps businesses operate a new, more effective, way for sales and new business. Gone are the days of ineffectively trying to do this solely in-house. Our model is the ‘uberfication’ of the biz dev function. Proven and effective that generates results.

Let us know what you think about our agency growth truths! We’d love to hear from you.

Rob King – The Client Key

The post The Truth about Agency Sales appeared first on The Client Key.

How does this translate in smaller agencies of 20-70 people? Can one person be a solution for delivering this large agency model for small creative businesses? Or is it simply too much for one person to deliver effectively?

New business for small agencies has long been a problem. You’re a creative so it doesn’t come naturally or isn’t your first priority. So you hire a sales person – the new business director. Very often this doesn’t work out. Perhaps they’re not what they’d promised and you waste 12-18 months on a misguided strategy, failed pitches and weak leads. Not to mention the £80K+ salary. Or, they’re everything you wanted for 2-3 years, then they move on. Because guess what? They’re great at their job and the big agencies will pay them double.

This is a very common problem in small to mid-sized creative agencies. Something we encounter on a weekly basis at The Client Key. Why? Because we believe agencies under 70 people don’t need full time, old school, new business directors. They need a new, more effective, hybrid sales model. A new way, for new business.

The successful large agency new business model is led by a team of individuals each with their own skillset and specialism. A new business team in an agency of 100 people will roughly break down into the following core strengths and skills:

Business Acumen: 40%
20 year+ director level professional
Proven ability

Creativity: 10%
Strategy development
Marketing & communications skills

Lead generation: 25%
Lead generation
Pipeline management

Sales: 25%
Sales negotiation & closing
Proposal generation

In other words, a mixture of grownups, creatives and doers as well as superstar sales people. People who will always get the job done.

Small agency new business usually fails because there isn’t one person who embodies this broad spectrum of talents. They’re a unicorn hire. Agencies hire senior new business directors, only to find out they can’t deliver on the creativity or rigorous sales processes required. Junior new business execs don’t always have enough experience and client understanding. Alternatively, Managing Directors, or founders, try to do their own new business but often don’t have time for real consistency or with enough regularity.

It’s a challenge for small agencies to access the breadth of specialist skills required. Arguably, the hybrid skills model doesn’t exist for agencies with 50 or less staff. These are the reasons The Client Key have developed A New Way, for New Business.

The new way is proven, simple, lean and cost effective. The skill set of a full team, for less than the expense of an old school sales director. So you get experience, knowledge and expert skills across each core sales function. We are specialists within the creative agency sector. The Client Key helps you ‘uber-ise’ new business in your agency. Eg, faster, better, cheaper and with results that deliver sales.

If any of this resonates with you then please do get in touch. We’ll be running digital workshops throughout January to help small agencies thrive in 2021. We’d love to hear from you.

Rob & Amy – The Client Key

A New Way, for New Business.

The post Death of a Sales Director – A new way, for new business. appeared first on The Client Key.

1) The digital pitch era

Pitching isn’t an ideal situation. It’s costly, risky and you will know there’s usually a front runner before you even enter the room – or at the moment the Zoom! That being said, it’s often a small agency’s best chance to step up and showcase your creativity.

In a recent survey from Creativebrief, three quarters of clients said they were uncomfortable with the digital pitch process. People buy people. So, how do you create pitch chemistry without accidentally interrupting your new client on zoom? We’ve adapted our pitch strategy for the digital era.

Research – Our number one rule of pitching is NEVER respond without researching the brief and asking questions of the client. Most briefs are rubbish and need more exploration. Create a list of questions and research to get your answers.

Chemistry – There’s a reason chemistry meetings exist, and it’s not just so you and the client can get on. It’s about the wider chemistry in your team. Organise multiple fact finding sessions with different team members. Let the client see the wider team get involved and share their experience. Keep 10 minutes of each research meeting set aside for informal coffee at the end. You’ll feel like you’re annoying them, but remember, they’re about to commit large amounts of revenue with you and need to see you’re committed.

