In reviewing the work of our agency over the last three years, I began to see a pattern. In our desire to help clients get ahead of the curve, we have often promoted ideas that were viewed as too risky. So the conversation goes something like this:

FG to Banking client: (seeing the regulatory environment loosen up and allow more competition plus the trend in online banking) “We think you should change the name of your bank to UnBank. We’ll advertise that you’re a new kind of bank – completely transparent, with no hidden fees or evil practices. Unbank takes the pain out of the banking relationship for the customer. You’ll launch new products with no minimum balance requirements, no penalties for early withdrawal or loan payoffs, no ATM fees, etc.”

Client: “What? But how will we make money? We can’t do that!”

FG: “You’ll make money the traditional way. Plus you’ll add some new services. And you’ll do it all online, so you’ll dramatically increase the number of customers you have without adding any significant overhead. You don’t even have to increase your advertising budget by much at first. You’ll be putting your ads online, a much more cost effective way to get the word out.”

Client: “We’ll give it some thought.”

FG: (six months later) “Have you thought about it?”

Client: “We’re still thinking about it.”

FG: (six more months later) “Have you thought about it?”

Client: “We’re still trying to figure it out.”

*Banking crisis happens.*

FG: (six more long months later) “Time is running out. Someone else will do it first.”

Client: (thinking “That’s ridiculous, no one will ever do that.”) “We’ve decided it’s not such a great idea. We’ll just hunker down until things get better.”

And then we see a commercial on TV for Ally Bank:

Sigh.

In hindsight, it is easy to see why clients would hesitate in taking our advice. As much as they want to believe our Challenger Brand philosophy and beat the competition, there are never any guarantees of success when you are blazing new trails. No way to measure anticipated ROI. No way to review what others have done, because they haven’t. No way to avoid other people’s mistakes.

We totally understand the client’s point of view: it’s troublesome to think you might not succeed. Sometimes the barrier to doing provocative things is fear of being laughed at or ridiculed. Well, actually, that’s a given…competitors will definitely ridicule and laugh at you…until you succeed. Then they’ll stop laughing. We know this because we have lived it.

There are reasons for clichés such as “no guts, no glory” or “nothing ventured, nothing gained.” We don’t make our recommendations lightly or without serious thought to the business consequences for the client. And we walk the walk.