Ep. 165 – How Small Marketing Teams Handle Big Business

Rob (00:00) Would you consider trade shows to be advertising? Don (00:04) Yes. Trade show is advertised. Rob (00:05) Okay, you consider public relations to be advertising? Don (00:10) I would say no. I would say at the end of the day, it is advertising, but it is advertising in its own disguise, right? ⁓ Because there is a methodology that channel goes out the door. There are rules of engagement, right? In terms of press releases and things like that. It is advertising because you do have a lot of pay to play in regards to like, you can buy yourself articles and publications or blogs or things like to me, that's kind of like, is a hot dog a sandwich, which does beg the question, Rob, is a hot dog a sandwich? Now it is meat between two pieces of bread, Rob (00:33) Yeah. Yeah. Don (00:41) even though that bread is hinged, A hot dog is a hot dog, it's not a sandwich. Yeah, yeah, so that's PR for me. What do you think? Rob (00:42) Yeah. Hot dog is a hot dog. What about a, Don (01:11) All right, episode 165, we're back, Rob. We'll start humming the theme song. We're never changing the theme song. I know we've talked about this before, but we're never changing it, right? It's just staying forever. Rob (01:11) 165. Good night. Nope, nope, it's gonna go forever. It's gonna go forever. Don (01:25) Nice. All right. Speaking of going on forever, I don't know how to segue that into today's topic. But why don't you tell why don't you tell everybody today's topic? Rob (01:34) Yeah, so thought today's topic, it might be interesting to talk about some of the similarities and or differences between marketing agencies and advertising agencies, right? Or the role of marketing versus the role of advertising, as general as we wanna go. ⁓ You know, a lot of times there's... Don (01:52) Yeah. Rob (01:59) with folks. there'll be a little bit of, I don't wanna say confusion, a little crossover, a little bit of blurred lines between what is the role of marketing, what's advertising? Because oftentimes, smaller companies maybe don't have a full marketing department, right? Larger companies have a very large marketing department. So it's different, I think, depending on the size of the business oftentimes. Don (02:05) There is confusion out there for sure. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Well, and we work with gigantic companies that are humongous and they have teeny marketing departments. Do you know what I mean? Like, so I mean, the size of sometimes even that boggles my mind like, there's only two people in this marketing department. You guys are like a billion dollar company. Like how is that possible? Like what in the world is happening? You know, so. Rob (02:29) Sure. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And I think, I think, you know, we say to people at times like, we're not your outsource marketing department. But, but I don't know that that's true all the time. I'm just going to go ahead and say that. Yeah. I don't, I don't know that that's true. And I think maybe as the industry evolves, those lines are being blurred a little bit more increasingly. So Don (02:52) Really? Okay. Hmm. Yeah. Rob (03:05) between marketing and advertising and strategy and all of those things. ⁓ Don (03:08) Yeah. Well, think well, I think different clients have different needs, though. I have, yeah, forever been like, I don't want to be your outside marketing department. I did not want it like I want you to bring us your plan and then we'll challenge the plan. We can execute against the plan and we can come up with new ideas, you know, but like, you know, yeah, forever. But I guess maybe to your point, especially with some recent client acquisitions, we do more of the upstream marketing plan development than maybe I guess I even I realize as crazy as that sounds. So Rob (03:15) Yeah. Yeah, I mean, it's. Don (03:37) Well, for those following at home, I guess, what would your description of marketing versus advertising be? And even us, like we, historically have sold ourselves as a creative shop. Like we are, we are creatives, you know what I mean? But I guess fundamentally the difference between advertising agency and marketing agency would be what in your mind? Rob (03:56) I think I would strip the word agency off of those and just say fundamentally what's the difference between marketing and advertising. And to me... I guess put as simply as I can, ⁓ marketing would be... the conduit between a business and a business's advertising, right? I think that's in simplest terms, I think I can put it, that's how I would define those roles, right? Don (04:19) Okay, yeah, yeah, I'll do that. Yeah, I think marketing is very broad, right? And advertising is a component within your