There’s something about the advertising agency business that has never quite made sense to me.
A business comes to an agency because they need help solving a problem.
Maybe sales are slow. Maybe their website needs work. Maybe they need help with SEO, social media, email marketing, or branding. Or maybe they simply need someone to help figure out what they should be doing next.
Yet too often, the first thing an agency does is try to sell them more.
A monthly retainer. A big website project. A 12-month contract. A package filled with services they may or may not actually need.
At Branding Creatively, we do things a little differently.
Sometimes, You Just Need Help With One Thing
I’ve been in the advertising and marketing business for almost 25 years, and I’ve seen a lot of agencies come and go.
One pattern I’ve noticed is that when the economy is booming, it’s easy to build a business around big projects and large monthly retainers. But when things tighten up, clients start looking closely at every expense.
Suddenly, those big contracts aren’t so easy to sell.
We’ve always believed there is a better way to build an agency:
Help your clients build stronger businesses, and they’ll keep coming back when they need you.
That means we don’t need every client to sign a big contract.
Sometimes you need a new website.
Sometimes you need ongoing marketing help.
And sometimes you just need someone to:
- Fix a broken form
- Set up an email campaign
- Create a Facebook ad
- Troubleshoot your Shopify store
- Figure out why your website traffic suddenly dropped
If it takes us two hours, it takes us two hours.
We don’t need to turn every problem into a $10,000 project.
Long-Term Relationships Beat Quick Sales
There’s a temptation in business to maximize the value of every sale.
We’ve always been more interested in maximizing the value of the relationship.
If we can help a small business solve a problem today, hopefully they’ll call us again when they have another one. And as their business grows, there’s a good chance we’ll grow right alongside them.
Some of our best client relationships have lasted for decades because we’ve become the people they call when they need help, not because they’re locked into a contract.
That kind of relationship is worth a lot more to us than making the biggest possible sale today.
Maybe It’s Old-Fashioned. We’re Okay With That.
I was taught a pretty simple way of doing business:
Handshake deals.
Help people solve problems.
Work hard.
Do what you say you’re going to do.
Take pride in your work.
And if somebody doesn’t need something, don’t try to convince them that they do.
There isn’t anything particularly revolutionary about that philosophy. In fact, it might sound a little old-fashioned in a world of recurring revenue, automated funnels, upsells, and subscription everything.
But after almost 25 years in this business, I still think it works.
Businesses remember the people who helped them when things were difficult.
They remember the vendor who found an affordable solution instead of pushing the expensive one.
They remember the person who answered the phone when something broke.
And they remember the people who treated their marketing budget like it actually mattered.
Your Marketing Should Fit Your Business
There are absolutely times when a monthly marketing program makes sense.
There are times when a complete website redesign is the right investment. And there are times when a larger campaign can completely change the trajectory of a business.
We’ll recommend those things when we genuinely believe they’ll help.
But we’ll also tell you when you don’t need them.
At Branding Creatively, you can hire us for a large project, ongoing marketing support, or simply a few hours of help getting something off your plate.
Our job isn’t to figure out how much we can sell you.
Our job is to figure out what will actually help your business.
It may be an old-fashioned business model.
But we’re sticking with it.
