Trevor Graves is a founding principle and the GM of Nemo Design.  I got to know Trevor a bit better recently when they were on the shortlist for a recent ad agency search I conducted.

NEMO lives Youth Culture.  From its roots as a three man shop in Portland, Nemo has grown into an internationally recognized marketing/design firm, with multi-million dollar clients like Nike, HP, ESPN, Fuel Television network, Smith optics, Bell helmets, Timbers MLS soccer, Salomon and Timberline–to name a few.

When asked that makes NEMO different, Trevor says “We never make ads: advertising is fake, it’s clutter, and it’s ignored by most. We touch people through art, we communicate emotions, we engage in genuine conversation, we create real experiences that real people will find interesting, inspiring, useful and memorable. We make the cash register ring, without trying to sell anyone.”

With respect to all the recent “label” discussions about agencies, NEMO eschews labels.  They become whatever kind of agency they need to solve problem.  I like that.

To everyone who wonders about the future of agencies and whether they’ll stay around NEMO says “We are paid for having vision (we see the invisible) and a Point of View (we can explain what it looks like, what it means, and why it matters). ”  In your face, cynics.

What was the aha moment when you realized “our company needs to be doing things differently than we have been”?

Is there ever one defining AHA moment? To be relevant in culture and in business, you need to have AHA moments all the time. We live in the age of change. So, the big lofty AHA may arrive and it’s very subtle. Growing up in action sports, you’re intuitively aware of nuances and you’re constantly moving. You see everything in a shifted paradigm: what can I do with this? What can I make here? What line can I take? This awareness is hardwired into a lot of the people at Nemo and it helps us tremendously; you learn to recognize change in the world and how to creatively embrace it, how to be curious and provoke the new. Our clients constantly look to us to help them see the invisible opportunity and create an impact with it.

What books are on your nightstand or great blogs on your Google reader?

The book that is literally on my nightstand today is “Built to Last” by James Collins and Jerry Porras. One of the dangers in this industry is defining your success and what your stand for through your clients, rather than having a great sense of your own core ideology. As for blogs and such, I am ADD. The snack-sized bites coming through my Tweedeck are in the same vein as things you’d find on the Hitch blogroll.

Give me an example of marketing you think is brilliant and why.

The world I came from, “marketing” was a dirty word and something not to be trusted. Marketing meant fake. The real impact came from the people and brands that were all about adding to the culture: Participating, connecting, and celebrating a lifestyle. I use that filter to judge what we call “marketing” today. Is it real, is it making real change and are people feeling it? Favorite examples are the iPhone, really centering around product as message, and the Obama campaign. The simple slogans of Change and Hope, the use of a logo mark,  and the social media was game-changing.

We’ve all read that the pitch / RFP process is broken.  Many agencies aren’t even interested in competing in pitches.  Do you see an alternative to this process?

I am going to make a Mad Men reference, please forgive me. Season 3, Episode 7.  Don Draper is called into talk with Conrad Hilton in his Presidential suite. Conrad asks Don to take a look at some mock up of ads he has on the coffee table.

Conrad- “What do ya think”

Don- “I don’t think you would be working in the Presidential suite if you worked for free.”

Conrad, surprised- “This is friendly”

Don- “Connie, this is my profession, what do you want me to do?”

Conrad smirks, taken aback that Don didn’t just roll over and give him the free advise he desired.

Conrad- “ I want you to give me one for free.”

With a poetic pause, the camera pans low and looks up at Don as he pulls a smoke and lights it with a cool guy style. The camera pans back down to an illustrated mouse dressed in a top hat, and a marker rendering of the exterior of the Hilton Hotel. Don exhales. In a confident straightforward response, he replies.

Don- “I don’t think anybody wants to think about a mouse at a hotel.”

Conrad Hilton is startled and dazed. Don has earned Conrad’s respect and is asked to symbolically sit at the table with him to discuss the advertisements, peer to peer. This is an opportunity we as agency people are asked to do in the RFP process yet we give away our spot at the table by giving our service for free. I think many of us have read Blair Enns “Win Without Pitching” and there are some insights in the work that help the community of agencies to commiserate as victims about how unfair the RFP process can be. We can’t control the world but like Don Draper, we can control our reaction to it.

