By Ainsley Lawrence
Advertising is a dynamic field, and your clients reflect that. When building long-standing relationships with advertising clients, you must work on fostering communication styles that are strong and adaptive. This will allow you to evolve with the changing market and nurture long-lasting client relationships. It’s important to take stock of how you currently communicate as an advertising agency, including internal and external communications, to create the best client results.
Creating a Mutually Beneficial Client-Agency Relationship
Effective business communication is the key to improving all professional relationships. External communication is made up of every interaction you have with other organizations and potential and current clients. This can include client emails, press releases, marketing materials, social media posts, phone calls, in-person meetings, and other customer service interactions. As an advertising agency, it’s your job to communicate effectively so that clients are satisfied with campaign results. Aligning your goals with the goals of your clients is tantamount to ensuring a mutually beneficial relationship.
Streamlining Internal Communication
If you aren’t well-coordinated behind the scenes, it’s difficult to run effective campaigns. Make sure that everyone in your advertising agency is clear on the company’s objectives and values. This way, they can take those into their interactions with every client, representing your brand in a uniform way.
Internal communication is the foundation on which successful client interactions are built. To improve internal communication even further, try employing tech like project management software and internal communication tools. Keeping agency communications all in one place can prevent miscommunications and streamline operations. This way, project steps are visible and able to be assigned to specific departments or employees, and project statuses can be updated to increase transparency. This allows your external communications with clients to be honest, upfront, and consistent.
Optimizing the Client Onboarding Process
Onboarding clients is more than just doing paperwork. You’re building trust and setting the stage for a successful partnership with your agency. Integrate clear communication into your client onboarding process by:
- Conducting a needs assessment;
- Setting clear expectations;
- Tailoring communication styles to each client;
- Providing regular updates.
Each client interaction will be unique. Your communication styles and channels should be flexible to fit the needs of your clients. For example, provide options for face-to-face meetings, extensive phone calls, or concise emails. Showing that you value your clients’ communication preferences can reduce customer churn and result in longer-lasting and more fruitful relationships.
Listening Actively and Incorporating Client Feedback
Your advertising agency should be customer-obsessed. After all, your end goal is to create advertising campaigns that fit the needs of each client perfectly. To facilitate this, you should keep the client informed at every step of the process. Be proactive with communication and ask for feedback. Giving clients a sense of autonomy allows them to feel valued and in control of the advertising campaign creation.
When soliciting this feedback, make sure to listen actively. Ask questions and restate their needs for clarification and to show you understand their objectives fully. Equally as important as asking for feedback and listening is actually applying that feedback. Take note of the communications with clients and how you’re integrating their needs into the advertising campaigns you are creating for them. Show this with reports and cite specific communications to highlight how you are going above and beyond for them. This will lead to stronger client relationships by expressing how much you value their business and respect their end goals for their campaigns.
Continuously Nurturing Client Communication
It’s important to continue proper communication throughout the entire client-agency relationship lifecycle. This includes everything from marketing materials that draw in clients to post-purchase engagements. Following up with clients at every stage of the advertising process, including after the campaign is over, can result in repeat purchases.
To facilitate this, you can even set up personalized email campaigns that disseminate to segmented audiences. For example, you can set up an email campaign to send out to clients who had a campaign with you six months ago. This way, you can ask how they are doing and remind them that it’s time to invest in their advertising again.
Moving Forward With Client-Agency Bonds
As the landscape of advertising changes, your agency should remain a constant for your clients. Let them know that you will always show up for them in the way they need by communicating your adaptability and commitment to achieving their goals. Effectively communicating internally and externally will place your advertising agency on the path to success, regardless of market shifts and changing client needs. Safeguard your agency’s future by optimizing your communication processes today.
