Companies are constantly switching their advertising agencies. They don’t get along with the team handling their account or they get tired of the creative or they don’t see results or they get tired of paying big bills. So they look around for other agencies. The process usually begins with a request. Then all the agencies that want to work for the client send in letters and books and DVDs of their work. It’s called a capabilities statement. The agency tells the client that the client is great and that they’re great and that they should all work together doing great things. The client will take all the capabilities statements and pick the agencies that might be good enough. These agencies then have the opportunity to impress the pants off the client with some really good strategy and even better creative. They have a week or two to meet and talk about the client, research what the client is currently doing, research the client’s target, meet and talk about stuff, eat cheeseburgers, write a bunch of stuff on post-it notes, drink coffee, come up with some creative, shoot some pool, meet and talk about other stuff, refine the creative, eat pizza, refine the creative some more and then, the night before the presentation, throw out all the creative and start over with brand new stuff.

Then there’s the presentation of the strategy and the work. Once again, the agency tells the client that the client is great and that they’re great and that they should all work together doing great things. And you go home and pray. And pray some more. And ritually sacrifice a kid. You know… a baby goat. If you get the business, you crack open a bottle of champagne or two. And if you don’t, you send out consolation emails to the team saying how badly the clients blew it when they chose another agency.

At least, that’s how we do it around here.

I’m off to Austin again on Monday for a pitch. I’ll be posting photos.