Re: My Last Blog Entry.

Yes, we won it and Mr Cadbury owes me a tenner!!!!

Always look up.

Yes Mark. I read your Blog entry tonight and it has been a tough month or two. But, heh, what did you expect? A walk in the park. Not on your life baby! This is the sharp end and we both know it. No cosy corporate cotton wool to snuggle up into when the going gets a little rough now matey.

You should have been with me right at the beginning of the Impress odyssey when no-one, and I mean literally no-one, gave it a prayer. But here we are. Doubling turnover year on year; more and more clients every week; losing the odd one on the way, but let's live and learn. The entity that Impress is still less than three years old and I kinda believe that we haven't even started yet. I know you love my comparisons with a past life in the music biz, so here's another one. We've just hit the tricky third album stage. Expectations are high and the audience awaits. Will the hype be justified? Or will the doubters have their day early? Well, guess what, there is only one answer. The third album will be the best yet; white noise overload and the lyrics of an angel. Just you wait. Wanna bet me....?

So, why so confident? Cos we produce outstanding work throughout. Cos we do deliver. Cos we are learning from our mistakes. Cos we have the humility to say 'I was wrong' (another Sisters' track) and apologise. Cos we take it on the chin and the spirit shines through. Cos the endeavours are heart-driven and cos we know what we have to do.

The old dame Lady Luck plays a part too. British Telecom - what do you really expect? A lumbering corporate monolith trying to hang on to the amoral monopoly it has always been gifted by God knows who. But it makes mountains of cash so our Broadband fiasco matters not a jot to them. I am even starting to enjoy the battle. Every call; every empty promise; every red bill. Sha la la la..... The battle will continue until the cheque arrives rest assured.

Pitching. Now there's another matter. So you have lost a couple of late. Don't worry about it. I admire your tenacity and belief in the concept that we do loads of work for nothing, only to be shrugged off like a errant fly. You know my view and I won't change. Just follow your instinct and crack on. You have won quite a few don't forget and what about Crown Paints!!!! I will follow my own (hooked) nose and do it my way following the labyrinth of referrals and introductions. It seems to be working cool my end and I am totally committed to our existing clients who really need their marketing agency at the mo. Business is tough for some of  them and we must stand shoulder to shoulder.....

Which brings me to Blue M. It was awful. Humiliating and a real wake-up call. We can blame BT or whoever, but we should have had a back-up plan. We should have. We were carried away by the concept we believed in so much. We missed a trick or two and the lesson has been a bitter one. Hopefully, the only loss has been reputation which can be repaired over time.

Two things I cannot change. Your age and your dog. Commiserations to one and all regarding the latter, but your age only matters if you start thinking about it too much. So keep the faith and get on with it. Oh, and buy the way, here are a few reasons to be cheerful agency-wise:

Orchard Park project cranking up into overdrive.
Winning Bodyline Books as a client - How cool is that?
The 3Sphere re-brand. Beautiful. Big thanks to Angela & Martin in particular.
Farm Shops everywhere and the irony of it all.
Everything that is Pythouse.

And, I nearly forgot, I did win the Top Banana pitch this week. Not that I'm rubbing it in or anything....

And we're pitching together tomorrow to a genuine multi-national!!!!!!!!!!!!

A tenner says we win it hands down!!!!

Personally the last month has not been the best time of the year.

Firstly we have been badly let down by British Telecom, we had no broadband access for 2 weeks, through BT’s faulty installation. This meant that we were unable to present a web-based pitch for a brand design agency for their global website. Not only had Impress done all the research work, presided over a workshop, interviewed some of their global clients in UK, USA, Australia and Europe, but also devised a site map. However, it was impossible to present the full extent of our work.

Secondly, I had a great idea for a really interactive and engaging website for a school in Dorset, Bryanston Public School. The idea was to engage with parents, pupils and staff both current and potential by online video – the way of the world at the moment if you look at Youtube.com (20 million unique visitors a month!) and Video Google. This was another pitch, against larger agencies, and Impress did not get the website work.

Thirdly, our family dog died of bronchial pneumonia which was incredibly sad, while all the above was going on. Lara, named after the cricketer Brian Charles Lara, was a 12 year old black Labrador who had the sweetest temperament you could ever wish for in a dog. She grew up as my three boys were growing up and is the same age as my oldest son. We all miss her terribly.

I don’t like the pitching process.

The brand design agency, Blue Marlin, one of the global leaders in brand packaging design, were incredibly generous in offering a fee for the pitch. They have worked on pitches for their potential clients over the past 12 years at huge cost to the organisation only to get a two-line email saying we’ll keep you on our books!

Bryanston had 5 agencies pitch for the website work, some going all the way down to Dorset from as far as Cambridge. Effectively each agency had a 20% chance of getting the business, and each of them (I’m sure) put in hours, days and weeks of preparation.

Impress do pitch for work and have successfully pitched for 4 or 5 pieces of work that include websites in the past 3 weeks. However, we always maintain that we are a marketing agency not a web agency or design agency in isolation.

Marketing is a broad area of expertise and we pride ourselves in delivering customer-driven solutions that involve strategy, branding, research and tactical delivery. Effectively you get what you pay for, and we deliver the highest level of strategic thinking.

Impress want to be in the position whereby potential customers come to us, talk to us, realise that what they are getting is a thought through strategic approach and not a simple tactical solution.

I was also my 43^rd Birthday on 7^th November!