Q&A: Client/Ad Agency Partnerships – Part 2

Gabrielle DeTora is a healthcare marketing strategist and founder of Gabrielle DeTora, LLC, a private healthcare strategic planning and marketing consulting company based in Philadelphia. In preparation for a presentation Stephen Moegling made at SHSMD this year on how hospitals find and evaluate ad agency partners, Gabrielle shared her thoughts with Stephen, which we present here as a Q & A.

How do you define a great client and ad agency relationship?

Ideally, the agency relationship will be longstanding. The agency will be investing in the hospital with time, energy, and talent and will fully understand the hospital’s culture, services, competitors, and market. This will lead to more strategic deliverables by the agency in an expedited turnaround time.

I have worked for two healthcare systems as the head of marketing and many more advertising agencies as the lead healthcare strategist. From my perspective of sitting on both sides of the fence, a great client and ad agency relationship is based on clear communication and respect. Understanding the roles and responsibilities of both the hospital marketing and the agency teams is vital. Is the agency’s role strategic in nature, or is it tactical execution? When is the agency team brought into the process? How much agency staff time is required for various types of projects, and why? Most hospital/agency relationships derail when the teams are not aligned in understanding their roles, responsibilities, and the timing of the development process.

What is the role of the agency search consultant, and what types of clients benefit from having this consultant role?

Many healthcare-system marketers have asked me to conduct their agency RFP processes. The role of the search consultant is to carry out a non-biased process, conduct initial agency screenings, write the RFP request, manage all correspondence, and advise the client throughout the process. Finalists are reviewed directly by the hospital leadership team. My clients have benefitted from my understanding of their hospital’s needs and the agency needs, as well as my experience with, and knowledge of, best practices in the RFP process. They also appreciate my undertaking the bulk of the time-consuming research and development, as well as my providing a buffer between the hospital and the agencies.

If clients were to cast a net for new agencies, what tools would you recommend they use for finding prospective agency partners?

It depends entirely on the hospital requirements for an agency and the identified criteria on which to judge the agency’s capabilities. The places where I would look to identify RFP candidates for strategic branding, creative tactical execution, websites, social media, or public relations are all different.

How do you feel about asking agencies for spec creative as part of a pitch process?

I would never recommend asking agencies for spec creative as part of an RFP process. In most cases, spec creative is not necessary to judge the evaluation criteria. An agency’s past work will usually speak for its talents. If the hospital leadership team requires spec creative, all agencies participating in the RFP should be given the exact same creative brief, allotted an appropriate time for creative development, and compensated for their work.

What topics should go into a client’s checklist when evaluating ad agencies?

Using a systematic, objective approach to identify, prioritize, and evaluate decision criteria is very important. Start by outlining the short- and long-term client requirements for an agency. Using Six-Sigma tools, such as a KJ Analysis and affinity diagrams, can ensure that the agency evaluation criteria match the requirements outlined by the hospital, that they are rated by level of importance, and that hospital leadership buy-in is achieved before agency evaluations begin.

What are a few common mistakes both clients and agencies make in the early stages of the relationship?

Most agencies prefer to build a relationship with a potential client early on. A good chemistry between the agency and hospital teams is very important, but hospitals tend to engage in relationship-building too early in the process, at the urging of the agencies. This may cloud the hospital team’s judgment and create a biased process. The hospital team may then choose an agency based on good chemistry and develop unfounded assumptions about the agency’s competency. If such assumptions prove to be incorrect, the relationship will fail in the long term.

Rightly so, my clients have requested that the first time an agency has personal interactions with the client should be during finalist in-person presentations. By that point, all agency finalists will have been screened for core competencies, experience, and client ROI, benchmarked against the allotted evaluation criteria. At the presentation phase, it should be very much about the relationship potential.

These are the key steps that should comprise your agency search process:

1.            Hospital Needs Assessment
2.            Agency Evaluation Criteria
3.            Request for Proposal (RFP) Development
4.            Agency Candidate Research/Preliminary Screening
5.            RFP Invitations
6.            Q & A with Agencies
7.            Finalist Selection
8.            Agency Presentations and Evaluations
9.            Agency Decision
10.          Awarding the Contract

Check out Gabrielle’s company website, http://www.GabrielleDeTora.com or e-mail her at Gabrielle at GabrielleDeTora dot com for more information.