VIEWPOINT: Leader - Managing client's expectations in HK

On the ground though, the picture couldn't be further away from this rosy - some would say distorted - scenario painted by the uptick in spending data. Increasingly, Hong Kong is beginning to look like the sick man of Asia's advertising community especially when so-called troubled markets like Indonesia are quietly galloping away.

With the exception of property advertisers, star performers like finance and telecoms are flagging this year. And unlike its less-developed and larger neighbours, there isn't a base of consumer goods advertisers to prop up spend.

So once again, the spectre of redundancies is hanging over agencies, cut to the bone as it were by earlier layoffs. Judging by the CVs flying off to rival agencies, unconfirmed reports point to two 4A agencies taking the lead in the latest retrenchment drive. Others are reportedly considering a similar move.

Since the US stock market gyrations have pushed recovery further down the horizon - it's now tipped for mid-2003 at the earliest - agencies will need all the tricks in the bag to juggle and manage client demands and expectations.

This is an issue that must be made crystal clear to clients, especially those with unrealistic expectations of how they should be serviced. In such a dire time, clients can only expect to get what they pay for.

When client budgets shrink as dramatically as some have done this year, it's impossible for their agency - with its own bottomline worries - to extend the level of service that they have become accustomed to.

In other words, a client paying for a Mazda shouldn't expect the support and quality of a Benz.