6 STEPS TO A TRANSPARENT BRAND + AGENCY PARTNERSHIPTHE ROADMAP TO A WIN-WIN RELATIONSHIP BUILT ON CLEAN DATA, TRUSTED INSIGHT AND MAXIMUM GROWTH.

A transparent, collaborative brand + agency partnership

represents a real change—you’re asking both the brand

and your agencies to adjust their traditional roles. And as

with all change, there’s likely to be some pushback. Get

ahead of any resistance by clearly articulating the vision,

benefits and plan for getting there.

Share your vision for the new world

Transparency is beneficial for agencies, too, because

it takes a huge amount of work off their plate.

There's a win for them in it. Agencies are afraid that

if something doesn't work, it's going to be viewed

negatively. They don’t openly share when things

aren’t working, but that’s a critical part of learning

and optimizing. It's actually very freeing when you

see stuff that doesn't work because then you can opt

out of it faster. I think it's just getting the brand and

agencies to be comfortable having the conversation

about what doesn't work, and that it's okay.

— VP, Global Media at a global CPG company

1

Work together to define success People are more likely to support the new world when

they help build it. So, instead of rolling out the new

directive from the top, consider bringing the brand team

together to align on the KPIs and metrics you’ll use to

measure success. You can also share the plan with your

agencies, incorporating any value-adds they have to

offer and discussing any issues they may flag.

A big ah-ha for us was the lack of transparency between

channel owners and agency partners. There was not enough

diligence around KPIs and benchmarking, and in some

instances, they weren’t even looking at the data. For us,

it’s really an issue of transparency across all channels.

The first instinct from the agency was, ‘Don't you trust

us?’ But we made it clear that it’s not a question of trust,

it's about alignment and working together to drive better

business results. And at the end of the day, it's hard to

argue against that. Now we’re all on the same page with

one common goal of where we're trying to go. It's very

clearly stated—the delivery, the expectation,

and how we're going to operate from now on.

— VP, Global Media at a global CPG company

2

The critical, must-have element in a transparent brand +

agency partnership is access to a clean, trusted data hub

that pulls directly from the source and continuously

updates as new data becomes available. This may require

a conversation or two to agree on format, frequency and

delivery method, but a data hub that serves as a shared

source of truth is non-negotiable.

Go direct to the source

We have different agencies for all our channels. To track each one of those individually would be nearly impossible. We needed a platform to consolidate that. That’s Beckon. Now, we own our data. If we were ever to try to slice anything in a certain way, we own that. We're in the best place we've ever been.

— Digital Analytics Manager at a leading CPG company

3

4

Now that you have clean, trusted performance data

flowing in, focus on rapid test-and-learn to boost ROI.

As you launch new messaging and creative and innovate

better ways of reaching customers, you’ll see

immediately what’s working and what’s not, and you

can reallocate spend from low performers to high

performers on the fly. Imagine no longer having to

decide down to the last dollar how you want to spend

across channels before you even start the campaign!

Test and learn to find out what works, then do more of it

Example: One multinational company with a very short, four-month

marketing window relies heavily on agency support. The short

window for campaigns means it’s vital to get performance results

quickly, in order to see what’s working best and reallocate spend

to those areas in a timely manner. However, the agency reports

often took a month to create. By the time the company could

review, there was little time left in the campaign to course-correct.

The brand automated data cleanup, established consistent

frameworks for viewing performance against goals, sped

up reporting cycles and integrated their data into real-time

dashboards. Once their agencies had access to the dashboards,

the agencies could reallocate continuously along the way,

significantly improving the return on marketing investment.

5

Meetings are meant to be time that you collaborate,

strategize and make the most of the smart minds around

the table. Set an expectation that reports be published

and reviewed at least 24 hours before the meeting, and

that everyone comes prepared to discuss learnings and

ideas to improve performance.

Make the most of your meetings

Example: One global CPG company meets with its media

agencies weekly to review dashboards and discuss how to adjust

strategies. The brand has its own dashboards and comes to the

meetings prepared with specific questions. For example …

The agencies then do deeper analysis within the dashboards to

recommend how to adjust course.

At first, the conversations were uncomfortable. The agencies

weren’t used to being so candid about underperformance and

talking about why things weren’t working. However, the brand

reinforced the message that talking about what wasn’t working

revealed key learnings to drive improvement. The agencies began

to see the benefit of those conversations, and began to opt-out of

underperformers more quickly and get campaigns back on track.

How much of our advertising costs

go toward non-working costs?

How does this change across traditional

channels like TV and digital channels like

search, programmatic and display?

Why is media spend up 10% year

over year while conversions are

down 20% year over year?

6

When you sit down to chart out your plans for your next

campaign, you may be surprised how much knowledge

and insight you have at your fingertips. Remember the

days of a blank planning template? When you had to dust

off last year’s plans just to have a starting point to work

from? Those days are over! All the data and insight you

captured along the way in Beckon, all the expertise your

team gained by playing an active role in testing, learning

and optimizing, will put you light years ahead. Combined

with the ongoing freedom to test and learn, the sky’s the

limit on what you and your agencies can achieve.

Leverage learnings when you do your planning

Beckon helped create a standardization project that makes it easier for us to work with our agencies and make sure we’re aligned. No more PowerPoint decks. We’ll use Beckon as the live optimization tool and capture what decisions were made on a call. And that's where we'll pick up the following week, what happened with those decisions.

— VP Global Media at a global beverage company

LOOKING TO IMPROVE TRANSPARENCY AND ROI IN YOUR AGENCY PARTNERSHIPS?

GET IN TOUCH AT HELLO@BECKON.COM. WE’D LOVE TO HEAR FROM YOU.