It’s not new for digital shops to perform offline work for their clients. Kinetic has created websites and TVCs for Nokia.
OgilvyOne has also conceptualised on- and offline ads for Levi’s Singapore (separate from Ogilvy & Mather’s P&L).
But what is revolutionary about the Tiger Airways shift is that for the first time in Asia — and one of the first globally — a client has named a digital specialist as its agency-of-record for all aspects of its creative work.
Is this a one-off or will more clients begin to follow the lead of the Singapore Airlines-owned budget carrier?
According Tiger Airways’ marketing officer Rosalynn Tay, this is just a sign of things to come. “We wanted to change the traditional way of thinking about our agencies,” she says.
“It is not sustainable, as an online retail business, to work in a traditional way anymore.”
During the pitch, Tay says the discussion was more about workflow efficiency than creative output.
“Clients don’t want to deal with three or four agencies to execute a single campaign,” says Fiona Bartholomeusz, MD, Formul8. “They want synergy.”
For this reason, 80 per cent of her clients are through-the-line, but this percentage is still growing. “Even if we start with interactive ideas, they start coming to us for above- or below-the-line work. I think clients who segment on- and offline business will see a lack of total synergy in their creative work,” she adds.
To overcome this, she says most of her employees are ‘hybrids’ who are well-versed in both media.
Most traditional networks will, of course, argue that their services are integrated, meaning that they possess units for each specialty: online, offline, retail, experiential and so on.
But according to a CEO of an independent agency, this is merely lip service to real integration. An underlying barrier, says the source, is politics. “Everyone has to look after their own P&L, everyone wants to take the lead creatively. If you have a good relationship with the client, why would you want to let another creative director present your ideas?”
Ogilvy & Mather China resolved the physical integration challenge for one of its most precious clients, Motorola, by building an entire floor of staff dedicated to the account. “Creative, retail, online, account management, PR, even MindShare people all sit together,” says Ian Chapman-Banks, vice-president of Motorola Asia-Pacific. “It’s the only way to make it holistic. I think we’re the only client in Asia-Pacific with a 360-degree team and a dedicated floor.”
Nonetheless, even Chapman-Banks warns that agencies giving their clients the ‘regular’ way shouldn’t rest easy. “There’s a lot of resistance in agencies, because obviously there’s a lot of vested interest to keep things separate.
“Online is cheap. People like to do big-budget TV work. There’s a long way to go in the creative minds,” Chapman-Banks adds. “But there’s demand from clients, so agencies will have to shape up.”
Even while the two camps squabble over the issue, clients are clearly reassessing their traditional agency relationships.
Singapore’s largest bank, United Overseas Bank, for one, is currently in the process of selecting its first online agency, eschewing the service of add-on online executions arranged by three-year incumbent, Saatchi & Saatchi.
