Newsflash: When it comes to Social Media, Agencies don't it

It's almost too easy.

Where's the catch?

Strike 1: A new study from TNS Media Intelligence and Cymfony (n=60 marketers in North America, France and the U.K) reveals that when it comes to social media, traditional agencies view "social channels like blogs as traditional media".

Strike 2: ...their (agencies) ideas are not backed up by practical skills in the area.

Strike 3: ...agencies have little of their own experience using social networks or video-sharing sites for themselves.

This, compounded by the rising importance of social media, makes for somewhat of a perfect storm:

• Nearly 50% of marketers said social-media efforts needed to be handled at an executive level with "significant" resources.
• Another 30% agreed social media is a "revolutionary opportunity."

The data/findings are consistent with the research piloted in association with SNCR and TWI Surveys for my book, "Join the Conversation."

Sidebar: I look forward to sharing some of this research when I keynote at the SNCR Forum on April 22nd.

To be sure, it is (as I opened up in this post) almost too easy to lay into the agencies. They pretty much deserve it, don't they? Still, it takes two to tango and I think this quote from Super Bowl loving FedEx

"I think traditional ad agencies have very little contribution to make," Bryan Simkins, a marketing specialist at FedEx, told TNS. "They are mostly driven by their compensation models which are made for closed media. Those models don't apply in open media."

This, coming from the company that put Jose Avila and his furniture on the map.

Marketers, if you want your agencies to survive and thrive, you too will need to adjust the way you source, compensate, reward and respect your agency partners.

...but yes, the agency model has to adapt, adjust and evolve and agencies are going to need to restructure the way they do business in major way if they are to survive.

To help you in your quest, here are 3 pieces of advice:

1. Stop being so damn arrogant and deluded to think you can do this yourselves. You can't. This is all about humility.
   
2. Stop trying to automate the whole process and solving your problems by a quick technology acquisition fix. You're drowning in your own data and laziness. This is labor intensive.
3. Stop trying to scale the whole process and replicate your old bad habits. This is about planting seeds and sticking around long enough to reap the rewards of care, consideration and hard work.

Questions?