All Star Direct
& Personal
By Billy Sharma
David Foy
Quite out of the ordinary, in fact quite extra ordinary.
“Good manners will open doors that the best education cannot.”
Clarence Thomas
One of my colleagues, Professor Anthony Kalamat, at Seneca College where I
teach copy writing for Direct Marketing, has an opinion poll pinned on his wall.
This poll ranks 20 professions and how the average person has rated them. Not
surprisingly Advertising ranks way down in this list at No.19, a notch below
being a Drug Dealer and a rung above being a Tobacco Lobbyist.
I have been told that on the Oprah Show, Dr. Phil also spoke about this same
list published by Facsource Canada. The list for 1999 was:
1. Social Worker
2. Teacher
3. Environmentalist
4. Fireman
5. Doctor6. Musician
7. Scientist
8. Actor
9. Journalist
10. Sanitary Engineer11.Truck Driver
12. Politician
13. Logger
14. Priest
15. Lawyer16. Sports Agent
17. Prostitute
18. Drug Dealer
19. Advertising Executive
20. Tobacco Lobbyist
Intrigued by this poor showing I surfed the web for other surveys and found a
BBC poll from England and another from Australia. The BBC poll was conducted
in May, 2002 and it showed that: “The 10 least respected professions were: MP;
estate agent; government minister; lawyer; journalist; footballer; advertising
executive; car dealer; company director; accountant.
The Australian survey is an annual one, the last being conducted in November
2001. The lowest ranked professions included: Car salesmen, estate agents and
advertising people.
I began to dig deeper with my own mini survey, asking friends who have some connection
to the advertising world, why such a poor opinion of our profession?
What came back repeatedly to me was: Advertising people are too self-absorbed
and arrogant. They do not even have the common courtesy or know the basics rules
of professional behaviour. People told me that it had a lot to do with ad people’s
attitudes. For example, they don’t have the decency to respond to a phone message
if it’s not advantageous to them. I had to admit that too often I had experienced
this myself.
So do we just lack manners or are advertising people downright rude?
I am not here to pass judgment but I do refute some of these charges because
I have a lot of friends who display exceptional courtesy and manners. However
I must admit that I have also come across many people in this business over the
years that give the industry a bad name. Lately they seem to be growing in number.
I would love to hear my readers’ comments on this subject, including their own
experiences.
One person who definitely bucks this trend is David Foy of AMW Direct, a thorough
gentleman with charm and poise. I met David five and a half years ago. At that
time I had presented my portfolio to the former president of the agency, Lori
Appleton. She was just leaving AMW to go to another agency but was kind enough
to instruct me to contact her replacement, David Foy, right away.
My first memory of meeting David was that he looked like a student fresh out
of high school. I thought this is surely a mistake, perhaps this kid was sent
to check me out before the real David Foy emerged. But as he began to speak,
I realized that I was in the presence of a really interesting and interested
young man.
Today, he still looks like a young man. He attributes his boyish looks to genetics
and claims that his secret of youth is: “Oil-of-delay.”
He has learned to break the ice when meeting new clients who often consider him
too young and look at him with raised eyebrows. He starts by saying: “I may look
eighteen, but that’s really the number of years of experience that I have in
Direct Marketing.”
Over time I have learned other facts about David. He treats his clients with
regard, his staff with fairness, his suppliers with respect, and his work and
position with honesty and integrity. He is the consummate gentleman. David has
a sense of social responsibility that is infectious. His inner conscience clearly
guides all of his actions. In fact, David volunteered his time as a board member
for “Second Harvest”, an organization that recovers fresh perishable food from
restaurants, hotels, grocery stores and caterers and distributes it to over 110
social service agencies in the GTA.
He started his
career with Vickers & Benson, right out of University, but
gradually moved through several agencies including Ogilvy & Mather Direct,
Cohn & Wells, Darcy Mackey Benton & Bowles and FCB Direct, picking up
the best from each.
He considers Tony Hull, of Hull Direct, to be his mentor and worked with him
for five years before Tony sold his company to FCB to be part of FCB Direct.
In those five years he quickly learned the finer points of the business and the
importance of good stewardship and leadership. He also has high praise for Ogilvy,
where he feels privileged to have received the best training, attending four
hours of account management training weekly, a training program, which Ogilvy
has since abandoned.
