ABOUT YARDSTICK
Yardstick provides a comprehensive range of management consulting services to the Marketing and Communication Industry.
Our products and services are designed to improve the effectiveness of your business’ marketing and communication programmes, to assist you in saving costs, and to reinforce governance and assurance within your organisation.
NINE WAYS TO REDUCE MARKETING COSTS
Covid-19 has placed tremendous pressure on marketing budgets and will test client-agency relationships.
Yardstick offers a range of services to help marketers reduce marketing expenditure and improve marketing efficiencies.
Agency Portfolio Review
Covid-19 has brought about shifts in how you market your product. Does your agency roster reflect these changes, or are you holding on to pre-Covid models that are expensive and ineffective? Conduct an Agency Portfolio Review and identify areas that could bring about savings by working with the right number and the right mix of agencies.
Marketing Supply Chain Review
Conduct an in-depth review of your Marketing Supply Chain with the aim of identifying potential cost savings, inefficiencies and other opportunities that will maximise your return on investment.
Benchmark Fees
Identify areas of wastage and potential savings by Benchmarking your agency fees, pre-production and studio costs, rate cards and working vs. non-working expenditure to industry standards.
Remuneration Methodology
Does your agency remuneration model match the dynamics of your business and ways of working, or are they inflexible? The adoption of a different Remuneration Methodology could bring about significant savings, ensure that you only pay for what you require and drive the right agency behaviour. Models for consideration include: output based remuneration, value based remuneration, resource based remuneration, performance based remuneration and extraction based remuneration.
Review and Renegotiate Agreements
Does your existing agency contract lock you into terms, conditions, fees and services that do not serve your post Covid-19 requirements? Review and Renegotiate your agreement to better serve your needs. In addition to reviewing your contract, Yardstick will provide terms sheets to put you in a strong negotiation position, help facilitate negotiation and draft new contracts.
Risk and Reward Models
Implement Risk and Reward Models that ensure a true partnership with your agencies where they reduce their cost of services and share in the spoils of successful campaigns. Link agency remuneration to agency performance, campaign effectiveness and efficiency. Yardstick also provides user friendly dashboards for easy reporting and instant calculation of incentives.
Terminate Contracts
Should Covid-19 result in you having to Terminate Contracts with your existing agencies, ensure that you consider and manage the associated risks, such as: future commitments, contractual obligations (e.g. usage rights, royalties, etc.), intellectual property, source codes and inventory transfers, and a full financial reconciliation of the account.
Condensed Pitch
Few marketers have the time or the budget to run expensive, protracted pitches post Covid-19. Yardstick’s Condensed Pitch will ensure that due diligence is applied to the selection of new agency partners, whilst cutting back on the time and the investment required.
New Ways of Working
Oftentimes there is no need to do new things; to save money you simply have to do the same things differently. Yardstick is able to evaluate your marketing practices and to identify New Ways of Working that will not only improve efficiencies but also introduce cost effectiveness.
If you want to know how to navigate the effects of Covid-19 on your marketing budget and agency relationships, contact either:
Johan van der Westhuizen
082 822 4198
Zahn Rossouw
082 653 4868