agency search & selection process   

At catalyst, we have a fine-tuned agency search and selection process (or "pitch process" if you prefer). We break it down into three main areas:

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1. Search

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The search for any advertising, media, digital or full service marketing agency always starts with the brief. Simply put, this is the key to finding the right agency. Some of the things we need to know are -

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• Discipline (e.g. Digital)

• Geography (e.g. UK)

• Budget (£10k-£10,000k)

• Culture required

• Network or Independent

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2. Selection

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(a) quantitative selection​

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At catalyst, we have a database of the Top UK Agencies across all disciplines that we can apply the brief to.

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Once we have filtered by the given criteria we are able to generate a comprehensive long-list of about 15-20 agencies that fit the brief.

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(b) qualitative selection​

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Starting with the long-list we can evaluate the more qualitative criteria of the brief and whittle the list of candidates down even further.

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We aim to get a short-list of between 8-12 agencies at this stage for discussion with the client.

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3. Comparison

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In order to help select the winning agency we do of course have to compare the agencies that are initially selected. We do that across three basic criteria - written submissions, agency visits (to test the chemistry), strategic tasks and finally the all important creative task:

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(a) written submission​

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Before too much time is taken up by either side we ask the agencies to write a little about themselves - 

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• Core credentials

• Who are the team?

• Tell us what you think of the client and their challenges?

• Examples of similar work the agency has already done

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(b) agency visits​

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Once we know a little more about the agencies we can decide which ones we want to visit. Then we can find the answers to some of these -

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• Do we like them?

• What's the culture?

• Would we enjoy working with them?

 

(c) strategic task​

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By now we should only have 3-4 agencies left in the race and we ask them to suggest some strategic solutions to the client's brief.

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It gives great insight into how the agency tackles strategic problems - audience, targeting, insight and hopefully many others.

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(d) creative task​

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Lastly, we set a creative task.

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Taking the brilliant platform set up by the strategic task, how would this agency go about telling a compelling story about the client's brand or product.

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Be prepared to be impressed.