In-House or Agency: Which one is better?

In the beginning, it’s better to focus on these two words, In-House and Agency. Though these words have several meanings, in this article, these words are related to Marketing and Branding.

In sales, marketing and branding of a product, we have to do several tasks and these tasks are very much important for a product to get customers and publicity. For example, making advertisements to broadcast in electronic media, organizing events, and even printing out leaflets if necessary and so on. Now the question is, who will be doing all these works? It’s a big concern for a marketer or a brand professional to think about, as different organizations have different philosophies and ideologies.

Nowadays, many organizations show interest in forming their own in-house team, which will be able to work like any other agency. But why they are interested in such a concept? Before answering this question, let me discuss some other topics related to this concept.

In-House

Salehin Chowdhury is the writer of this article

According to my work experience with some ‘A’ category agencies, I have realized that these types of agencies are very efficient. As they have worked with several brands, their thinking is sharp and applications of thinking is attractive as well.

In this age of specialization, there’s no alternative to specialized manpower. Moreover, those agencies who practice the principle of “Right person in the right place”, can show the mastery in their projects, which definitely stands apart, and it’s not difficult for them to give brilliant feedback to its client. The problem is with the unplanned agencies which have been grown with whimsical effort. This problem is increased when people with little knowledge start working in this field. In an emerging economy, many new initiatives will be introduced. Conventional companies will be introduced in new way, and it’s quite natural. I am a marketer, I will have to follow deadlines and to deliver product maintaining the accuracy.

I always try to maintain the variation and I do work in a different way. I would like to share the strategy that I follow with my team. I divide my team into four categories naming “A”, “B”, “C”, and “D”. Here, A means ATL, which means Above the line and it includes press, electronic media, etc. B means BTL, which means below the line and it includes event, outdoor activation etc. C means creative and it includes visualizing, designing etc. And, finally, D means Digital which means Facebook, Youtube, Linkedin, Websites, e-commerce etc. I have trained 4 senior colleagues as the head of these segments and with them, I am working in several brands and bring out results of their daily works. Moreover, in my team, there is one copywriter, one backup designer, one video editor, and one product specialist.

Those who are interested to work and bring output under a conservative budget can form a team as I mentioned above. I hope, you will get a better result. As I said before that, agencies play an important role to bring out result through a good marketing campaign. As a result, it’s not easy to establish a 100% in-house. You should always take help from agencies for making brand guidelines, photoshoots, making TVCs etc. As this write up is for a conservative budget, I prefer to hire a rising agency. Many group of companies are now hiring senior persons. Some seniors are now establishing agencies. You can hire them. Hopefully, they will be able to provide you good service at a competitive price. And, the most important thing is, in creative tracks, or in advertising, it’s really important to maintain a good relationship.

Before I conclude, I would like to say that, if you achieve something brilliant with limited resources, it’s the success of a marketer. The more you share experiences, the more knowledge will be increased. Hopefully, Almighty creator will show us the path and seniors will guide juniors in this area.

Salehin Chowdhury is an expert on Global Brand Communications. He has exposure to branding local products and services and has versatile experience on all segments of ATL and BTL Communications, along with B2B and B2C background in terms of Product, Service and Social Branding. Salehin has specialised skills on Startup Ventures Brand Formulation with cost-effectiveness and high integrity. Throughout his career, he has an enriched experience on Brand Communication and Marketing and worked with Brands like OTOBI, RUNNER, The City Bank Limited, Premier Bank, BanglaCAT, Abdul Monem Limited, Bengal Foundation, Jamuna Group, Lubnan Trade Consortium, Canadian University of Bangladesh etc. Currently, he is a Research fellow doing his MPhil in the topic "Globalization strategies of Local brands" at Bangladesh University of Professionals (BUP).
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