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WHAT THE AGENCY OF THE FUTURE WILL LOOK LIKE (by Lynn Madeley)

The great thing about being asked to write about what the agency of the future will look like is that in 2011 you can’t be wrong.  The bad thing is that it is likely that your article will be available on the web for years to come and someone can get hold of it and roll around in the aisles at what you said way back then.

Regardless I am prepared to risk it.

There is a wonderful comment from Bud Caddell, “Asking what the advertising agency of the future will look like is a bit like asking what the horse drawn carriage of the future will look like’, because it won’t. That doesn’t mean that advertising agencies won’t exist they will but they will have morphed into the electric car.  My thoughts reflect those of Bud Caddell when he also said, ‘The future doesn’t need printed news but it needs journalism’” and it is the same with advertising agencies, we might not need 30” TVC’s but we’ll need to communicate about brands and products.

Joseph Jaffe said, “The future will be made up of two kinds of agencies, ideas generators and the executors of ideas”. I don’t agree with Mr Jaffe. I think agencies of the future will be a balance of skills around IQ and EQ and will need to have a holistic offering and at the same time be visionary.

On the rational side we will really need to invest in technology. Steven Hawking said in 2010, “The world has changed far more in the past 100 years than in any other century in history. The reason is not political or economic but  technological – technologies that flowed directly from advances in basic science.” You only have to look at the 2001 film, Minority Report, to see that  some of the incredibly futuristic personal consumer communication that went on in that film are now happening in real life. In fact I am tempted to say that if we want to predict the future we should spend more time watching movies that reading Nostradamus. Still on the technical side there was a superb presentation made by Mark  Holden of phd at Cannes this year, where he spoke of the future in technology and how it is going to affect our lives significantly by 2016 , only 5 years away. Boffins are already working on WiPo which will literally be the ability to wirelessly charge your devices as you walk through an airport. I’m looking forward to that one, as I sit in an aiport lounge typing this.

So my prediction is that the successful agency of the future will have to invest heavily in technology, research and development.

We currently tend to think of agency people as left brain (rational) or right brain (creative). However the agency leaders of the future are going to need to be mid brained because they are going to have to learn to add more value and be able to solve client’s problems constantly in a creative way.In the future agencies will only be measured on how original and how clever their ideas are but not just ideas around specific elements of communication.

Implementation will be about adding value to the client not adding process to the procedure.

This leads rather smoothly onto creativity. Let me use the example of Lady Gaga, she has learned that she doesn’t need to communicate through channels, she needs to communicate to people who like her all the time. She is always on, whether it be through arriving at an awards ceremony in a giant egg, through to tweeting her little heart out. This trend icon has learned to be 365 and 24/7 not 360 degree. It is going to be highly important for agencies to become totally ideas centric and media agencies will slip away because channels will become obvious facilitators to the birth and life of the idea.

The successful agency of the future will ensure that products and services will be a friend not a brand to consumers.

And the agency of the future will have to have a conscience. We have all heard of green washing but there is also CSI washing. Painting a building with a few staff members on a Friday morning is not going to work. In the book co-written by Andrew Benett, from Euro RSCG Worldwide, ‘Good for Business – the Rise of the Conscious Corporation’ Andrew talks about the need for corporations to really give back.  The wonderful case study of the ‘One Young World’ movement that was started by the Global CEO of Havas and UK Chairman of Euro RSCG UK is testament to that. It is only something so visionary and so big in its ambition for young people that will get people like Arch Bishop Desmond Tutu and Bob Geldof, to name but two, to engage with you on a really high level. The exposure and experience gained by the group has been incredibly significant and has led to much higher level discussions at top corporations than ever possible before, but you have to be prepared to pay the price, which is a massive investment of money and senior people’s time into making it really work. I truly hope that One Young World will create a future global leader for our planet, because we sorely need one.

Having a conscience and being truly honest will also mean the agency of the future can attract top talent. In a study done on the millennial generation Euro RSCG found that being proud of the things that the employer does, the acceptance of a need for life-work balance and having a purpose beyond profit are key reasons that people who are currently under the age of 25 will want to work for a company. Salary has become significantly unimportant, measuring an average of 7% when the question, “What do you look at first when choosing a job?” was asked.

The agency of the future will really care and be really honest.

In summary the agency of the future will need to predict, accurately, what the consumer wants before he knows that he wants it. The successful agency of the future will be visionary, it won’t build on existing ideas and thoughts, it will constantly be striving to be ahead of the curve in predicting the future. It will be incredibly tough, because not every day is someone like the late, great, Steve Jobs born.

Source: http://www.eurorscg.co.za/blog/

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