David Zucker, CMO at King Ranch, recently told me: Agencies only capture his attention in two ways: deep mastery of the space or ideas bold enough to break through the noise.
And he’s right.
I speak with agencies every week that are trying to break into a new category or land opportunities with brands they’ve never worked with before.
But here’s the hard part:
Most don’t have a clear reason why a brand marketer should pay attention.
If you’re entering a new industry, you’re asking a marketing leader to trust you more than the specialists who already know their world inside and out. That’s a tough ask unless you’ve built a track record in a specific discipline so strong it transfers across industries.
On the other hand, many agencies do solid work, but not the kind that makes a CMO stop scrolling. If it isn’t clearly differentiated, clearly original, or clearly driving outsized outcomes, it blends into the same pile as everyone else.
And when that happens?
Leaders fall back on the partners they already know.
To earn attention today, you need one of two things:
• Deep expertise in an industry or a marketing discipline that makes you the obvious choice.
• Or creative and strategic performance that’s so strong it can’t be ignored.
And in a market this competitive…
you may need both.
So ask yourself:
Would a CMO look at your expertise and say, “they know my world better than I do”?
—or—
Would your results force them to stop and think, “I’ve never seen an idea like this before”?
If not, that’s the gap to fix.
