In fond memory of clients who had time...

A personal account.

I have a lot of respect for Clients who have time.

Take giving a brief on a campaign for instance; the expectations are - great insight, exceptional creative, disruptive ideas, and optimized costs. This is fair. No client must settle for less. However, "We need it in 48 hours..." is where the break down begins.

Ambika Sharma

The client loses!

"You are not giving the time for any of your fair expectations to be met. No time for insight, no time for the awesomeness of creative thought and certainly no time to plan an optimized execution. In fact, this deadline is a set up for a cut-copy-paste job." Such manner of work rarely flies and if it does, it does not matter how little you paid, it's probably not worth it.

The agency loses!

"The deadline is set up for mediocrity and any agency worth their salt will want to do a damn good job on every brief and every piece of work that comes their way. So the agency may win the business, but they have lost the chance to put their best foot forward." There is also the matter of the message it sends.

#you are not expected to be brilliant

#client does not care enough about the campaign; it's an afterthought

#they already know who they want to give the business to; you are the third quotation

#they forgot they have to present a plan to their boss; you are their suckers

#they will not reply with feedback once the plan is presented

So a big 'Thank you' to all the awesome folks who plan a nicely written brief in advance and provide reasonable time to exceed expectations; you are the last of the good ones!

(The author is founder and managing director, Pulp Strategy Communications, a full-service interactive, digital communications and technology agency)