Let’s look at the RFP process from the client side and see where we as the agency can have our own Don Draper moments. The average relationship between agency and client is about 4 years. What that means for the client is that they are not practiced or even up to speed on what agencies are out there, who is a good fit for their band and even practice on how to “court” a great agency. Like Mr. Hilton, the client can be a bit unsure and wants to avoid what Enns calls Buyer’s Remorse. They don’t want to hire the wrong firm. They ask the agency to pitch free ideas because the execution is very literal and makes it easier for them to compare agency to agency. I get it. What Nemo has done is set up a routine or process around qualifying the lead.

1. Is this client a good match for Nemo? Nemo is an Action agency and it makes sense for a client to come to us to us for our expertise. A Hotel like the Hilton might not be a good fit for Nemo however a resort like the Black Pearl resort in the Caymen Island would be a good fit for Nemo, http://www.blackpearl.ky/
2. Budget. If they are not willing to go over a scope of work and budget then they are showing signs of a bad client and we would put up a red flag at this point. If they have a small budget, we ask to work around an actual contest of pitching. Our margin gets sucked up in handing out free work when there isn’t more money to offset the pitch once and if we win the account. $500k is a budget that pitching starts to make sense for Nemo. Smaller than that is a project and handled differently.
3. We ask whom else are they asking to pitch. I am not sure why all the secrecy around this topic but it is fair to know the landscape. If a client is asking for something for free, I want transparency of who else is on the short list. This is because if we perceive any of the competition is a better fit for the client’s needs, we are the first to endorse their service and save ourselves all the expense and inefficiency of pitching.
4. If the client has a smaller budget and the work lines up and the client is still in the “Buyer’s Remorse” mode, we suggest doing a small, real project to see how the relationship works first hand. We have also done in depth case study reviews to help clients understand how we have worked with other clients and how we might work together.
5. We try to have the actual stakeholders present rather than just the marketing department. The territory is not the map.

What does the agency of the future look like?

The agency model I see reflects our vision of what Nemo was born to do. Fast, smart, passionate and well connected. We keep our core team full time to insure our branded look and service, then ramp up around them with experts and freelancers when needed. There are so many talented creatives in the market; it makes managing a business much smarter. We can hand pick a SWAT team of experts to tap for consulting in short bursts. Hollywood works this way.

I also see the best creative agencies contributing more to culture; making their own brands and content, taking more risks and sharing the rewards, collaborating and experimenting. Who wants to play?

What do marketers need that agencies are not giving them?

Marketers need their agencies to offer emerging rates for services that they want to grow into. The old cliché states that you can’t get the job without the experience and you cant get the experience without the job. Your agency understands your brand and with the ability to expand that service you both win. For an example, if you were an interactive shop, extending into a social media service wouldn’t be a huge leap of faith. It is fair to pay that firm less for them to gain the experience on your brand and in return you as the marketers get a deeper service at a discounted rate. A win-win for both parties.

Who do you admire and why?

Amelia Graves. She is our 5-year daughter. I guess I am getting to maturity to be able to observe her world and how she might see it. She is imaginative, curious about the world, she lives in the present with no concern for the future, she has no concept of money, she breaks out in song and dance with no fear of being ridiculed. When she plays with her toys, she is lost in an endless imaginary world. My selfish side wants to bottle that energy up and use it to further my agenda in the real world of constantly needing to invent more creative for clients. The other side of me admires this innocence for what it is and knows that she can own that space and time.

“All children are artists. The problem is how to remain an artist once he grows up.” - Pablo Picasso

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Well, it’s been an exciting and busy summer.  I’m talking to lots of agencies lately who are hearing the phones starting to ring again–which is good news for everybody.  That’s partly why it’s been nearly a month since a new Ad Industry Innovators series, everybody’s busy, including me.  I’m a little over two weeks from finishing up the first Hitch search–with a few other interesting potentials on the horizon so stay tuned for exciting news!

