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What are the benefits hidden behind a decentralized marketing structure? Besides the obvious does such organization has the power to influence creativity, work speed, innovation and productivity? Hear out what 12 experts have to say on how the decentralized marketing structure has affected their business in quite a positive way.
You could read our founder and managing partner, Terry Tateossian’s opinion on the issue under number 9. Optimized And Efficient Use Of Time
(The Expert Panel was initially published at Forbes.)
While many agencies work with a centralized marketing structure, recent studies have indicated that more than half of the industry is expecting to work with a decentralized model in the near future. Decentralization has several benefits, not least of all, the allowance for individual departments to develop their own innovative ideas or the ability to offer more specialized services.
Agencies stand to benefit a lot from decentralizing their marketing approach, but the exact ways these companies will improve is still rather unclear. To help sort out the details behind how agencies stand to benefit from a decentralized marketing approach, these 12 members of Forbes Agency Council dive into how it could be a blessing to the world of marketing.
Table of Contents
1. Enhanced Specialization
Decentralized marketing structures will lead to more outsourcing as in-house staff look to augment their abilities with specialized skills. Those specialized skills could lead them to a variety of agencies instead of the centralized agency-of-record that a larger firm might have traditionally had in place. In this environment, specialists will be able to form relationships with clients and grow them over time. – Amith Nagarajan, rasa.io
2. Empowered Local Teams
Decentralized marketing systems are good news for the little guy. Local marketing teams will be empowered, and they often side with smaller, more nimble agencies. We will also see a bigger shift toward project work as opposed to retainer work, giving marketers maximum flexibility. Agencies that thrive in a project scenario and those who collaborate well with other agencies will end up on top. – Lee Roth, BeenThereDoneThat
3. Better Customization
In a decentralized system, there is greater opportunity to create custom campaigns for specific brands, products and audiences. This is a great opportunity for digital agencies adept at offering custom ad creative and content. Distributing custom campaigns and focusing on robust reporting to help clients understand the learnings and impact can lead to long-term, fruitful partnerships. – Kate Weidner , SRW
4. Faster Content Distribution
Our agency finds that we can produce quality content faster in decentralized teams. Our website team, search team, social media team and email marketing teams all rely on unique and often vastly different data. That data leads their decisions around content and advertising strategies. Letting them run on their own and share the results after has led to big benefits. – Patrick Dillon, WISE Digital Partners
5. Connections With Large Brands
One way agencies (especially smaller agencies) will benefit from a decentralized marketing structure will be easier access to working relationships with divisions of large brands. These divisions, which once may have mandated to work with a master brand agency-of-record, will now be more able to select agencies they desire and get more attention and access to deeper subject matter expertise. – Brian Sullivan, Sullivan Branding
6. Opportunities For Strategy And Creativity
Decentralized marketers will create a greater need for what agencies do best: strategy and creativity. Whether a marketer splits by business unit, region or marketing channel, each team will be specializing in their core area. Agencies contribute from the experience of many organizations and can provide a broader market perspective for strategy and an outside spark for creativity. – Eileen Baumann, Uncork-it
7. Dynamic Collaboration Between Agencies
There used to be only a handful of ways to reach an audience. Along came the internet and now there are hundreds, if not thousands of ways to reach an audience. A decentralized marketing system allows brands to engage with agencies that specialize in one or a few of those marketing mediums, allowing more agencies to collaborate with a single brand. – Travis Peters, EightPM
8. More Innovation And Agility
A seemingly unending approval process is the death of innovation for agencies. Often, new innovative strategies or ideas can take months to get approved, so long that clients shudder at the thought of shifting strategies or taking back new ideas to their boss. A decentralized marketing system will allow agencies to move faster and be more innovative, resulting in better work for their clients. – JP Johl, AdTribute
9. Optimized And Efficient Use Of Time
As decentralization becomes the new norm, I think brands and marketers will rely less on in-person meetings and more on delivery of value. Virtual teams will be more widely accepted and remote teams easier to manage. An agency is the perfect partner for brands who are looking to scale their teams during these times and leverage the flexibility an agency brings to the table. – Terry Tateossian, Socialfix Media
10. Better Decision-Making
When decisions come down from on high, it can be very frustrating for people who might have been working for months to create a strategy. A decentralized approach will allow people who are responsible for brands and budgets to make better decisions. This can lead to better and more targeted outcomes. – Randy Shattuck, The Shattuck Group
11. Increased Ownership And Ideas
Ownership of specific duties will increase as each team has specific goals to hit and metrics to follow. The team will still report to a CMO. But if set up properly, they will have key metrics to hit. By empowering each team, from paid ads and search ads to social, print and TV, the teams will take ownership of their specific marketing efforts. New ideas will flow with that. – Peter Boyd, PaperStreet Web Design
12. Stronger Virtual Companies And Agencies
Given the disruption in the world economy from COVID-19, it is clear that 100% of virtual companies had a distinct advantage to continue operations smoothly. In the future, more staff will want to be remote and more firms will manage remote teams well. Decentralized agencies will be the winners. – Jim Caruso, M1PR, Inc. d/b/a MediaFirst PR – Atlanta
