Friday, May 11, 2007

What Does Separate Equal?


The trend for years in big budget marketing is to have separate agencies for creative and media buying. As budgets have grown into the tens of millions, hundreds of millions and more, I guess that came out of (perhaps long overdue) respect for the media process.

But it never made sense to me. Media buying, done right, is creative. And good creative is thinking about delivery options. Separating them can work, sure, but how many good ideas do you miss when you do that? You won't know.

The tide may be shifting, as companies like the Johnson & Johnson and Proctor & Gamble are saying in the Wall Street Journal that it's a bad idea. And when those types of mega advertisers speak, trends follow. Watch for more accounts to roll back up into one agency.

That's what I think anyway. What do you think should or will happen?