By Ben Shaw, Chief Strategy Officer, MullenLowe
Despite the 15 years I spent agency-side, it was the three years client-side that taught me what it really means to “do marketing.”
When you’re responsible for chunky budgets, pitching work internally, and being grilled on ROI, you quickly learn that marketing clients have one of the toughest corporate jobs. Returning agency-side, I realised how much agencies misunderstand client’s worlds. If all agency growth comes from clients, then more agencies need to not be ‘work-centric’, but client-centric.
Here are nine lessons I wish agencies prioritised to become truly client-centric.
Only 10% of the job is the idea; 90% is selling it.
As a client, I spent most of my time selling – not to external customers, but to internal stakeholders. I pitched, re-pitched, adapted, and pitched again to get buy-in at every level. Selling the idea internally was more about anticipating objections, framing implications, and managing timing than flashy visuals or polished voiceovers.
Agencies need to help clients navigate these internal hurdles. It’s not just about presenting a 17-slide deck; it’s about crafting hallway-ready summaries, executive briefs, and tools for internal alignment.
Agencies should lose the ego and focus on helping clients sell ideas themselves.
Non-marketing people have valuable opinions.
Some of the best creative feedback I got as a client came from unexpected places – colleagues far removed from marketing, people from product, customer service and the board. Their outsider perspectives helped identify blind spots and stretch ideas beyond the obvious. Agencies should include voices from across the organisation early in the process. This broadens buy-in and uncovers bigger ideas with greater impact.
There isn’t a perfect answer.
Clients face enormous pressure to make decisions amid competing priorities, limited resources, and differing opinions. Most of the scrutiny in approving marketing activity is if this is the “right” thing to do. There is no “right” in marketing, just the “best right now”. Agencies can help by acknowledging uncertainties, highlighting risks, and offering ways to analyse the ideas.
Be humble and focus on presenting the “Most Advanced Yet Acceptable” (MAYA) option -what’s best with the information available today will help get ideas over the line.
Brand is more than marketing.
Agency folk often use “brand” when they really mean “company.”
When you’re responsible (and therefore get it in the neck from the CEO) for every touchpoint – typo-ridden emails, outdated signage, misaligned customer communications – you truly understand that brand experience is the public face of the business.
Great agencies help clients integrate brand thinking into every corner of the organisation, from ESG strategies to customer service to 404 pages.
Marketing is more than brand.
As a client, it really hit home how ‘communications’, while vital, were only a small part of my marketing role. My real job was running the “machine” of marketing – optimising processes, integrating technology, and managing budgets. Agencies need to empathise with this broader scope, showing interest in how their clients marketing systems work and offering solutions that go beyond creative outputs.
Outside thinking is priceless.
When you’re immersed in a brand, it’s easy to get stuck in a world where everything looks the same. You’ve read all the history books and so everything has been done before. Agencies number one benefit is fresh perspectives and ideas unshackled by internal politics or corporate history. Agencies need to formalise bringing novelty and creativity into the organisation with competitive and cultural references.
Short-term wins keep the lights on.
Every agency tries to get the big brand work signed off by espousing the long of the long and short, but in today’s economic climate most clients can’t afford to ask for returns beyond this quarter. Agencies must balance ambition for long-term brand-building with the reality of short-term pressures that are actually keeping their clients in their jobs, and their business afloat.
Helping clients achieve quick wins alongside visionary goals earns trust and ensures sustained success.
The bottom line is truth.
Non-creative businesses operate in a world of numbers – forecasts, budgets, and ROI. Most agency folk love to joke about it, but that’s the actual reality. No matter the emotional terrorism you can deploy by seeing your brand on a billboard outside the CFOs house, you still need to explain how spending hard earned cash is going to impact the business. Agencies should take time to understand how their clients’ CFO measures success and craft strategies that speak the language of the boardroom.
Clients care deeply, even if they don’t show it.
Clients’ careers, reputations, and livelihoods are tied to the success of campaigns.
They may seem dispassionate, but their job in the partnership is to think about the risks, the sell-in, and the consequences of failure. Agencies must empathise, collaborate as true partners, and act like one team united by shared goals.
Moving Forward
To truly succeed, agencies need to earn the trust of their clients. That means understanding the client’s world beyond the brief, demonstrating commercial acumen, and offering support across the entire marketing spectrum.
Clients, in turn, need to open the door, sharing the bigger picture and treating agencies as integral partners. By working together with empathy and curiosity, agencies and clients can create work that drives results, builds brands, and fosters trust.