Interrogation – By now you’ll have realised the brief they’ve written isn’t really the brief. Without being rude show them you’ve interrogated their problem. You told us X but following insights from this conversation and this research we actually think the problem is Y.

Response – This one is down to you. If you’ve done step 1,2,3 then you should have the foundations to create a truly different and impactful response.

Pitch Chemistry – You’ll be introduced to the decision makers of the client at the pitch. You’ve met the team, they’ve met yours. Now is your time to shine. Having won over the wider team, be prepared for who else is in the room. Ask key questions to understand and align to your value drivers. Use these in your arsenal when you’re under the spotlight.

2) Engaging new clients

A large proportion of new clients come from various meetings, often over a coffee or a beer. So how do you engage new clients now? Would you commit £200k of spend without seeing ‘the whites’ of your new partners eyes? Has zoom fatigue (you heard it hear first!) ruined the opportunity to engage new clients?

We’re supporting our clients in new business with a clear strategy and a proven process that works for creative businesses. Now is the time to increase your new business function, widen your net and start at the top of the funnel. Research and lead generation need to come first. Followed by an extensive phone and email engagement campaign. Now more than ever there is a need to widen your pipeline.

Some traditional formats of B2B marketing aren’t available with clients working from home. So consider what else you can do? Campaigns? LinkedIn promotion? Blogs? Events? Targeted case studies? It’s often not easy but with a strategic new business focus you can create effective campaigns to support you during difficult times. Credibility and relevance are the key drivers to leverage.

3) Unwinding the pivot

Many creative agencies have (through necessity!) pivoted their business into new areas during the last six months.

Suddenly clients have multiple options that were not available to them before. Many of them cost far less than previous services. The challenge for creative agencies is to wean clients off the cheaper alternatives and return to usual business and revenue levels. Demonstrating your true value is essential.

It’s fine to develop what you do but is it inline with the core of your business? Will it hold up over time? Can you articulate the elevator pitch? If the answer to these is no then you’re creating long-term vulnerability for when the world suddenly shifts again. Unwind the pivot or redress the balance before it’s too late.

If you don’t have a strong brand proposition, that you can clearly articulate, now is the time to get one!

Every agency is different and therefore needs a tailored approach. If you take anything away from this it should be about finding time to implement a clear process, and strategy for sales and growth. New business success doesn’t happen on a whim or overnight, but with experience, planning, relevance and clarity.

The Client Key operates ‘A new way, for new business’, removing the need for an ineffective (and expensive) new business director and instead a fully resourced, more effective solution, for agencies. Perhaps consider who could do this in your team? How could you implement some of these ideas in your agency? If you don’t have the resource, give us a call!

Rob & Amy

The Client Key ‘A new way, for new business’

The post 3 key agency challenges and 3 ways they’re responding! appeared first on The Client Key.

However, is that really so? Can you run successful business development campaigns purely in the digital realm? Are clients just as motivated to engage digitally, than they are in real life?

The balance of power has shifted massively towards the customer and buyer, which in itself is a great thing. Suddenly customers – your clients – have more information, more knowledge and more power at their fingertips. They can find you, qualify you and make a quick judgement based on that information (rightly or wrongly!) on whether to give you any of their most precious resource – their time. Beyond company websites all of your CVs are on Linkedin and all of our personal lives are on Facebook and Instagram. All that person has to do is go and have a quick look! In short buyers don’t need to meet sellers. The old agency world of meet-greet-pitch and win has changed.

However, I don’t believe that this is now the permanent reality for any business or creative agency. Human beings are a social species and we’re hard wired to want to interact, communicate and socialise. Whilst a lot of the sales process can now be conducted through technology there will always be a place for customer interaction at some stage in the process. Buyers want to understand and they want to learn. They seek rapport, want to do their due diligence, and they like a relative degree of certainty in their decision making. Logic makes people think but emotion makes people act.

