Columnist Scott Rayden discusses the challenges facing agencies in a constantly-changing digital marketing landscape, explaining what agencies must do to adapt and survive.
Performance marketing agencies are dying.
No, this isn’t one of those posts like the ones we’ve been seeing for the last five or six years claiming that “SEO is dead.” Performance marketing itself is alive and well. But the old breed of performance marketing agencies – channel-based, silo-shaped, pure campaign management performance agencies – is indisputably going extinct.
The biggest fallout is being felt by independent agencies, which are either rapidly folding or being bought up. Technology is shrinking management margins to unsustainable levels. Consumers, channels, device behavior, data, and business models all look dramatically different than they did 18 months ago, and many smaller agencies don’t have the scope or resources to adjust. (Note: The author’s agency, 3Q Digital, was acquired by Harte Hanks on March 16.)
So what’s becoming of digital marketing? And will there be any independent agencies left to lead the revolution? To get to that answer, we’ll examine changes to the industry, channels, technology, data and clients, and we’ll explore how agencies need to position themselves to thrive…
