Challenge
A client engaged APR to conduct an audit of a past complex, international and multi-platform advertising campaign. The intent was to identify the elements of the production process that had the greatest impact on efficiency, quality and cost in order to define improvements on future jobs.
Action
APR assembled a team of its specialists in London, Paris, New York, Denver and Los Angeles to review hundreds of pages of production documents: TV and print bids, director treatments, conference reports, overage reports and client/agency communications. Additionally, APR interviewed key people from both client and agency teams. Root causes of production inefficiencies were identified and distilled into a summary with recommended actions for the client.
Result
APR identified 7 key areas of opportunity and a series of 23 recommendations for improving the overall production process for this client. Areas ranged from a consistent and clear budget process, better role definition and communication within the client and agency teams, a standardized bidding process and a system for integrating and re-using assets across media platforms. APR identified post mortem inefficiencies valued at $420,000 (13% of the total production investment) for this campaign. Based on the success of the audit, the client re-engaged APR in a subsequent advertising production retainer.