Today’s Ad Industry Innovator is a shout out to the Emerald City with a Seattle agency called Creature.  New Business Director, Barton Bodell described Creature as their clients’ wild card agency.  The folks clients go to when they don’t want same old same old.  I thought that was a great description, so I’m going with it.

I interviewed Robson Grieve, who is Creature’s Managing Director.  He came to the agency after being a Creature client con Corbis.  ( 5 pts for reading that correctly out loud.)

1. What was the aha moment when you realized “our company needs to be doing things differently than we have been”?

The big “aha” moment for Creature happened back in Amsterdam, when Matt and Jim (co-creative directors) were talking about starting an agency. After working in a couple of the biggest and best agencies in the US (Wieden & Kennedy and Goodby Silverstein), they went to Europe and saw a different way of doing things. This old world+new world experience led the guys to the simple philosophy that “the best media space you can buy is in someone’s mind.” That idea really defines how we look at the changing relationship between consumers and brands, and it has shaped how we do our work on a day-to-day basis. The evolution from a “broadcast” model where advertisers were telling people what to think, to more of a cooperative model where we are starting a conversation with people and incorporating them in to the brand development process.

The truth is, however, that we are having “aha” moments all the time and we look at our model as a work in progress. We are constantly studying our capabilities and looking for ways to make Creature more relevant to current and future clients. Every year we seem to undertake one or two big changes, and we are constantly challenging the status quo and updating our business model. Essentially, we look at the search for “aha” moments as an every day part of the job.

2. What books are on your nightstand or great blogs on your Google reader?

I almost never read about advertising or business, because I find most business popular books to be a little too orderly in their analysis.  There are a few notable exceptions, of course, but in general I try to find interesting/thought provoking books rather than books about business.  I’m working on a pretty scary book right now – it’s called “Global Catastrophes and Trends.”  It is a comprehensive look at the risks we face in the next 50 years by a university professor named Vaclav Smil.  Smil has written a lot about energy and the environment, and has a very data driven perspective on projecting the future of the world.  Before that, I read “The Black Swan: The impact of the Highly Improbable,” which was a really inspiring book that basically reinforced my belief that it is more important to be open to new things than it is to be expert at pattern recognition.

In terms of blogs, I read Mark Cuban’s blogmaverick.com a lot because he is such a firebrand, and has the ability to separate the hype from reality in new media.  For social media stuff I read Logic+Emotion.  He has a nice theory-based approach to explaining social structures online.  I am also a bit of an economic news junky, and my jumping off point there is a blog called “calculated risk” which has some interesting articles, and a wealth of links to top econ authors.

3. Give me an example of marketing you think is brilliant and why.

Michael Jackson. Look at how popular he is all of a sudden. Tough way to do it, but you have to give the guy credit for his commitment to the brand.

Seriously, this is a really difficult question to answer because some of the most examples that people use as great “marketing companies” aren’t marketing companies at all – they just make great products that people love. I would say that I have been pretty impressed with Fed Ex and how they have incorporated golf in to their brand. They created a great event with the PGA (The Fed Ex Cup), and they have succeeded in making the connection between golf and fed ex very natural through their advertising.

4. We’ve all read that the pitch / RFP process is broken.  Many agencies aren’t even interested in competing in pitches.  Do you see an alternative to this process?

I think it is convenient to complain about the RFP process. Is it fun to put a bunch of resources in to a high risk endeavor, with disappointment the most statistically likely outcome? Of course not, but I don’t see how the industry could come together and invent a method for pitching could be set up that would solve all the problems. Competitive bidding is a part of almost every industry’s procurement process, so agencies aren’t alone in being disappointed because they didn’t get a piece of business. Watch “Glengarry Glen Ross.” Life isn’t fair.

The thing agencies need to decide is how much they are willing to give in this process. This is an individual and situational decision. For example, at one extreme, some clients are demanding ownership of all ideas created for the pitch, and agencies just need to decide if they are willing to go that far. In some cases, the answer will be yes, in some cases it will be no.