marketing plan, but your marketing plan could also include things that are not advertising. Would you agree with that? Yeah. Yeah. So I advertising is one of the tools in the toolbox of marketing. And oftentimes it is a very big one. I mean, let's not get around the bush. And sometimes maybe it is the only tool that you use in your toolbox, you know? ⁓ But marketing to me is kind of an umbrella term that encapsulates more than just advertising. Rob (04:40) Correct. Yes. Don (04:59) Right, but but to your point I think over the last, know 30 40 years, right? It's kind of like the definitions of what everybody does and who does what have kind of meandered, you know Evolutionary wise right because it's like some clients have marketing departments some clients don't you know some clients, know And then agencies always say yes, we can do it whether it's a marketing agency or PR I mean, how many times do we hear about PR firms that did logos the logo rebrand? It's like what how did that happen? Rob (05:28) That's right. Don (05:29) And that's not, like no one's really playing in the sandbox of what their name definition or category is, right? Over the last 10 or 15 years. ⁓ And then supplement that with the fragmentation of ⁓ technical execution, right? We went through a whole phase where it's like, we're an ad agency, but then, we're a digital shop, right? Remember that? Like back in the nineties, it was like, well ad agencies do traditional media planning and print advertising and you're, know, and then you have, ⁓ digital only. Rob (05:57) Right. We do digital. We do digital. Yeah. Yeah. Don (05:59) Yeah, all we do is digital, right? And now that's all blended together and you know, it's yeah, it is kind of a that's why I asked the question like how would you define what the difference between the two is? I think it's an astute point to dump the word agency, right? And just kind of go marketing versus advertising. So. Rob (06:15) Yeah, I mean, think the role that, you know, the, and again, we're painting with a broad brush here, but the role of marketing is to, in my opinion, is to, and I say conduit between, you know, the outward facing persona and advertising of a company. The role of marketing is to A, understand the business, right? And then, and then understand specifically and help define Don (06:39) Totally. Rob (06:44) who the target audience is for that business, right? So if I make a pen, the marketing department, it's up to me to go, okay, well, I know this pen better than anyone. I know how it works. I know what it does. I know the benefits of the pen. I know all this great stuff. ⁓ And I know who's gonna buy this pen. I think I've figured out who's gonna buy this pen, right? So then I would go, again, in a traditional sense, then I would go to my Don (07:05) Yeah. ⁓ Sure. Rob (07:14) advertising department or my ad agency or whatever and go, all right, I've got this great pen, let me tell you all about it. Here's who I think we're gonna sell this pen to. Ready, go. And then it's the role of advertising to figure out A, okay, great. How do we reach those people? If we think about it from a media perspective, where are they? ⁓ How do we go find those people? ⁓ And then B, how do we effectively tell them or sell them on the benefits of this incredible pen? And how do we do that in a creative way that makes them ultimately buy the pen? I mean, that's. Don (07:32) Yeah, where are they? Yeah. Yeah, what's the message? What's the message that's gonna resonate with them to buy that pen? ⁓ Go ahead. Rob (07:54) Yeah, yeah. I think more and more you you well, let me back up. Traditionally, the marketing department would go, all right, great. I know everything about the pen. I've got the personas. I've got all the things I've got. The I've got the king, you know, the the the key selling point, right? Or the universal universal ⁓ differentiator. And then they write the brief. Here you go, everybody. Here's my big brief. And then we hand that to the agency and then the creatives go read the brief and then they Don (08:17) Yep. Yeah. Rob (08:23) That's their launch pad to develop ideas. Don (08:24) Sure. Sure. Rob (08:30) We've talked about briefs before. Don (08:31) Yeah, I was gonna I was I didn't want to interrupt your role, but I was gonna say, Hey, when was the last time we got a absolutely kick ass spot on brief from a client? You know? Yeah, yeah. Rob (08:39) Couldn't tell you. Couldn't tell you. And honestly, like, and this is not to knock brief writers, right? Or clients. But I have, I would say in my career, I have only really come across like... Don (08:48) Yeah. Or clients. Or clients. Yeah. Rob (09:01) maybe a handful of really, no, probably, but I guarantee it's not a whole lot over five, if it is over five, of really well executed briefs, I would say. Don (09:03) Okay, I thought you might say one. