The Hindu Business Line : Getting `Apraised'

Marketing communications consultancy Aprais, which recently set up shop in India, says it helps marketers and their advertising agencies work effectively together. Read on.

IT is described as a "delicate service" that stems from a belief in "partnership in everything." And it seeks to correct the skew in the one-way process that most evaluation systems of client-agency relationships tend to be.

Aprais, a marketing communications consultancy based in London, works with marketers and their advertising, direct marketing and other communications agencies to help them work together more effectively. The organisation calls its service unique and tags its objectives as `Better Relationships, Better Work, Better ROI.' Set up seven years ago, it recently tied up with former JWT executive Sunil Gupta to set up operations in India. Aprais uses proprietary methods and software that enable these relationships to be measured and managed.

Says Gupta, "Most evaluation systems are those designed by the clients for the agency. Though there is a provision for the agencies to state what they feel about the relationship, it is difficult for the agency to articulate that. It becomes a one-way process with only the client rating the agency and not vice-versa. Aprais is different because both client and agency have to hire us together and both have to pay for the service. We espouse partnership in everything."

Aprais is an independent organisation set up by people with extensive experience in advertising and marketing. It has operations across Europe, Australasia and in the Americas. Gupta says its processes enable its reports to be completely objective — the scores speak for themselves (on the quality of the relationship) and opinions and suggestions are given only if they are sought.

It has two processes: the first is the Relationship Measurement and Management (RMM) process, which uses an Internet-based questionnaire. RMM analyses the relationship's strengths and weaknesses and identifies issues that need to be addressed. The questions are designed to reflect aspects most important to the particular relationship — information that gives a view of performance across `disciplines' (agency departments) as well as more qualitative `values' (initiative, capability, timeliness, cost-consciousness) is obtained. Marketers are also assessed on the clarity of their brief to the agencies, the quality of their strategic direction, co-operation and so on.

The processes need to be carried out over regular intervals as that is the only way to assess and make continuous improvements. The minimum time client and agency sign up for a package is one year (comprising two rounds of assessment) but internationally, the firm is selling packages for a three-year period, says Gupta.

The package costs $13,000 (about Rs 6 lakh) per year for two rounds and the next service, Payment By Results (PBR), costs $2,000. Aprais follows up with both parties on whether it has completed the processes necessary for the appraisal. The Aprais pass mark is 65. Prior to the start of the evaluation process, Aprais meets both parties to determine discipline and values selection and the weightings given to them.

A report at the end of each round compares self-assessment with partner assessment to highlight areas of agreement and disagreement about performance. Progress and deterioration against the previous round are also reported. Each round of the procedure provides a single quantified score of both agency and client performance. This allows performance tracking over time and is used as a soft measure in the PBR process.

In line with industry best practices, the PBR process allows the inclusion of key performance indicators (market share, trial take-up, volume growth, share growth) relevant to the particular relationship and weights them to reflect their relative importance. Once all the data is gathered, the software carries out an on-screen calculation of bonus as results against each measure are recorded. When all results have been put in, a single bonus payment figure is displayed. Usually, PBR is calculated annually, as results must be measured before any incentive remuneration is decided. As weightages and measures are agreed on upfront, there are no unwelcome surprises and there is more control for both client and agency on remuneration, says Gupta.

Gupta calls this an "equitable system for both points of view. Both must have the maturity to accept that there might be problems which need to be tackled internally." The system gives the clients and agencies the ability to benchmark performance worldwide, regionally or locally, by division, category, company and relationship type and is a fairer and more even-handed measurement system delivered by an independent third party, says Gupta.

Aprais is available for all types of marketing communication relationships — advertising, direct marketing, media independent, new media, public relations, market research, sponsorship and packaging and design. "India is now maturing as an advertising market, and only recently has the concept of media commission begun to be discarded. There are now many multinational companies and marketing agencies that belong to multinational owners, so it will be good to have common standards and benchmarks — the time is ripe for a service like Aprais'," says Gupta. "Great relationships lead to great work which leads to great brands being built," he adds, making a case for the kind of service it provides.

Aprais has many of the world's biggest brands and marketing agencies as its clients. They include Nestle, Adidas, ANZ, Asahi, GlaxoSmithKline, Philips, Ogilvy, BBDO Worldwide, Euro RSCG and M&C Saatchi, to name just a few. In fact, Nestle is so happy with the results and effectiveness of the Aprais process that it plans to extend it to all its marketing services relationships worldwide, claims Gupta. In the case of a very large multinational in the FMCG category, Aprais' procedures helped reduce the gap and improve matters between the company and its many agencies. Over three-and-a-half years (seven rounds), the client's average scores of agencies' performance increased from 59.3 per cent to 73.1 per cent, client's perceptions of agencies' creative performance went up from 60.6 per cent to 72.2 per cent and the trendline showed consistent improvement over the years. All nine agency relationships qualified for and earned incentive payments. Likewise, the gap between the agency's perception of the client and its perception of itself also reduced.

How do marketers and ad agencies view this service? Marketers say that a service such as this will benefit medium and large companies where several people handle different functions, and not small companies where communication channels are pretty clear and access to the other side is not difficult. Ramanujam Sridhar, CEO of Bangalore-based consultancy brand-comm, says it seems like a good thing. "Anything which improves accountability and shows how well one has done is welcome." A concern is the fee — the amount of money agencies have at their disposal is reduced now that the practice of media commissions is dying out — but that depends on the strength of the client-agency relationship, says Sridhar. Ideally, payment is 50-50 but some marketers choose to pay a greater percentage if the agency can't afford it, says Gupta.

"Such concepts take time and effort to establish, or it may remain a fad. Its success depends on clients declaring it worked for them," Sridhar says, adding that it's a worthwhile experiment.

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