There have been some crazy pitches the last few months (the famous “twitterfp” and Zappos are on people’s minds) that have people buzzing, and I would say that if they agencies don’t like the process, they should sit out. Or better yet, if agencies don’t like the process they should work with the client to shape the right process.

5. What does the agency of the future look like?

It is interesting to try to predict what the agency of the future looks like, because we are likely to be mostly wrong no matter what we predict. I think it is safe to say that it is likely we will be more similar to strategy consultants like Bain or McKinsey than we will be to old-line Madison Avenue agencies. I also think it is safe to say that we are going to need to be “cross trained” at every level, because the world isn’t going to be neatly organized by media like it has been in the past.

I do think that a lot of the speculation around ownership of ideas that has gone on is a little misleading. Big brands don’t need to share risk with agencies, so the expectation that they share rewards in a significant way is probably unfounded. Pay-for-performance is coming in some way, but I think it is going to end up being more of a cost cutting measure by corporations than it will be a chance for agencies to grow their piece of the pie.

6. What do marketers need that agencies are not giving them?

Marketers need agencies to solve problems – not just make ads. Too often agencies decide to make ads, even when they know that won’t solve the underlying problem. Our clients need us to be ready and willing to look at each engagement as a chance to solve an important problem – sometimes that will be through ads, sometimes it will be through something entirely unexpected.

7. Who do you admire and why?

I would say that I admire my business partners, Matt and Jim. They have had a lot of fortitude and foresight as entrepreneurs, and I am fortunate to get to work with them on a day-to-day basis.

In the agency business, I admire the guys at Goodby Silverstien. They have managed to reinvent themselves over and over, and that is no small feat in any industry.

I look at Tiger Woods as a role model from a competitive perspective. He has such great focus, and usually finds a way to be win even when he isn’t at his best.

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I’ll admit it.  Until a few weeks ago I had never heard of BooneOakley.  Then I saw their company website.  After I stopped laughing, I gave them a call.

BooneOakley was started in October 2000 by two former Martin guys–which probably made the people at The Martin Agency pretty mad, considering the great work these guys do.

BO’s sharp, strategic work has been put to the test by MTV, HBO, State Farm, Carmax, Visit Charlotte, the Charlotte Bobcats, Charlotte Hornets and Ruby Tuesday, to name a few.

If any part of David Oakley’s answers tick you off, I have his cell # and you can call him, after you stop laughing.

1. What was the aha moment when you realized “our company needs to be doing things differently than we have been?”

Why is the first question always the toughest?  There have been many times in the last 9 years at BooneOakley that we have said to ourselves, “We are really screwing up.  And we’ve got to change things.”  Back in 2002, things were really slow at the agency and we were trying to cut costs, so we switched to that really thin scratchy toilet paper for the agency restrooms.  It didn’t go over well so we switched back to the 2-ply Cottonelle pretty quickly.  That was truly an “ah ha” moment.  We learned that if you make a decision and it isn’t the right one, it’s ok to admit you’re wrong and try another solution.  Being a relatively small company, 30 people, it’s easier for us to do that.

2. What books are on your nightstand or great blogs on your Google reader?

I have a really short attention span so I absolutely love Amy Flanagan’s blog, “the shortest blog in the world.”  She describes it as “a blog in handy bite-sized pieces for people who want to follow a blog but don’t have hours and hours of time to spend reading.”  I think she’s hilarious.

There are three books on my nightstand right now. “Me Talk Pretty One Day” and “Dress your Family in Corduroy and Denim” by David Sedaris.  Both of these are a series of short, (I’m sensing a theme) laugh out loud essays.  The only problem is that I usually laugh louder than I snore and that keeps my wife Claire awake.

I also just finished reading “Where the Red Fern Grows” by Wilson Rawls.  It was on my kids’ 6th grade reading list and they both loved it.  Trust me, you will too.

You’ll notice that there are no advertising or marketing or social media books on my nightstand.  That’s the stuff that keeps me awake at night, so why would I read that right before I try to go to sleep?

