Agency 2020
(in bites)
Written by Doremus
Co-authored by
Evelyn Neill, Executive Creative Director
Howard Sherman, Worldwide President
and Matthew Don, Chief Innovation Officer

In order to understand what
Agency 2020 looks like,
you have to ask yourself what
2020 itself looks like.

2020, Generally Speaking:
Technology is geography (it’s one world)
Sustainability is efficiency (greener is cheaper)
Each person is empowered (freer to soar & freer to fail)
These obvious points capture a snapshot of all of wonders – the ubiquity of Internet-facilitated revolutions, the
rise of efficient technology and the high cost of fuel that is inspiring it. The rise of the individual voice thanks to
the technological amplification of that voice. The crumbling of the paternal employer and blue chip safety –
replaced by the empowered, mobile, entrepreneurial, global, untethered and unprotected individual finding his or
her way in the world. It’s a marvelous, dangerous adventuresome world. A veritable plugged-in Dickens novel.

You imagine the future
by searching for its roots
in the present.

True now, truer in 2020
Technology is the game changer
Internet population 2007 vs 2012, a 2x increase in 5 years
Data source: Internet World Stats www.pingdom.com

A view of the big data landscape
detailing how much content is
created every minute of the day.
Domo, 2012
People have integrated technology into their lives
True now, truer in 2020

Thanks to the transparency of
technology, agencies and their clients
can’t control what customers think
and know about brands/products/events.
Ahh, the Mommy Blogger who took on Maytag. The legendary friendship between Zappos, the online shoe
retailer, and its customers. Passengers who wage war with mobile devices from delayed planes on the tarmac.
These stories abound like fairy tales of commerce: evil companies with poisoned apples, giant-slaying customers
with technological slingshots. By 2020, the novelty of this power will fade away. Like women playing sports and
gay marriage, these will be ordinary stories of daily triumph.

We may not be able to control customers,
but we do know a LOT about them.
Doremus 2012

The questions is:
will we be able to mine
the infinite data by 2020 and
will it reveal magical insights?
“Every day, we create 2.5 quintillion bytes of data – so much that 90% of the data in the world today has
been created in the last two years alone. This data comes from everywhere: sensors used to gather
climate information, posts to social media sites, digital pictures and videos, purchase transaction records,
and cell phone GPS signals to name a few. […] Big data is more than simply a matter of size; it is an
opportunity to find insights in new and emerging types of data and content, to make your business more
agile, and to answer questions that were previously considered beyond your reach.”
What is Big Data, IBM, 2012

Or will it
confirm
something
we already
know?

Not to be forgotten
In order to stop a
slump in orange
sales in the 1920's,
Albert Lasker of
the California Fruit
Growers Exchange
popularized
Orange Juice.
This is the heroic ideal of the the big idea. Is the Killer App, the Big Idea, any different from the Fosbury Flop?
For those who saw Dick Fosbury go over the high jump bar BACKWARDS, using the simple power of centrifugal force,
it was as if the world had inverted, the sun rose in the west. A good idea is a good idea – shockingly simple and revolutionary.
This will be true in 2020, 2040, 2060.

The pernicious staying power of
“the BIG IDEA”
as a mainstay of the idea business
is an abiding validation of the principle
that people are the same – they still
respond to “game changing” ideas.

So if people don’t change,
but tools and technology do….
What does that mean
for agency structure?

Well, an agency in 2020 will probably be
The Full Meal Deal Agency: a technology,
culture, insights, and experience company.
Doremus 2012

An agency in 2020 will also be
The Big Brain Agency: the resource
that delivers best of breed ideas
from outsourced excellence.
“agency”
Brilliant
outsourced
creative
Brilliant
offshore
website
developer
Brilliant
small
strategy
business
Affiliated
media
conglomerate
Media
content
partnership
Small
design
firm
A
gaming
firm

In other words, we’re
going to continue to see
a proliferation of models.

In 2020, these will be table stakes
Flexibility
Adaptability
Strategic capability
Ability to deliver consistently

The agency business is not different from
other manufacturing and service businesses.
It will have to figure out what to own,
what to rent and when to form partnerships.
And because this is a time of shifting
cultural platforms, there will be many models.

Are these unprecedented times?
No, every time technology has presented a new platform, we have seen similar confusion and proliferation.

As Victor Hugo said of the printing press
when its ability to print the Bible rendered the
biblical stories of cathedral architecture unnecessary:
“It is the second Tower of Babel.”

The printing press offered unending
proliferation of “authority” and the written word.
The radio changed the narrative of the printed novel.
Television changed the radio narrative.
The computer is altering television, telephony & mail.
Mobile technology is altering the computer.
Etc., etc. with increasing speed.

To prepare for the future:
Identify the forces that impact culture.
Leverage them in appropriate and
unexpected ways to further clients’
relationships with their customers.
Partner with clients in a financial model
that captures the worth of this endeavor.
Then, repeat.

And repeat.

A role model:
With the cathedral released
from its duty to tell a story,
architecture was free to become
something entirely else.

What will the agency of 2020 be?
Something we recognize as familiar
but almost certainly changed.

Like the Fosbury Flop