7. You're the biggest client
Make a practice of randomly auditing your agency's numbers. If your account is more than 50 percent of the entire agency's billings then you may have to audit more thoroughly and more often. Also if your company is more than 50 percent of an agency's billings and you are not certain that you're being billed properly, try bringing in an additional agency.
Employees at most ad agencies are required to fill out timesheets every week. It is a process that management loves and every employee loathes. The issue is that senior leadership within the ad agencies wants all their teams' hours, every last one, to be billable. Some clients are on retainers for all of the work the agency does-- some are not.
Many employee hours often fall outside a particular project. In order to control costs, and not blow the budgets of some of their "less affluent" clients, employees simply find another client to bill the time to.
Whammo! The biggest account gets hit.
When the agencies report back to their large clients how their time is being spent, they naturally say that they are running at or above the retainer, and aren't you getting a great value.
"What? Isn't that illegal? Can't I do something about it? This is terrible. My agency does not do this!" Correction, your agency does not condone this, but employees sometimes do it. Look, this is the way the business works. Is it fraudulent? Yes, but never usually malicious. It's just what happens.
Thing to consider
To avoid this, make a practice of randomly auditing your agency's numbers. If your account is more than 50 percent of the entire agency's billings then you may have to audit more thoroughly and more often. Also if your company is more than 50 percent of an agency's billings and you are not certain that you're being billed properly, try bringing in an additional agency.
The new agency should be strong in areas where your existing agency is not as strong. Also, make sure your agency knows why you are bringing in an additional agency. This solution is more costly and requires more of your team's resources to manage, but it may be healthy for the relationship.
If you do this a few things will happen. You will get more value out of each agency for each hour of work. Everyone at the agency will try and be more efficient with your money, while still providing the same value. Senior leadership at the agency will accept overages on your account in lieu of either losing the account entirely or the opportunity to win more of the portion of the business. You may get better creative work as a result. Additional creative people will be assigned to your account in order to improve the agency's odds of impressing you, and thus win more business.
Next: You're feeding your own ego