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Now, of those five, did they come from clients, briefing agencies on what the task is at hand, or is that post client brief and from an internal resource at an agency from Mixabow? Okay. That's a fair answer. I think again, in the interest of not bashing on anyone, you know, it's funny because nowadays we'll do a project launch and maybe there'll be Rob (09:26) Mix of both. I would say that it's both. You know? Don (09:40) multiple clients on the phone. And sometimes they can't even agree amongst themselves. You know what mean? It's like, whoa, okay. know, clear as mud is an understatement, right? Like, okay, you know, and then it's, it's well, you know, how you tap dance your way through that when they don't even know what they want, and they can't even agree on what's the most important thing. Well, you know, I mean, there's methods and strategies, and there's there's ways we can handle that, you know, I don't want to get off topic on it. But yeah, to your point, it's it's Rob (09:44) That's right. Yeah. Don (10:08) that traditional method is increasingly going by the wayside. Rob (10:13) Yeah, well it used to be, and again, this still happens. I don't want to pretend that it doesn't, but in larger organizations, it's, we go out and we hire the research firm, and the research firm does all the personas and does all the things, and then we've all agreed in the marketing department that, okay, here it is. Here's what we're trying to say, and we're all in the same boat. More often than not, they don't have the research and they don't know. So when we're on the call with eight people from the company, we get eight different points of view because not everybody's aligned and... Don (10:45) Yeah. Yeah. But there's only one point of view that matters, generally speaking. so there's somebody over there has the gift. And it is astonishing to me sometimes when they just veto all the data and all the numbers and all the research, you know, it's like, No, I want it this way. Okay. So anyway, I feel like I pulled this off off topic, you know what mean? In terms of, you know, yeah. Rob (10:52) Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then you always have those. No, no, it's all part of the conversation. I mean, when you, you know, when, when, and when we talk to clients and marketing folks, sometimes if there's not that research or there hasn't been a great brief developed, it is, it's incumbent to us to ask like the hard questions and keep pushing and pushing. What is the one thing tip of the spear? We always say. Don (11:21) Sure. Sure. Rob (11:26) What is the one thing we want to lead with? What is the one? Well, we want to do this, but we also want to say this. ⁓ Don (11:30) Yeah. Yeah. Rob (11:34) So as advertisers, it's up to us to help figure that out. Don (11:38) Yeah, yeah, yeah, the 10 pounds of shit in a one pound bag. Let's just call it what it is. So yeah, on the design side of life, that's, here's the eight page word doc. Can you make this a sell sheet? No. That's called a brochure. That's not a single, like, you know, you just sent me an eight page word doc. What are you talking about? So yeah, I mean, that same methodology applies on the advertorial side of life. So yeah, think what's interesting is, Rob (11:42) That's right. That's right. Don (12:08) from a marketing perspective, you know, I'm going back to what you said earlier, which is, I don't want to be your outsource marketing department. But I think we do a good job of staying in our lane of what we feel very, very comfortable with and what we do exceedingly well. But then push back on clients because sometimes you don't know what you don't know. Right. And what I mean by that is the hey, have you thought about this? Hey, have you thought about that? You know, like to sort of not trying to take over. I want to build your entire plan. But hey, here's a supplement idea. Here's a this, here's a that. And sometimes clients know their product very well, but they don't know where to fish. And that can lead into some sort of additional marketing avenues potentially outside of just advertising. ⁓ And then guess, what is the definition of advertising? I mean, low-hanging fruit for this conversation. It's called influencer marketing. Rob (13:07) Sure. Don (13:08) But isn't that just advertising? Yeah, right? Right, we're paying someone to hawk your pro, I mean, I'm saying that in a negative fashion, it's not negative, but like, it is interesting that the terminology has been bastardized, right, to where it's not marketing, or is it? know, so, okay, I'm sorry, you're gonna say. Rob (13:11) Of course. So, okay, let me ask you