Planning vs buying: is it all a case of positioning?(BBJ Media Services consolidation)

BBJ is the latest media company to reposition itself. So, are they all distancing themselves from their buying heritage, Alasdair Reid asks

Consolidation tends to smooth all the unevenness out of a marketplace -- even an arena as complex and sophisticated as the media marketplace. When trading becomes concentrated in the hands of a handful of variations on the Acme Big Buying Company, media inventory doesn't exactly become a commodity, but there's certainly a feeling that buying performance is no longer an issue.

Consolidation on the media buying side of the fence has continued to trundle along in its own inexorable way with the giant holding companies -- Omnicom, WPP and Interpublic -- all in the middle of long-term programmes that allow group billings to be pooled at certain levels of negotiation, especially in the TV market, but most probably eventually right across the board.

It could be argued that the decline in the importance of buying prowess is not just a function of holding company power play. For many years the buying performance of the top 20 or so buying points has been relatively similar.

This has fundamental implications for the individual operating units within the big groups and for all media specialists with a brand heritage based on buying ability. Specialists such as BBJ Media Services -- an operation that had, in a previous incarnation as the Bass Buying Unit, the dreaded B word in its monicker. Over the years, BBJ has evolved strategic planning credentials without attracting the recognition for that move it feels it deserves. Last week it announced it was restructuring and repositioning itself in the marketplace as BBJ Communications Partner.

Trista Grant, BBJ's managing director, says that consolidation isn't actually a factor here. The Carat Group, BBJ's parent company, may have consolidated its negotiations with some media owners, but that's not the same thing as pooled buying. Grant explains: "We keep buying here -- that way our clients' strategies remain confidential and we have not changed our belief that planning and buying should stay together. There are two main motivations behind what we are doing. Firstly, we feel that although BBJ as a brand doesn't have negative connotations, it hasn't had a particularly clear positioning in the marketplace. We know we have a strong brand and we know what we stand for -- it's a case of making that clear."

The second strand of motivation is more fundamental. Grant adds: "We believe that you must have a strong understanding of where you want to be in three to five years' time and how you are going to get there. If you don't you are going to miss a lot of tricks. This is about what clients will need: media specialists who are adept at understanding the relationship between the brand, the media and the consumer. They will expect the leadership that comes from that understanding. That means we must add to our skills base. We will take people who are adept at uncovering consumer insights through communications strategies and executing those strategies across multiplatforms."