Publishing prices and lead times, in an agency, in 2014
An agency sells bespoke work. That is its pride and its ceiling. Every quote is rebuilt, every price renegotiated, every lead time improvised, and the client leaves without knowing what they are buying until it arrives.
In 2014 we went the other way. A 76-page digital catalogue, structured into product lines, with a published price and a committed delivery time for every service. Ad-server campaign management by the month, display formats by price band, campaign management with retargeting at a fixed fee, and so on.
Behind it, the machine that made it credible: a six-figure annual paid social budget and a five-figure search budget, over 1.2 billion impressions a year, 18 brands and over 245,000 followers managed. You do not productise an offer you cannot produce at scale.
In 2014, in an island market, digital was still sold by the project and by the relationship. Advertisers did not know what a display campaign cost, and agencies had no interest in telling them. The outcome was predictable: long sales cycles, quotes rebuilt ten times, and a conversation about price rather than results. We also had a production volume that let us know our real costs, which is the precondition for daring to publish a price.
Publishing your prices inside an agency means giving up three things. Giving up charging more to the client who does not know the market. Giving up hiding a lead time you will not meet. And giving up the bespoke argument, which is the comfortable refuge of every service business. Internally, the resistance does not come from sales, it comes from production, which knows a published lead time becomes an enforceable commitment. That is exactly why it has to be done.
1 · Week one: listen and decide.
On site. Understand what the cooperative does, what its buyers and partners need to believe, and what the members are proud of. Positioning written and validated in the room, not by email.
2 · Week two: build the identity.
Visual identity designed against the positioning: name system, marks, colours, typography, and rules simple enough to be applied without a design team. Every choice tested against one question: does this raise institutional trust?
3 · Week three: ship the assets.
The working kit the cooperative actually needed: documents, signage, presentation materials, templates. Delivered with a short guide and a working session so the members could produce their own materials next month.
4 · Spend where perception changes.
The budget went into the few physical touchpoints partners actually see. Nothing was spent on deliverables that flatter the consultant.
2014 financial year, offer and production volume.
- A 76-page digital catalogue, offer structured into product lines, published price and committed lead time per service
- Six-figure annual paid social budget, five-figure search budget
- Over 1.2 billion ad impressions a year
- 18 brands and over 245,000 followers managed, including monitoring and crisis handling on those brands
- Real-time bidding offer written into the business plan, the direct root of the engine built in the following years
Productising a service offer does not commoditise it, it makes it buyable. The client stops negotiating a price they do not understand and starts choosing between products they do. Which requires knowing your production cost, and therefore having measured it. If you cannot publish a price, it is not that your trade is too subtle, it is that you do not know what it costs you.
Could you publish your prices and your lead times?
The first call30 minutes. We talk about your traction and what is blocking it. You leave with 2 or 3 moves you can act on. No pitch.