3. Give me an example of marketing you think is brilliant and why.

I was blown away by the “There Can Only Be One” campaign that Goodby did for the NBA.  It was so simple.  It was deceptively simple, actually.  The first time I saw the split images of Kobe and Shaq, it almost seemed to me to be a really easy, first concept or idea.  But what it was, was an idea that got to the core about the NBA playoffs:  that everyone wants the same thing.  They want the championship and that’s all that matters to each and every player.  Well OK, maybe money and prostitutes matter too, but any player can get those.  There can only be one champion.  Last summer, Time magazine featured a split image of Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama on the cover with the “There Can Only Be One” headline.  That’s when the campaign truly became a part of culture.  And history.

4. We’ve all read that the pitch / RFP process is broken.  Many agencies aren’t even interested in competing in pitches.  Do you see an alternative to this process?

We’re truly not interested in competing in pitches.  We’d like for clients to instantly recognize how different we are from all the others and just hand us their business.  Yeah.  That’s it.  That’s the way new business should be.

But the fact is, as cool and good and different as we think we are, we’re not any cooler, or better or really that different from 100 other shops.

That’s what makes the rfp courting process so difficult.  For the agency.  And especially for the client.

How do they cut the list from 20 to 10?  Maybe they chop the list based on how many people the agency employs…

How do they cut it from 10 to 4?  Maybe it’s based on who has the most creative packaging…

How do they cut it from 4 to 1?  I’d venture to guess that mostly it’s on relationships. It comes down to who do the clients want to be spending a ton of time with.  It comes down to who they like the most.  Personally.  It rarely has anything to do with the work.

At least that’s been our experience.

One question:  When we make it to the finals of a pitch and don’t win, the consultants always tell us we came in a close second.  Do you think they say that to everyone?  Just wondering… [Editor's response: Umm, I'll get back to you on that.]

5. What does the agency of the future look like?

I’m not even sure what the agency of the present looks like.  But as we move into the future, I’d venture to guess that some things are timeless.  Like hot interns.

6. What do marketers need that agencies are not giving them?

Nice Answer:

A true partnership.  Genuine collaboration.  And a real chance for them to be on the same team with the agency.

Not-so-nice Answer:

The finger.  Especially if they let 107 agencies pitch their business.  OK, maybe I’m a little bitter that we did the zappos rfp.  I guess that was really an “ah ha” moment for us.  Like “ah ha”, we’ll never do that again.

7. Who do you admire and why?

I admire and love my wife Claire for putting up with me for almost 20 years.  I’m sure it seems much longer to her.

I also admire my second wife John Boone for many of the same reasons.

Mentors are often overlooked.  I have been lucky enough to have been blessed with several great ones.  John Sweeney, professor at University of North Carolina.  Peter Coughter, life coach, ad guy and professor at VCU Brand Center.  And my parents, Sid and Pat.

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I first met Pete Lerma when I heard him speak at South by Southwest in 2009.  In short, I was impressed and determined to learn more about his shop.  I’m honored to have them profiled on the Ad Industry Innovators blog series today.

Founded in 1995, Click Here is the digital division of The Richards Group, a privately held full-service branding agency based in Dallas, Texas.

Probably the strongest story about ClickHere  is that they grew out of a well established organization where brand development was second nature–and in the interactive world, that’s unique.  If asked to quantify that Lerma quickly points to the fact that a number of shops provide similar services, but none can back them up with a resumé that includes more than three decades of branding experience.

“We leverage this experience to deliver digital brand integration, marketing strategies and technology solutions that help our clients build brands online.  And as experts in the full spectrum of digital marketing services, our clients count on Click Here to deliver a holistic, integrated approach to solve their business challenges.

The ClickHere team includes nearly 100 digital marketing professionals specializing in strategic planning, management, media, creative, production and digital development.

1.  What was the aha moment when you realized “our company needs to be doing things differently than we have been.”?

It happened in early 2008. The prior year had been a challenge for us. We had grown by 50 percent. But at the same time, we’d had a lot of our talent poached by traditional agencies trying to build interactive capabilities. So we had a lot of new talent and a huge influx of demand for what we do.

