Flock’s Top Tips for Marketing Operations

Flock recently partnered with the WFA to conduct a piece of research on the evolution of the Marketing Operations function. View a sample of the study here; Watch our webinar on the findings here. From this research Flock have developed six top tips for marketing operations: 1 Processes Understand your existing processes, structures, tools and…

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I run Agency Reviews for a living, but I just told a Client to wait on looking for a new Agency. For now.

At Flock Associates we have managed many of the largest and most complicated reviews in the US over the past several years: Ford, McDonald’s, J&J, and others have all gone through our agency review process in order to adjust their existing agency relationships.  This may surprise you, but more often than not we advise clients to NOT put their current agency in…

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Top 5 key themes from Creative Operations Conference London

Flock recently had the privilege to partner with The Creative Operations Conference in London. We hosted a panel of experts discussing “In-housing, out-sourcing, freelancing and more…” and attended many of the speeches, panels, and demonstrations.At Flock Associates we have managed many of the largest and most complicated reviews in the US over the past several years:…

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Re-booting Media Agency Relations without the Costly Pitch

With recent articles of 2020 being a year of anticipated media pitches, we thought it was worth highlighting the alternatives to running pitches, which are costly, labour intensive and time consuming for both clients and agencies. As independent media consultants, who have worked both client and agency side, our experience is most pitches can be…

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How to G.R.O.W. the Brilliance of your Marketing Team

For many marketers, late Summer is the time when personal development plans (PDP) are set or given a half-year review. With that in mind, I thought it would be timely to re-share a tried and tested model that ensures PDP sessions go well, both for the Manager and Team Members. “Coaching focuses on future possibilities,…

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Lost sight of how your agency can and does add value?

In terms of marketing, the biggest opportunity that most organisations of any size miss is the implementation of an effective supplier relationship management system. I know the “yawn” … But, people, stay with me — it’s important! Supplier Relationship Management (or SRM for short) is NOT: a collection of hand-holding meetings surrounding relationship guidance; solely…

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The greatest ad ever and how to be a leader in marketing

As the snow fell on Friday and I had abandoned my wife’s Fiat 500 at the bottom of our off-road drive my thoughts quickly turned to one of my hero’s Sir Ernest Shackleton or “The Boss” as he was affectionately known.  His story is well known, but if you don’t know it there are plenty…

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Marketing Capabilities? What’s That all About?

“What is it you do?” was the polite enquiry from a fellow member at my local sports club. “Marketing transformation” I replied and knowing this is never enough information, followed up with “specifically, marketing capability building”. A blank look was followed by a grin and “what does that mean?”, which to be fair is a…

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Capability development in a Millennial world

 How companies need to adapt their capability development approach to suit a Millennial workforce. We are all familiar with the mantra ‘our people are our most powerful asset’, but with employee retention levels on the rise, it seems not all companies are expert at hanging on to these powerful assets. Retention is particularly challenging for…

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Marketing Capabilities – 7 key steps to success

In a recent Marketing Capabilities study conducted for the World Federation of Advertisers by our own Maarten Albarda: 71% of leading global companies said that marketing was key to their growth However only 54% thought that they were World Class marketers Only 48% of CMO’s were responsible for developing marketing capability plans Only 39% of…

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