Aaron Savage’s blog ‘The Gypsy Mission’ has an article on corporate blogging and cites Welcome to Optimism as an example. He says:

"The second type of blogging company has an official blog in the company name, which designated members of staff can contribute to on a daily basis. Typically this is how smaller companies handle blogging. Some set this for senior management and department heads whilst others encourage the entire organisation to contribute. Wieden Kennedy’s blog “Welcome to Optimism” is a good example of this. They keep write-ups of pitches they have done, new work just released, company night’s out, late nights at work, new hires, and really show what it’s like to work with this extremely talented group of advertising people. It therefore serves as a recruitment tool but also showcases work to clients and prospects alike. A new prospective client gets an extremely good view of the agency and gains valuable information as to whether this is a team that they want to work with. The question though in these circumstances is whether clients really want to know what it is really like to work inside an agency or whether this is more truth than they can handle. Wieden Kennedy’s growth for the year seems to indicate that this isn’t the case and the rest of the personality of the agency is clear for all to see whilst the industry reads their blog hoping to pick up some tips on how they produce the excellent work they do."

Which is a nice write-up of what we try to do. I know that some people in ‘the industry’ look at this blog but I’m not sure that prospective clients do. Though they definitely look at the ‘official’ site over at https://wklondon.com/ . In fact, I suspect that browsing of agency websites has to a certain extent replaced the part of the new business process known as the ‘creds meeting’. It used to be that the new business director of a large agency would be expected to arrange two or three creds (credentials) meetings a week, at which the agency would present examples of its work and approach to potential clients, whether or not they were actually reviewing their business at the time. These speculative meetings just don’t happen any more. Clients don’t visit agencies unless they’re actually putting a pitch list together. Partly because they’re too busy and partly because the competitiveness of today’s new biz environment would mean they’re liable to be torn apart by desperate agencies if they started just ‘popping in for a chat.’ It’s easier for them just to have a look at the agencies’ websites – no commitment and no feeding frenzy.

So, are there any propsective clients out there reading this? And have we put you off by revealing too much of what it’s like on the inside?

Just came across this book again. Randall Rothenberg’s ‘Where the suckers moon’ is an insider’s account of the pitch for and subsequent loss of the Subaru U.S. account by Wieden + Kennedy in the early 90s. For anyone interested in a behind-the scenes look at the pitch process and client/agency relationship, it’s one of the best books you can read. It also gives you a warts-and-all feel for what W+K Portland was like in those days. Rothenberg got an extraordinary degree of access to the clients and the agencies involved in the story. I remember talking to Dave Luhr, W+K CEO, who features in the book, about this. He said, "Yeah. The guy would even follow me into the john."
I orginally read it before I worked at W+K so it’s interesting to look at it again now. It’s a good read and it gives some interesting background on the history of W+K. Here’s a wee bit:

"Wieden was an unlikely creative star. His father Duke was one of the grand old men of Portland advertising…Dan was born on the cusp of the baby boom, in 1945. He was as rebellious as his father was establishment. An angular, perpetually energetic kid with a seemingly limitless capacity for wonderment… Dan wanted to be a writer but not like the writers at his dad’s agency. If these subordinated scribes were the best minds of his generation then they were, as Allen Ginsburg wrote, ‘ burned alive in their flannel suits on Madison Avenue amid blasts of leaden verse and the tanked-up clatter of the iron regiments of fashion.’ Dan would have none of it. Advertising is a whorish business, he told his friends. It’s a shell game. An easy way to make a living… Dan knew he wanted something more…"

And here’s a bit about Dan and Dave’s breakaway from the William Cain agency in 1982 to start their own shop, taking the then-small Nike account with them.

"Some of the more junior members in Nike’s marketing department were aghast. However creative Dan and David may have been, their managerial abilities were…questionable. These guys were long-haired, bearded flower children. How are these two guys going to start an agency? several of the company’s young executives wondered."

Well, some things have changed a lot in the last 24 years. And some haven’t changed at all. Dan’s hair is a bit shorter but he cheerfully confesses to being an old hippy. His managerial  style certainly reflects that description of him as a kid, but it seems to be still working pretty well.

The book is highly recommended. Buy it here.