The Billboard That Launched an Agency

The launch of Duncan Marketing & Advertising has been postponed, for obvious reasons. I am still offering freelance services (copy writing, media buying, social media management, etc). However, it looks like it will be at least Summer 2020 before I get the full agency started.

So to make the best of a difficult situation, I have redirected my domain to this simple blog. I will be sharing my thoughts on marketing and advertising, resources for my future clients (like you, dear reader), and maybe even some general nonsense.

There are a number of reasons why I decided to start  my own advertising agency. I will start with the most important one, I just like it. I genuinely enjoy the challenge of telling a story, driving revenue, and the beauty of well crafted media. I also seem to thrive the most when I am self-employed, both financially and spiritually.

But there are sometimes events in your life that show you the way forward. I want to share the big one, the proverbial smack in the face that confirmed for me the need for yet another advertising agency in the Triangle.

While driving along on the inner beltway one day, I saw this billboard:

Billboard reads "We think you'll find it's quite a find. The WakeMed All Access App. Find it all."

In case you don't live in Raleigh, WakeMed is a local hospital chain with over 3 billion dollars in annual gross revenue. For those of you who caught the problem right away, thank your English teachers. Setting aside that their slogan has too many words in general, they use the word "find" twice. This happened even though this organization has a marketing budget potentially in the millions, a capable director of marketing, both external and internal ad agencies, and a billboard company to proofread the copy.

I have heard it said, true or not, that the perfect billboard has seven words. Do I have a better suggestion? Yes. "It's quite a find." It's simpler, cleaner, and can be read as you drive by without the urge to get out a red pen. It also fits into copy that almost adds up to the magic seven words. As in, "WakeMed's New All Access App. It's quite a find!" I also rewrote their radio ads for the app as soon as I heard them, inserting my own slogan as a more effective hook to grab the listener at the end. Sadly, that's what I do when I drive around; look at and listen to media, and find ways I could have done it better.

There is one more public relations disaster that contributed to my decision to start my own business again. But that's a long story for a future blog about how even good press coverage can go bad.

This leads us to my big, life changing decision to start my own business. Taking this leap wasn't as scary for two other reasons, the first being I had done it before (successful entertainment production company with clients like Disney and the Citrus Bowl), and the Triangle is an amazing place to start a business. But the main reason is that there is a need I can fill, namely offering a record of ratings and revenue success to a market where even the biggest organizations can have marketing missteps.

So stay tuned for our launch, hopefully sooner than later, when this economy gets going again. In the meantime, I hope you and yours stay safe. If I can help you in the meantime, please feel free to call me at (919) 336-9993‬, or email me at scott (at) duncanmarketingandadvertising (dot) com.