Boutique vs. Big Box: How Small Agencies Win Big
In many cases, size matters. But not all.
Believing “the bigger the better” brought us superstores and shuttered book shops in favor of Amazon orders. But there is a cost in buying into bigger operations that convenience or prestige can’t make up for.
We live in an era that values expediency over quality and buzzwords over innovative thought. As Forbes noted earlier this year, the era of Super Bowl commercials being an event on par with the game itself is long gone – a casualty credited to herd mentality. The Puppy Bowl players took more risks.
We get it. Sometimes bigger just feels better, giving you the assurance that you will not only get a better product, but will also get better service. Unfortunately, this is not always the case – and more often than not, you end up being relegated to the “B” team, depending on how much you spend.
Here are a few more things to consider.
Big Agencies = Big Box Mentality
- The Ringlemann Effect: Ever played tug-of-war? French architectural engineer Maximilien Ringlemann put groups together for several rounds and discovered the larger the group, the less effort individuals put into their tasks. Lack of coordination can only take half the blame: individuals in large groups become less productive as their group size increases.
- Bureaucratic Mindset: No one ever asked for more red tape. The more people involved with a project, the more ideas are put through rounds and rounds of approval, disapproval, and simply getting forgotten as time moves on. Worse than the tedium is the death of ideas.
- The Quality Question: Big Box stores don’t sell the best clothes, produce, or equipment. They sell convenience. Anyone who has used a sewing machine can spot a job done hastily with poor materials, which is why it’s so physically painful for us to see ads that merely reference flash-in-the-pan trends and call it a day. When you trust your branding and marketing to advertising agencies that are trying to be meme factories or LinkedInfluencers, you’re getting the same ideas, wrapped in plastic, that everyone else is.
Small Agencies’ Secret Strengths
- Transparency: There is no room for run-arounds in a small agency, and at brandRUSSO, you always get the “A” team. In other words, you know who you’re talking to. When you sign on as a client, you meet the team you will be working with. And when you need something, you know who to reach out to and what to expect.
- Emotional connection: This is a big one. Forming an emotional connection is the difference between an amusing ad and an actionable one. And you don’t form an emotional connection on accident: it takes research, planning, strategizing and above all, a process.
- A proven process: Razor Branding ™ permeates all levels of marketing, advertising, digital and social media giving us a unique advantage in first identifying our client’s target audience and then developing messaging, strategies, and creative that builds awareness, loyalty, and eventual advocacy.
We accomplish this by changing the conversation to better position our clients within their marketplace giving us a unique advantage in first identifying our client’s target audience and then developing messaging, strategies, and creative that builds awareness, loyalty, and eventual advocacy.
When you’re ready to change the conversation, just let us know.
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RUSSO is a strategic branding agency that uses consumer insight to change the conversation; forming emotional connections with the target audience. To learn more about Razor Branding visit brandrusso.com, or CLICK HERE to schedule a meeting with one of our Business Development Managers.
