Partner or supplier: An examination of client/agency relationships in an IMC context

Abstract

There is growing evidence from practitioners that the advertising industry is in a state of crisis. As campaigns become more integrated and multidisciplinary , the relationship between advertising agencies and clients is being tested to its limits and is presently considered to be at an all-time low. Agencies feel less valued and are being excluded from C-suite discussion. Clients feel that agencies do not appreciate the changing landscape and how the customer experience is now key. Both sides recognise the need for more trust and collaboration. This study applies the agency theory and the social power theory to understand the pressures that the relationship is under. It looks for evidence that IMC is creating a movement away from a business alliance relationship by comparing qualitative data collected from both agencies and clients, using NVivo to identify themes. The findings identify four themes which illustrate this shift towards a supplier relationship: the client ownership of the customer journey, the lack of a strategic role of agencies, the challenges of agency collaboration and difficulties of agency specialisation.

Desarrollo de un nuevo modelo de evaluación competencial para la selección de una agencia de relaciones públicas y comunicación

“…Se es consciente, además, que considerar a las agencias de relaciones públicas y comunicación como proveedores, más que como socios que participan en las decisiones estratégicas de gestión, no está ausente de la controversia a nivel teórico. Sin embargo, muchas organizaciones consideran como parte de sus proveedores a las agencias de relaciones públicas y comunicación con las que colaboran (Doan y Bilowol, 2014;Mortimer y Laurie, 2017).…”

Framing the customer journey: touch point categories and decision-making process stages

“…Hamilton et al (2019, p. 532) cite the Court et al (2009) definition of a consumer journey as “an iterative process through which the consumer begins to consider alternatives to satisfy a want or a need, evaluates and chooses among them, and then engages in consumption”, which lacks any reference to touch points. Similarly, Schamp et al (2019) and Mortimer and Laurie (2019) also highlighted the traditional consumer decision-making models/stages when referring to the consumer decision-making journey. Herhausen et al (2019, p. 11) suggested customer journey research began in the 1960s relating to the buying process.…”

“…Schamp et al , 2019 who refer to consideration phase and choice stage). However, there were many papers that did reference the stages as part of the customer journey (For example see Batra and Keller, 2016; Schamp et al , 2019; Mortimer and Laurie, 2019; Herhausen et al , 2019; Steward et al , 2019; Rudkowski et al , 2020; Shavitt and Barnes, 2019; Lemon and Verhoef, 2016). Overall, this analysis highlights that there was an inconsistent approach beyond whether the decision-making process stages were considered as part of the customer journey, but if they were considered, what stages were used.…”

How to achieve true integration: the impact of integrated marketing communication on the client/agency relationship

“…They proposed that a greater degree of integration would be achieved if there was a high level of collaboration and sharing of information as well as clients having fewer agencies and minimising agency turnover. However, more recent research by Mortimer and Laurie (2019) suggests that the opposite is happening, with agencies being increasingly used as suppliers instead of partners, and a clear shift of power and influence moving towards clients.…”