CLIENT SIDE: “What Clients Don’t Understand”

FESCH.TV INFORMIERT:

What makes a client happy?

Although every client ticks to a different clock, they all share a similar mindset when it comes to business – and agencies.

This means that an insight into the mind of one can often help us understand them all a little better.

Seasoned marketeer Claire Ralston spent 18 years working client-side before making the switch to advertising agency Adido.

“My career client-side was 95% in travel, mostly in shipping,” says Claire. “Royal Caribbean was my longest stint – I spent around eight years there.”

During her time at Royal Carribean, Claire worked closely with a small agency based in Richmond called Positive Thinking.

“They were definitely an extension to our marketing team in the UK,” she says. “They understood the brand, how we were trying to market, and they came to us with all the suggestions of things we should be trialling.”

“They had their finger on the pulse, and we very much relied on them to make sure we were following common practices and getting everything right.”

This isn’t uncommon in the agency world. Often clients rely on their agency counterpart to do pretty much everything.

“Just a year ago we had the core vitals algorithm update with Google. If I was in the corporate world still, I wouldn’t have a clue about that, because you’re too far removed,” says Claire. “For that you rely on your agency to understand what’s happening and keep their eye on the changing trends.”

The biggest challenge that Claire notes, however, is the change in mindset around time.

“In a big corporate company, there’s this culture of ‘you do the hours it takes to get the job done’, so no matter what, you get the job done,” she says. “So, if we were blog short or something, I would just automatically do it in my own time.”

“But in the agency world, you log your hours because you have a certain number of them to be given to each client. And if it takes longer than that – who’s paying for it? Is the client paying for it? Or the agency?”

Come along to hear Claire’s advice on the best way to work with clients, and how treating your own agency as a client can help strengthen your brand.