So at the beginning of 2008 we instituted a dynamic process we call the “Continuous Process Improvement Initiative (CPII).” It’s a cross-disciplinary evaluation and improvement program that gets everybody in the company involved in making us better. There’s a lot of communication from leadership to the staff about what’s happening within CPII. Additionally, there’s ownership of the process at all levels within the organization. I believe, wholeheartedly, that this is everyone’s opportunity to shape the future and the success of the company.

It has made us better systematically and has fueled innovation and creativity. It’s a simple process to implement and manage, so we’ll continue to use. We’ve found there’s a little bit of magic in it. The improvements we’ve seen are dramatic, and the speed at which we improve and evolve is incredible.

2.  What books are on your nightstand or great blogs on your Google reader?

I recently read Resonant Leadership. More than anything, it reinforced my beliefs about what makes a leader great. It’s all about inspiring with actions and a positive attitude. Those who are able to lead with emotional intelligence find it much easier to gain the trust and respect of everyone in their organization.

Outliers: The Story of Success is a fascinating study of how people succeed and why. There are lots of points in our lives when outside powers influence our path, whether we know it or not. Outliers dives deep into how those situations might affect us long term. It made me appreciate where I am in my life, while reminding me that I’m not completely responsible for any level of success I might achieve.

Our blog: blog.clickhere.com. Some might say I’m a little biased, but it contains a lot of really smart and insightful thinking from the people I work with every day.

3.  Give me an example of marketing you think is brilliant and why.

Nike. Everything they create makes me want to get off my butt and do something. Every single time, I’m inspired. From a digital standpoint, the Nike+ program is brilliant. The use of music and technology to build a community is simply beautiful. It truly crosses the line between advertising and building a fully interactive experience around the brand.

I talk a lot about digital being more than just an ad medium – it’s multidimensional. Digital is an ad medium, sure, just like TV, radio, print, outdoor, etc. But it’s also a communication channel, where a brand can engage its audience in a dialogue, where it can observe conversations as well as participate. Digital is also a retail channel where people can buy the brand’s product or service. And through that same retail channel, the brand can provide customer service. Finally, digital is a life utility. In an application-centric sense through things like mobile, email, calendars and GPS, brands can make themselves beneficial to their customers in ways other “media” can’t replicate. And I think Nike gets that.

4.  We’ve all read that the pitch/RFP process is broken. Many agencies aren’t even interested in competing in pitches. Do you see an alternative to this process?

Let’s face it; it’s an imperfect process. What I think needs to happen is agencies need to be more selective about the ones in which they choose to participate. We have a series of questions we ask ourselves up-front:

1.  Can we make a difference in the business?

2.  Can we do great work?

3.  Can we make a reasonable profit?

4.  Can we have fun?

If we can answer “Yes” to all of these questions, it’s something we’ll go after with everything we’ve got. But there are times when we’ve gone into a pitch where we knew the assignment wasn’t a fit for us. We went into it hoping we could change the situation. And the end result is always undesirable: we lose the pitch, we win the client but wished we’d lost the pitch, etc.

If agencies will be more honest with themselves up-front, I think they’ll see the RFP process as less imperfect.

5.  What does the agency of the future look like?

I talk a lot about integration. I’ve studied lots of agency models for integration. And I’ve concluded that the model doesn’t matter. Integration is a mind-set. It’s about everyone, offline and online, starting with ideas (not media platforms) to create “oneline” between a brand and a customer. Integration is idea-centric, but leverages each touch-point to its maximum potential. I heard a term the other day that I thought was brilliant: “Matching luggage.” Integration is not just about “matching luggage.” And the agency of the future understands that.

6.  What do marketers need that agencies are not giving them?

See previous answer.

7.  Who do you admire and why?

The people I work with every day. When I interview new talent, I’m often asked what I like best about our company. My answer is the same every time – the people. There are people in this company who have given me incredible opportunities and inspired me to grow the practice. In return, I’ve felt it necessary to allow people those same opportunities. When someone sees a need in our company, they have my full support in creating innovative solutions. As a result, I’ve seen people come straight out of college and quickly grow into senior leaders in the company. Those people inspire me and have my everlasting admiration.

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