Adland’s associations: self-serving social clubs or a vital industry resource?
The Australian marketing and advertising industry is awash with associations, dubbed “self-serving social clubs”, eating up resources and competing with each other for members. Mumbrella’s Simon Canning looks at the crowded landscape and asks if it is time for consolidation.
When Trinity P3 founder Darren Woolley branded Australia’s marketing and advertising associations “self-serving social clubs” who are “peddling crap”, at least one major industry association CEO demanded a right of reply.
Woolley’s incendiary comments on a panel at Mumbrella360 debating transparency have been far from welcomed by those marshalling memberships, but the question remains: is Australia overrun with associations, councils and institutes?
The list of associations reads like a bowl of alphabet soup. There is the IAB, AANA, MFA, AMI, IAA, ADMA, PRIA and the Communications Council.
Added to the mix are local chapters and another host of stand-alone associations: The MADC, AADC, PADC, BADC, AWARD, the AGDA, IIA, APSMA and the IABC.
What do the CEOs get paid?
$1.9m?
From a creative perspective, some of ‘our’ associations are becoming redundant. The state-based awards seem to be going the way of local municipal councils, living in the shadow of the national and global entities and becoming less and less relevant as time goes on.
AWARD School still seems to have the best education for the prospective creative. Though the universities are playing catchup in this space, there is still the question of why a full degree is necessary when an intensive 10 week course provides the most effective way to learn this ‘black art’. And once you’re on the job, one way for a creative to progress is to win the types of awards recognised by creative directors – generally not state-based.
Which is not to say awards are everything.
Would it not be best to hear from the actual members of these societies instead of having each society’s CEO plead their case of relevancy? Pretty pointless talking about the oversupply of associations without talking to each associations membership. Members are the customers of said associations, and since these are all marketing industry bodies/associations, should we not focus on the customers of these associations? Anyone willing to take on the undertaking to conduct such a survey…Any industry body talking about the relevancy of their organization is actually irrelevant unless we get to hear the voice of their customers/members…
Companies in the ad game aren’t shearers. So we don’t need a union of burnt out old hacks who can no longer get a job in industry to protect us.
@ Non member : harsh, true though.
I am a director of the IPA in the U.K. And we tried to achieve consolidation of associations ten years ago and failed due to the ego’s and self preservation instincts of the CEO’s.
I have been encouraging this debate for a number of years without much success.
The problem is the inward looking self serving attitude, and no one is looking at the big picture which is a global perspective, who is trying to make Australia the third centre of global excellence? Everyone is too busy on the small stuff and no one is big enough or interested enough to engage with the government to achieve a global position of strength for the country. The third centre of global excellence after London and New York will emerge in Asia Pacific, but do not underestimate the ambitions of other countries.
I am emigrating next month to Sydney and will watch with interest to see if anything happens, sadly not optimistic
John oldfield
Hello.. llo .. o
Anyone else see the irony that this is reported in one of the many industry echo chamber “publications”?
Question for me is if any of these orgs went away would anyone notice and would it impede the industry?
Have these bodies actually done anything industry changing aside from add more people to their social groups?
IAB has made good changes of late but still very detached. Take AdOps conference Melbourne, feedback was more non-adops people than adops people. Content not incredibly relevant to pushing that discipline forward and then the sales pitches.
As long as the social groups hold more influence we are not going to see businesses move forward in this space.
Dare I say it that boys clubs and lack of actual understanding on how to run a business is not a good example for Millennials.
Appreciate the feedback on the recent Melbourne event. Even second-hand it’s important. Thank you.
We do want to run more detailed hands-on ops/tech sessions moving forwards (including live demos) rather than the typical conceputual presentations / pitches. The audience at these Ops events wants and deserves a higher level of detail and the opportunity for scrutiny, I fully agree.
Regarding the social aspect, networking for key Ops and Tech functions that spend the majority of their time in-screens and in-platform is critical. Many form strong bonds and working groups within their own businesses, but often less so outside their own workplace – from my experience.
Meeting other like-minded individuals and building a community around the people that do so much valuable work in our unique industry is important. It provides the opportunity for personal and professional growth, as well as creating very practical lines of communication between the problem solvers across every part of the eco-system. Good for the industry, companies and individuals involved.
Thanks again for the feedback.
..loves to take a pop at the industry associations as they are easy targets.