CREATIVE AGENCIES: PITCHES, FELLOWSHIP AND ADVERTISING IN THE TIMES OF COVID-19
Two weeks ago, I was in the middle of a meeting with the head of an independent creative agency when he got a call about one of his clients cancelling an ad shoot in a different part of the country. Half an hour later he was busy responding to employee concerns about the COVID-19 panic engulfing the world, which had now hit closer home. He was definitely worried because neither he, his employees nor the agency had the systems in place or the wherewithal to work from home, or so he thought at that point. Cut to a week later, all agencies big and small, were by default telling employees to not come to office.
The Association of Advertising Producers (ASAP) along with other industry bodies - IFTDA FWICE, WIPFA, IMPPA, and IFTPC – called off all shoots between March 19 to the 31 due to the spread of the coronavirus. States were declaring Section 144, (and now the 21 days lockdown) restricting all but essential travel, and soon after agencies perhaps for the first time in history were unanimously working remotely, discovering novel ways to tackle system roadblocks. After all, necessity is the mother of all inventions they say. A couple of days later, Ogilvy brought out a series of morale booster ads widely circulated on social media on the upside of WFH.
For another creative head, who by his own admission was flying three cities and taking six flights almost every week, being ‘grounded’ has presented a different side of the world.
For some others, WFH has increased productivity. A creative head of a top agency in the country who didn’t wish to be named says, “We are a notoriously lax industry, so to ensure safety and to keep people at home we gave away laptops even though internet speed is still a challenge. Yet work is productive, and I can do four meetings instead of two. We had meetings planned for three weeks in advance, so we are doing those presentations on films, stories and ads. Yes there are clients who are asking how they can help people during the pandemic. However, we have not pitched in the last two weeks. This lockdown is giving us time to sharpen and polish our ideas.”
But these are network agencies. Are the challenges of independent agencies any different at such difficult times, and what kind of revenue loss are they staring at?
Agencies, big and small, independent or those under holding companies are facing an uncertain future. Some say perhaps they will recover the losses incurred in the second part of the year, when the agencies, marketers and the campaigns are back with a bang. But right now with production, supply chain, procurement, pricing etc. taking a hit, and its cascading effect on agencies, the sentiment is bleak. Add to that the fact that creative people are not designed to be shut in rooms and stare at screens. But they are reorganizing themselves and their systems and also supporting each other in a big way to tide through the crisis. Yet the impact on business will be huge.
Industry experts are saying that between clients reducing spends, reducing fees, cut in projects, indefinite delays in campaign releases, creative agencies are expected to witness 20-30% drop in estimated annual revenues. The quarter will look worse obviously but things will get better if the industries which lay low in this period spend heavily later. On the one hand, retainers continue but agencies dependent heavily on badly hit industries like travel are expected to suffer more.
hope that at least attitudes like these become ‘contagious’ in such testing times.
Tags : advertising creative agencies Neeta Nair IMPACT magazine COVID-19 WFH