For the past decade, twice a year, AdForum gathers the world's leading consultants to meet with advertising industry leaders and discuss the best practices in the industry. These workshops revealed that these two groups of people share common values and beliefs; and wished to communicate their principles in an official form.
Through signing the code of conduct, the agency search consultants wish to express their business commitments, which they consider a necessity to ensure the quality and objectivity of the service provided to the advertisers. They also commit to respect the position of the agencies involved in these selections, because relationships between advertisers and agencies have to be fair and equitable.
Consultants have organised their code of conduct around seven key principles that they constantly follow during the agency selection process:
The code of conduct will be communicated to all relevant parties through their trade associations. It will be published on participating consultants' websites as well as on AdForum.com. A list of consultants can be found on www.adforum.com.
Says Johanna McDowell, CEO of the Independent Agency Search and Selection Company (IAS) in South Africa: "The IAS has attended the Ad Forum Summits for the past four years. Each year attendance by the consultants has grown. The opportunity to discuss client/agency relationship management with our international colleagues has brought enormous value to our business and, we believe, to the clients and agencies that we serve."
