The need for something different

I left my position at GroupM to start We Were There. A Nordic network of independent cross functional industry experts, niche agencies and freelancers. It's like a version of the existing independent consultancy providers out there, but team based and focused on creative services, media/marketing and innovation instead. Here are my thoughts on why I think it's needed.

Agencies

What happens to agencies in a world where Chief Marketing Officers and Marketing Managers are neither chiefs, officers or managers any more? Or when marketing departments are not departments any more? The “new” management paradigm with roots from Toyota in the 80’s that later reached software is now spreading like wildfire in all businesses and have started to involve all areas including marketing and sales. Regardless if you call it agile or not, the change towards working with autonomous cross functional teams have really put pressure on the agency business.

The paradox is that agencies are full of creative talents, niche experts and innovation power that organisations rate as the most important thing to have going forward in todays competitive market. The two eco-systems just doesn’t match any more. Partly as a response to that and also to the ambition of becoming faster and more efficient the in-house trend is growing rapidly.

In-house

It makes sense to increase marketing, media and creative competences in-house and integrating them into the teams but recruiting and retaining creative talents and some niche expertise is really hard and expensive. Often because of cultural reasons but also because they are not needed all the time. So regardless on how ambitious your in-house plans are you will probably still need some help from the outside to be really successful. So is getting help from freelancers the answer?

Freelancers

The gig economy is blooming and growing rapidly. More work is becoming project-based versus the classic agency-of-record assignments which also boosts the need for freelancers. But what holds many back from taking the step to become a freelancer is the uncertainty of income, having to chase new assignments and not being part of a social context. The IT consultancy business that have had a longer history in this economy and also in agile ways of working have been creating independent consultant suppliers and digital platforms you can use. If you work in a bigger organisation you probably have a frame agreement with at least one of these consultant suppliers. The creative and marketing/media business however have not really caught up to this in a good way in my opinion and your existing consultant suppliers neither have the knowledge nor the network to help you in that area, and continuously chasing individual freelancers by yourself is nothing you should be focusing your energy on. So is going to the big networks the answer?

The big players

The big networks are really trying to change their business models from being just holding companies with siloed agencies to become something that resembles one big company with the agencies acting more like competence pools that can be combined into tailored client teams instead. The big consultancy players who realized what had happened earlier have also tried to broaden their offering with the same approach by acquiring independent agencies at a breakneck speed. In theory that might sound good but because of legacy, cultural and structural reasons both of these players are having a hard time realizing the strategy properly or fast enough. They still have big overhead costs requiring them to go for volume with the really big clients. We've also seen death by acquisition over and over and if you are a creative talent or a niche expert that is in demand you can probably choose to work where ever you want and also get good money for it. Because it all boils down to these individuals. So what usually happens is that a lot of the talents leave the big players and become freelancers or start their own niche agencies instead. All this movement resembles a catch-22 in some aspect. So what to do?

An independent alternative

I believe that there is a need for an alternative to the traditional agency setup with multiple different agencies with their own agenda and to the big players trying to offer you full service. I think there is a need for a collaborative network of independent cross functional industry experts, niche agencies and freelancers that can be used for up-skilling and supercharging in-house teams with creative services, media/marketing expertise and unbiased strategic advise in a coordinated way. The network can also be used to create tailored teams with a neutral team lead that can act as a customized agency and change over time depending on your needs. I believe it’s a more effective and flexible solution that is based on wanted collaboration rather than a forced one and that cuts out a lot of middle-men.