For now, at least, the majority of this work must take place through a digital and virtual lens. It’s important for agencies and creatives to understand their clients and their problems. To ask deep and searching questions that uncover a basis for a constructive and collaborative relationship. This can be done virtually but it takes preparation and research to put yourself in the mindset of your clients. Here are some of the key things to look out for when prospecting new and existing client relationships:

• Listening
The first rule of law in sales. Listen more than you talk. Practice becoming a better listener. Most people listen with the intent to respond, planning their response. Instead, try being an active listener. Asking questions will allow you to understand more. If you do one thing, talk less – listen more!

• Understanding people
First and foremost you are simply trying to understand the other person or company. Once you’ve understood a little more about that person you can begin to understand their needs and if they align with yours.

• Learning
Listening and understanding will help you to learn more about your clients and their business. Learn as much as you can and use that knowledge.

• Building rapport
It’s your job to help lower the tension levels in any conversation as quickly as possible. Both you and client will have a degree of tension in any first conversation or meeting. It’s literally hard wired into our DNA as human beings to be a little wary in unfamiliar situations. Use the above tools, to lower the tension levels and build rapport.

• Thinking like your clients
Put yourself in the mind of your clients and try to walk a mile in their shoes. Why should they talk to you, how are you relevant? See things from their side of the fence. Try to think like a client when pitching, how will you be perceived in their mind?

To thrive in this ‘new normal’ agencies and businesses must recognise that sales and new business is central to growth and success. It’s no longer enough to just hire a sales person and hope it works out. Or undertake some lead generation and marketing in isolation.

There is a new way for new business. Agencies need a holistic, comprehensive strategy for sales and business development. When it’s embedded and engaged across every level of your organisation, and with every team member, then your business will thrive. Even in a downturn or lockdown!

The Client Key – A new way for new business.

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The barrier to entry for agencies these days is low. Very low. A slick website, beautifully curated social presence, a strong creative track record (often for former employers!) and boom; you’re off. A fully bona fide ‘agency’ is in business. Form an orderly que please clients.

Many people think that just by setting up shop and simply ‘being’ an agency their business will thrive, succeed and grow. A lot of start up’s I encounter think that clients are relatively easy to engage and win. You might think that sales will happen and continue to grow organically because that’s what they’ve always done.

You also believe might think that clients truly understand what you do and how you can help them – sadly, they almost certainly don’t. To change that you need an effective pitch. You might also believe that once they do understand  they will want to give you a pitch opportunity. Reality check – they probably won’t.

Clients have more information, more knowledge, information and more power than ever before. It’s now easier for them to identify, qualify and reject you. And, yup, you guessed it, reality check – they almost certainly will. Even more scarily, they can do all of this in a few moments and in just a few clicks of a button. They won’t even bother to tell you they’re not interested. Far worse, they’ll probably just ignore you. They will have already moved on whilst you’re sat there expectantly waiting, hoping, that something might come of your fleeting encounter.

However, you’re not responsible for new biz, other people are leading the sales drive within your business, aren’t they? No, they’re probably not. They’re all too busy and overrun with other things being fired at them from all directions. We live in the information overload age, especially in agency land. Which means that sales and new business is not top of most people’s list, however talented or well-intentioned they may be.

So how do you begin to change the reality you are faced with? How do you tip the balance back in your favour. The first thing to do is implement a clear strategy for sales and execute it effectively. Being very clear about how you communicate and delivering your value so that clients realise they can’t get it from anyone else but you. We’ve covered strategy in another article ‘the only five ways to grow your agency’.

Does the world really need another creative agency? – no, possibly not.

However, if you start from a different place altogether and recognise that understanding people comes first – above all else in fact – then you’ve got a fighting chance. Because once you understand what they want, what makes them tick and more importantly, what they need, then you are beginning the client conversation from a far stronger place. Armed with this knowledge and insight you will begin to stand out and once you stand out you’ll also start to resonate with your clients. When you resonate then you will start to accumulate.

Reality check: You are not just in the creative business: you are in the people business. You are in the building relationships business. Understanding these points, and implementing a radical shift in agency thinking, are the single most important things you can do to help your business grow, differentiate and thrive.

Reality check – it works. Try it.

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