CareerBuilder.com’s unceremonious dumping of its long-time advertising agency Cramer-Krasselt in February for failing to place in the top 10 in USA Today’s consumer poll of favorite Super Bowl commercials sent shockwaves throughout the industry.
The agency’s award-winning creative work since 2002 is largely cited as the reason for the online employment Web site’s ascendancy in that category.
A CareerBuilder spokesperson denied that its showing on the Admeter, which queried 238 viewers in McLean, VA, and Houston, was the reason for an agency review. Cramer-Krasselt CEO Peter Krivkovich rejected the “opportunity” to participate in the review, and was quoted in a published report as saying: “There are a few times in your life when you have to tell someone to f— off and mean it.”
Their feud epitomizes the age-old tension between brand clients and their agencies, and rarely has the dichotomy been played out so publicly.
A new survey by Forrester Research, timed perfectly with the split making the news, provides empirical evidence that marketers increasingly wonder whether the efforts of advertising agencies are all that effective.
Furthermore, agencies overstate the roles they play in achieving client goals, as evidenced by the study’s finding that only 63% of marketers feel agency contributions drive marketing success, as opposed to almost all of the agencies queried (93%) who feel that way.
The report, Help Wanted: 21st Century Agency, found that 76% of marketers do not measure the return on investment of their lead agency relationship.
“Without measurement, marketers cannot hope to manage and improve performance,” writes Peter Kim, the report’s lead author.
Kim says that he’s not suggesting that marketers would be better off going at it alone.
“No doubt marketers need agencies,” he says. “But it’s as if both are in the car, and neither has a map [to ROI]. How are they going to get there?”
The report cites promotion-related agency blunders that resulted in public embarrassment, including Wal-Mart’s fake blogs, GM’s Chevy Tahoe/Apprentice user-generated ad and Agency.com’s viral video pitch for Subway.
Perhaps somewhat unsurprising given the topic, PROMO had a hard time finding brands to comment on the study, but found two agency heads willing to opine on the subject.
“It is understandable that Forrester found such a discrepancy, because when reviewing their overall brand’s marketing objective, the client looks at the total sum of the parts where the agencies often simply judge the work they did for the brand in their discipline (digital, PR, media buying),” says Chris Weil, chairman and CEO of Momentum Worldwide.
While the Renegade Marketing Group generally enjoys a productive relationship with its clients, “our experience has been that sometimes clients get pissed as hell,” admits Drew Neisser, the agency’s CEO. “We’re a time-based business; you really can’t fake it.”
When assessing a campaign’s effectiveness, it’s important that they compare “apples to apples,” Neisser says.
At the time of an RFP, all details need to be spelled out so there’s no confusion whether or not the objectives had been met, he adds. Sharing data all through the process is key for both parties so that “everybody learns.”
Neisser was shocked at CareerBuilder’s decision to put the account in review. “Cramer-Krasselt did a tremendous job building the CareerBuilder brand,” he adds.
So what will come of Cramer-Krasselt’s branding campaign, which had been valued at more than $250 million, now that client and agency have split? CareerBuilder.com will be “continuing with our campaign as planned,” according to a company statement. “While this year’s campaign is good, it did not carry the same break-through impact as previous years.”
Still Cramer-Krasselt’s Krivkovich is not buying it. In his memo to employees announcing the news, he wrote: “In the history of this crazy thing called advertising, I’m not sure there has ever been any thing as baseless or as unbelievable as that.”
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