McDowell says she got the idea from the UK-based AAR, who she worked with back in England, and brought the methodology back to South Africa, where it hadn't been done before. Nine years later, the IAS is in a strong position, helping agencies get better work and getting marketers to connect and work together.
"In the end, our job is to create new business for agencies, that's what the IAS does, and creating the right connections for marketers," she says. Next month, the IAS will be hosting the first speed-dating for marketers, which has never been done before in South Africa.
Launching on 20 August 2015 in Johannesburg, the event offers agencies and marketers a no-strings-attached 10-minute opportunity to size each other up and feel if there's enough chemistry to warrant a longer conversation over a boardroom pitching table.
Future sessions are already scheduled for 1 September in Johannesburg and 28 October in Cape Town. McDowell says she "suspects if we created more opportunities for both parties to be together, there would be less and less poaching of clients," which she points out as an issue in South African agencies. "The UK market is slightly more advanced in the sense that there's a more mature relationship between marketers and agencies - not much more, but they're more used to being with each other and not trying to immediately win."
"In the UK it's a slow process, it's about creating that relationship and growth, which is advice for SA agencies to learn from."
Agencies really need to start focusing on their client relationships, she says, it's important for account managers to really bond with clients, and let them know they're not in the backseat when new clients come on board. She warns that if clients are not managed properly, it can lead to some poor behaviour on their part, lack of payment or finding another agency to hear pitches from.
The IAS is also heavily involved in Masterclasses, running almost 33 a year in South Africa. The classes are for both agencies and marketers. Agencies get this perk as part of their subscription to the IAS, and marketers can join classes they're interested in.
The classes cover a variety of subjects, providing a broad landscape for advertisers, media professionals and more, they really try to choose topics that will resonate with the audience. For more on the Masterclass series, click here.
You can find out more about the IAS here.