Having worked with both small and large agencies, David learned early not to
rely on the agency to hand over their clients to build the direct marketing arm
but became adept at building the direct marketing division independently. On
the business side, he believes in controlled growth. Today as President of AMW
Direct, he has created an agency that is highly flexible where various departments
can be quickly reshuffled and re-channeled to meet the client’s needs for expansion
or contraction. This way he provides his clients with the best service and at
the same time ensures that none of his staff gets burned out working 14-15 hours
a day. He believes they should have a balance in their lives, especially today
when the demands of work are placing a huge burden on people’s lives.
His own free time is spent with his family, golf and lately tennis where his
wife Helen has been an instigator. Hard to believe, he has a daughter, Julia,
who turned fourteen in October and an eleven-year-old son, Matthew. David has
been married for over sixteen years. He is quick to point out that he always
accomplished things ahead of his time; he married at 23, had a child at 25, and
became president of AMW at 34.
He has been steadily building an agency on a completely different track from
any other Direct Marketing Agency. He feels the present trend in direct marketing
is customer retention, not acquisitions. He also feels that segmentation is the
buzzword for today, and getting the maximum from your data base pool has become
a key mandate.
However, he also knows that clients cannot continue to survive on old blood.
Eventually they will have to get back to acquisitions. To this end he has added
a new division to AMW Direct. It is an event-marketing group called ‘Brandtonic’.
His reasoning is that events do many important things. First, they involve newer
younger players who participate with a higher level of intensity and loyalty.
Secondly, events help these players get into the habit of giving and belonging
to a cause or group. Finally, event marketing can be the catalyst that is mutually
beneficial to both current clients and the agency by finding new customers for
both.
To give you another indication of how smart David is, the first thing he said
when we met for this interview was: “I like to surround himself with smarter
and more experienced people. People who have skills that will not only add but
complement my own.”
He cites the water cooler effect as an example. “Get a group of people around
the water cooler and you will get some tremendous thinking.”
David is the water cooler. He continues to work with the agency’s former president,
Lori Appleton, who acts as a strategic consultant and business advisor on certain
accounts. He has even hired his old friend, Robert Dinning, from Tony Hull days.
He does not have an in-house creative department because he feels that the most
talented and experienced people are not working for any one agency today, but
are out there as freelancers.
“ I could not match their salaries or hold them for long, but by using them as
freelancers I am saving big bucks for the agency. This not only allows me to
match talent to task, but also allows me to get the best pool of expertise for
my clients.”
Another area he has actively been pursuing is hiring consultants on a two or
three day basis. That way he feels his junior people are gaining years of experience
and knowledge simply by association.
When I questioned him about his greatest business achievements, he replied: “I
don’t know if there is one great achievement… more like several small personal
victories in my career that’s helped shape who I am and what I’m doing.
Being appointed as President of AMW Direct at a young age was certainly a proud
moment for me, but the most satisfying accomplishment has been the ability to
successfully grow the business year after year. The key has been building a team
of talented professionals who have the right attitude for this business. Each
individual has contributed to the success of AMW Direct and that has been my
greatest triumph.”
When I questioned him if you could redo certain things again, which ones would
he redo? He replied: “There isn’t any one specific thing that I wish I could
redo over again. Life’s experiences, good or bad, help develop your personal
growth. Each decision and move I’ve made has ultimately lead me to my present
position, and I’m very happy with that.”
Finally, I believe that there are two reasons why people, especially his clients,
like David. The first is because he instantly reaches out and builds a bond or
“chemistry” with people. As David says: “Profit may be our primary focus but
building a relationship with our clients is just as important. At the end of
the day your reputation means everything.”
The second reason is that despite what the polls indicate about advertising people,
David is not an egotist. He is well mannered, well educated, cultured and a pleasure
to be with. As David says: “I treat people the same way as I wish to be treated
- honestly, ethically and professionally.”
And I can certainly vouch for that.
“There is a storehouse of hidden talent here and abroad. I hope to bring
you insightful personal stories of those people who are changing the direct marketing
landscape. If you wish to help me in my pursuit, please be my guest with your
suggestions below:”
Billy Sharma is President and Creative Director of Designers Inc., Toronto