Advertising: It's the Best Part of a Client's Day
Early in my career, I was working on a P&G account with a client I liked and admired. He ran a big business and had a lot on his plate. One day after a meeting, he said something I've never forgotten:
"You know, I spend less than 10% of my time on advertising. But the time I spend with you guys? That's the best part of my day."
I was young enough that this surprised me. Better than running the business? Better than the strategy sessions?
He smiled. "Yeah. You bring creative energy. You're solving problems, not creating them. And honestly, it's just more fun."
I've heard versions of this from clients throughout my career. "We love talking to you guys." "This is when I get to think about the exciting stuff." It took me years to understand this wasn't flattery. It was reality.
What Their Day Actually Looks Like
Look at what fills most of a client's calendar. Budget reviews where they defend every line item. Cross-functional meetings where every department fights for resources. Internal politics. Reporting up to executives who don't always understand what they're doing. Firefighting issues that have nothing to do with building the brand.
Most of their day is necessary and important. It's also a grind.
And then they come over to the agency.
Suddenly the conversation is about creative ideas. About what's possible. About reaching consumers in new ways. About building something that didn't exist before. Even when we're working through problems, the conversation is about solutions and possibility.
That's what advertising offers them. A break from the grind. A few hours a week where the work is about ideas, building, imagining what could be. The part of their job that reminded them why they wanted to be in marketing in the first place.
Why Advertising Holds That Place
There's a reason this work — what agencies and clients build together — gets that spot in someone's day.
It's one of the only parts of a marketer's job that's genuinely creative. The strategy is creative. The work is creative. Even the problem-solving is creative. Most of their calendar is built around managing what already exists. The agency conversation is built around what could be.
It's also more collaborative than most of their other meetings. With us, they're building. There's energy in that, and clients feel it even when they can't articulate it.
That's the gift of working in this business. We get to be the part of the day that someone looks forward to. We get to bring creative thinking into rooms that have spent the morning grinding through spreadsheets and politics. We get to build things that didn't exist before.
That's a privilege. It's also the responsibility we owe every client we work with.
-Anthony DelleCave, Managing Director, The BAM Connection
