Consultancies are trying to “set the tone for the future”, according to the head of Deloitte Digital, and aren’t interested in emulating existing agencies.

“I’d actually say the agencies are trying to copy the Deloitte Digitals of the world,” Andy Main told Ad Exchanger.

“Agencies with a media-heavy bias to their business model are struggling to shed that as a main source of revenue, but they can’t change quickly enough,” he added, as he observed that it is Facebook and Google who are “eating the agencies’ lunch”, not the consultants.

That being the case, he has no interest in moving into the media space, preferring to partner with media agencies, placement companies and the duopoly as necessary.

“We think that focusing on owned media is a much better use of marketing spend than paid,” he argued, “because you can capture first-party data and use it for personalization.”

Main charted the evolution of Deloitte Digital as a creative digital consultancy, beginning with a focus on customer experience and customer relationships and building on that with additional technical design, business skills and creative.

“It’s about business model innovation and enabling businesses to come up with new value propositions,” he explained.

That positioning reflects how the world is changing as companies struggle with digital transformation and the role of chief marketing officers extends far beyond the basics of awareness and demand generation.

“CMOs are more like chief experience officers now,” said Main. “Their job description is being redefined, because there has to be messaging at all touchpoints, not just when someone is buying something.”

At the same time, marketing plays a vital role in digital transformation, which he described as “discovering unmet human needs to help a business win for the future – and that means figuring out what needs to be transformed across experience and services.

“Our job is to flip these unmet needs into an offering and put it into the market quickly and successfully,” he said – a process that requires a host of skills all under one roof.

“Marketing is an integral part of transforming a business, but it comes in toward the end of the journey, and it’s far from the only thing a business has to solve for,” he added.

Sourced from Ad Exchanger; additional content by WARC staff