Last week Jon Bond became an
investor, advisor and strategic partner with Victors & Spoils. In the last
few months, Jon and I spent a lot of time talking about the future of
advertising, not only between ourselves but also with dozens of clients. Jon
has a clear, expansive vision for the future. I’m excited to be working with
him. Here’s a conversation we had over the past couple of weeks. Buckle your
seat belt. The future is at the doorstep.
John Winsor: Lately, we’re seeing
some big culture shifts taking place. Just this past week, I was struck hearing
that YouTube celebrated its 5th anniversary and reached a milestone of more
than two billion views a day. It’s clear, as a society, we’re moving from
a world of scarcity to one of abundance. Do you think it’s still possible for
the agency models built on an old cultural paradigm to help clients survive
(and thrive) in this new world?
Jon Bond: Traditional agencies are
threatened by abundance and see it as yet another tool to commoditize their
already tenuous position in the marketing hierarchy. They see abundance as
simply over-supply, tipping the balance of supply and demand toward
commoditization. But change also produces opportunities. The new generation of
creative people who rise to define the job of "curator" will thank
the advent of abundance for making this new profession possible, and in fact
necessary. Traditional shops cannot easily adjust to this new age because it
would mean enduring a painful transition. Their legacy issues are their weakness.
I love ad people and the ideas part of the business. It's the “business” of the
business that really sucks and brings down the rest of it. Sometimes you
have to destroy something you love in order to rebuild it again, and that is
what the new models, like Victors & Spoils, will do. There will be pain.
But there is no alternative to the slow, painful death that has been eating
away at the soul of the business for the past 15 years.
JW: In our careers, we’ve both seen
clients go to the big agencies of say 500 people to gain access to the 25 folks
who are really pushing the work forward. Clients want the best creative work
without having to pay for bloated agency infrastructures, but the current
paradigm is built on a full time employee (FTE) compensation model. This means
access to the top 25 talent comes with a price tag that includes the cost of
the other 475 people at the agency. How will increasing client demand for
higher quality at a fair price impact the current size and scope of agencies?
JB: In the current model the top
talent are underpaid and the bottom people are overpaid. That is true
commoditization. FTEs are commoditizers because they reward hours versus
results and talent, which isn't advertising - it's the post office! If we want
to regain the top talent we've lost, we need to take a tip from Hollywood and
make the rewards of stardom spectacular.
JW: You’ve been out talking a lot to
some of the most interesting and progressive CMOs. What are they saying?
JB: CMOS are about efficiency. They
want it better, cheaper and faster, and if you can't do one of the three, you
are out. Unfortunately, the only recourse has been to get shops to cut price,
which only serves to drive more talent out of the business, make us worth less
to clients and incentivize them to pay us even less. We need to embrace tools –
technology, new models, etc. – that enable us to deliver more for less in less
time, without making people work harder for less money. The old must die to
make way for the new. And, the only alternative is outright extinction.
JW: It seems the whole concept of
aggregating place-based assets under a global holding company is being
threatened by the radical shifts taking place in society. In your opinion, what’s
in the future for holding companies? Will they exist? If so, what do you think
they’ll look like?
JB: Holding Companies? What is their
true purpose? Businesses cannot exist without a purpose that serves a customer.
I believe holding companies are the traditional agencies of the corporate
world. They are generic because they try to be everything to every client. The
holding companies of the future will be more specialized and will be great at
something. For example, maybe Google will own the “data driven” holding company
and Facebook will control the “people driven” one. Each will have a
diametrically opposed view of the world, and an epic battle of ideologies will
ensue, which will not be won by either side because they define the essential
ways in which people differ by nature. There will always be a large
market for both.
JW: You’ve got a big vision for the
industry and the future of advertising. What’s your next move?
JB: My goal is to reinvent the
industry by bringing the power back to the practitioners the way Hollywood has
done it with DreamWorks and stars owning points in their movies, or having
their own production companies. The advertising business sucks, so what are we
afraid of losing at this point? Change is our friend and the more dramatic the
better.
JW: Thanks, Jon. I’m stoked to be working with you to fulfill this vision.
This is going to be fun.
