Making account management relevant again

February 15, 2007 | Author: Tim Williams

The trade press – and some clients – are announcing the end of account management. They say that account executives have lost their relevance on two fronts: 1) They don't add value to the business, and 2) They don't understand the internet.

The account manager should really become know as an "integration manager." The integration manager is in a position to inspire the creative and media team to go beyond their habitual use of traditional mass media. In fact, the brightest account people brief their teams by saying, "Let's say we couldn't use conventional advertising. How would we solve this marketing problem?"

This is the value the integration manager can add right upfront in the process — as an ambassador for the multi-channel world.

If you're in account service, you need to know the online world as well as you know the offline world. The solution is not to invite the interactive department to a client meeting. The solution is to disband the interactive department altogether and weave the interactive function throughout the fabric of the agency, starting with account management.

Back in the 1950s, when television was new, agencies had "television departments." Seem ridiculous? The interactive department of today is the television department of yesterday. It's time for it to go, and time for account management to step up to the plate and make interactive the centerpiece of the agency's efforts for a client, not an afterthought.

Armed with a knowledge of the internet and database marketing, along with a perspective that puts traditional mass media last instead of first, the "account executive" can once again be valuable and relevant clients.