Good PR doesn't come cheap, and if you're not seeing results from your agency, it's only natural to consider other options. But before firing your agency, Todd Defren at the PR Squared blog asks whether you've lost faith in its senior management, or in the team handling your account.
Your answer to that question might lead to a fairly simple solution. "[I]f your problems are related to the performance/creativity of your team but not to the agency's training and capabilities," he says, "consider asking for a brand new team, instead of firing your agency outright."
Defren lists various reasons your PR team might not deliver:
- They're burned out.
- They're being mismanaged by a vice president.
- They're just not a good fit for your company. "Sometimes the same team can have both raving fans and disgruntled detractors simultaneously," notes Defren. "Different metrics, personalities, etc., work differently for different clients."
The Po!nt: "If you believe that your current agency provides good training and reporting practices," says Defren, "your willingness to try out a new squad means that you are effectively 'getting a new agency' without going through the rigamarole of the Agency Review process."
Source: PR Squared. Click here for the full post.
by Christina "CK" Kerley
Comments
by Norm Levin Thu Mar 26, 2009
Change squads? Sure, dump the junior level folks, who no doubt are burdened with too many accounts and not enough bandwidth. When you signed the contract with senior management, did it say yours would be a priority? Do you get it in writing that your business will be no lower than 2nd on their attention span radar? It really all comes down to money: big accounts get the talent and the time. Try a smaller, or more hungry agency. Just switching account teams won't change the economic dynamics of the agency you hired in the first place.