this. Yeah. Yeah. I think also as you know, because because we're we're lean and efficient the way we are and because we we ⁓ sort of manage all the accounts ourselves, it's like we know enough to be dangerous, right? Meaning and I mean that in a positive way in this instance, ⁓ it's you know, oftentimes, you know, we're creatively intelligent, but but we understand the business of marketing as well. Right. So we can kind of back into helping them clients figure out, okay, have you thought about this or have you thought about that? And kind of swim upstream a little bit. I dare I say that would might be a competitive advantage for us because I think a lot of bigger agencies are so very siloed that the creative teams are in the creative department. They're doing their thing and they're not necessarily thinking about the broader business objective potentially. ⁓ Maybe that's it. Maybe. Don (14:09) Yeah, well that is. Exactly. Yeah. Rob (14:27) Maybe marketing is more of a focus on the business objective than on the delivery of a message. Maybe that's a way to distill the difference. Would you, let me ask you this. Would you consider trade shows to be advertising? Don (14:37) or which tactical deployment you're using, right? ⁓ Yes. Trade show is advertised. Rob (14:51) Okay, would you consider public relations to be advertising? Don (14:58) ⁓ I would say no. I would say at the end of the day, it is advertising, but it is advertising in its own in its own disguise, right? ⁓ Because there is a methodology that that channel goes out the door. There are rules of engagement, right? In terms of press releases and things like that. There's the global news. There's kind of like best practices in different industries and things like that, right? It's harder to game the system from a PR perspective, right? ⁓ It is advertising because you do have a lot of pay to play in regards to like, you can buy yourself articles and publications or blogs or things like that, right? But to me, that's kind of like, is a hot dog a sandwich, right? I mean, it is advertising, but it is called public relations and it is its own kind of thing, like, which does beg the question, Rob, is a hot dog a sandwich? Yeah, it's not, it's its own thing. Now it is meat between two pieces of bread, right? Rob (15:36) Yeah. Yeah. Don (15:56) even though that bread is hinged, know. A hot dog is a hot dog, it's not a sandwich. Yeah, yeah, so that's PR for me. What do you think? Rob (15:59) Yeah. Hot dog is a hot dog. What about a, What about ⁓ a ⁓ loaded bagel, like a ham bagel or a turkey bagel with sprouts, maybe some Swiss cheese on there? Would that be a sandwich? Okay. And what? Don (16:16) Yeah. Is that a sandwich? Yes, that's a sandwich. Yeah, yeah. If you put roast beef and cheddar and whatever and you put it on a croissant versus a bagel versus rye versus sourdough to me it's a sandwich. Yeah, sandwich. Rob (16:28) That's a sandwich. Okay, so the sandwich then, I don't know why I'm going, so a sandwich then is defined by, how do we define sandwich? Don (16:40) I think it's meat between two pieces of bread. Now, maybe meat is incorrect. It is because you can have like, know, veggies or whatever, know what I mean? Like, yeah, I think it's the bread, magical deliciousness, and then bread. That's the family. Rob (16:56) Is it okay, so the hot dog argument then, is it because it is a hinged receptacle? mean, is that what is keeping it from being a... Don (17:01) ⁓ No, think I think hot dogs and hamburgers are their own category outside of sandwiches, if that makes sense, right? Like just like it is its own branded sandwich. I mean, at the end of the day, you could make an argument. Someone's probably written a paper on this. You can make an argument. It is a sandwich. They are sandwiches. But they are sandwiches that have transcended the sandwich category to their own to their own category, which is a hot dog. Yeah, yeah. Rob (17:10) Okay, okay, okay. I'm okay with that. Don (17:30) Okay, but back to PR is in your opinion that asking the same question back at you is PR advertising? Rob (17:39) Um, I think, I think it's going to be such a stupid answer. Um, I can, I can argue it both ways. mean, I would say at the end of the day, I would say yes, because it is, um, uh, it is an, it is an outward facing. Don (17:43) It's like the most eloquent form of advertising. Yeah. communication. Rob (18:04) representation or piece of communication about your company or brand. So I think if you use that broad definition, then you could say, yeah. But then you could also say, yeah, well, trade shows, same thing. It is an outward communication of your, you know what mean? So I mean, I think there's absolutely a world where you can kind of put them together under that big bundle. Don (18:06) Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I would say trade shows are more advertising than PR is advertising because you will because you will have press releases about not good news, right? You would never run an ad. Yeah, you would never run an ad that's like, oops, we totally f'd up. Sorry. We're doing the best we can, you know, will infrequently infrequently you would you do that, right? But Rob (18:26) I think so. Yeah, damage control. Yes. Yes. Don (18:47) If you have crisis management, you like, yeah, you're going to send out press releases because you are calming, you know, a specific set of target audience, right? In this instance, potentially it's investors, right? It would be, hey, here's what we're doing to mitigate that. You know, like you're trying to let people know what the deal is. But you are crafting that message. mean, it is your own. It is not, you know, being thrust upon you. So but but trade show is like, here's a gigantic ad. That's the backdrop. What's the message? And you still have that targeted ⁓ audience that's very specifically, we all went to Chicago. You know what I mean? And you're trying to lure them in to, you Rob (19:17) Yeah. Yeah, it's like outdoor with a company representative. Right, I mean, it's a sea of billboards with company representatives. Don (19:30) Yeah, yeah, totally. Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely. Yeah, that's a really good way of putting it. Rob (19:40) Lots of cocktails, cocktail parties and things like Don (19:43) Yeah, come into the little closet and let's write an order or whatever. You know what I mean? so yeah, buy, you whatever, we'll drop ship them to you. So we'll buy your pens, you know? So yeah. Rob (19:46) There you go. We'll buy your pens. So yeah, do think ⁓ just to sort of wrap this thing up, I guess, ⁓ you know, I think we are absolutely at the heart of what we do, a creative ⁓ agency, ⁓ and that will never change. But I think increasingly so, you know, and again, depending on the size of the client, it's incumbent upon us to understand their business enough and get to know them enough, which is why we talk about personal relationships and really diving in and understanding. ⁓ I don't want just a brief, right? I don't want just a good brief. I want to get to know and ask the questions and do the thing, which really helps us kind of move upstream a little bit. And so at times, again, enough, you know, knowing enough to be dangerous, can, we can, I don't want to say we're going to act as your marketing department. I don't, I don't ever want to say that, but if you have marketing questions and you need a little bit of perspective and guidance and opinion, ⁓ we've been doing it for a while. and certainly throw our hat in the ring there as best we can. Don (20:54) We have experience. That's a kind way of saying we have experience. yeah, we've been through the. Yeah. Rob (20:58) That's right. We're saying we're old, really. If you couldn't tell by these delightful gray beers that we have. Don (21:04) Oh, man, we just started hanging up a ton of photos in the house with this one hallway and are like, you know, photos or whatever. And I was doing the math on like, when did when did when did it start? Everything started turning gray. You know, I mean, you can look at the chronology of different things. You know, like, oh, here's a photo with, you know, child number two, that's this age. And it's pretty funny. And it's like, Oh, gray hair. Rob (21:08) We are. Yeah, you can see when it happened. Well, I was doing some work on our agency site the other day and looked at our pictures. And these beards do look very different than they do on our agency photos. Don (21:34) Yeah, I don't look like my photo do I? ⁓ Yeah, that's a good point. Yeah, we should we should we should. It's like the realtor that's like you don't look like your photo at all. You know? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, that's funny. That's really funny. So ⁓ well, we do look like ourselves on YouTube. But where can everybody else find us if they want to talk about marketing and advertising with us the experienced experts? Rob (21:46) You don't look like well, it's like the Tinder profile, you know. the experienced creative experts. ⁓ You were easy to find, mocktheagency.com and of course on any of the socials and ⁓ wherever you get your podcasts. ⁓ Don (22:05) Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Drop us a note. Yes, we're coming for you. ⁓ Who's number one Joe Rogan, we're coming for you, Joe Rogan, right? Yeah, the world needs to listen about advertising. All right. We'll see you next time. Yeah. Rob (22:18) Rogan, we're coming for you, Joe Rogan. There you go. All right. Thanks for tuning in, everybody. We'll see you next time.