6 Steps to a Transparent Brand + Agency Partnership by BECKON

6 STEPS TO A
TRANSPARENT BRAND +
AGENCY PARTNERSHIP
THE 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.

6 Steps to a Transparent Brand + Agency Partnership by BECKON

Recommended

Recommended

More Related Content

What's hot

What's hot (20)

Similar to 6 Steps to a Transparent Brand + Agency Partnership by BECKON

Similar to 6 Steps to a Transparent Brand + Agency Partnership by BECKON (20)

More from Amanda Roberts

More from Amanda Roberts (11)

Recently uploaded

Recently uploaded (20)

6 Steps to a Transparent Brand + Agency Partnership by BECKON