Agencies plead case

JDA has retained the $3 million Transperth advertising account amid mounting industry concern about the affect of the Gallop Government’s proposed 30 per cent cut to the State advertising budget.

The Government is a big client in the WA market and concerns about affects of budget cuts within the entire industry have prompted local advertising agencies to form an alliance to address the new Labor Government with one voice.

It is understood the Advertising Federation of Australia is seeking support from within the industry to undertake research into the cost of government advertising and the social benefit of many of the cam-paigns.

A large body of the government work provides public information or addresses social issues like drink driving, alcohol and drug awareness.

There is growing concern that cuts to advertising budgets may adversely impact on more than just the industry itself.

The value of services like help lines – supporting key social intitiatives in health, drug abuse, domestic violence and suicide prevention – would be undermined without an advert-ising component, a situation which could have far reaching social ramifications.

The AFA plans to present the results of this research to the Government ahead of the budget or any announcement of specific budgetary cuts.

Transperth director Mark Burgess said the Government’s proposed budgetary cuts would apply across all the Transperth budgets, including the department’s advertising account which was recently consolidated into the hands of one agency.

“The very clear indication is that the concept will be applied across our department,” Mr Burgess said.

Previously shared between JDA, Core Marketing Group and The Shorter Group, JDA will now be solely responsible for all Transperth’s marketing and advertising work.

Transperth contracts supply and development officer, John Miller, said JDA was assessed to be best able to meet the requirements set out in the tender.

JDA general manager Julian Donaldson said retaining the Transperth business demonstrated JDA could successfully compete with the top advertising agencies in Perth.

“Holding business is essential and it’s at the moment what the game’s about, from JDA’s point of view we held it against the whole town,” Mr Donaldson said.

Mr Donaldson said he believed JDA’s success was in part due to its new customer relationship management business, JDA Solutions.

“We’ve invested and built part of our business around e-commerce and e-marketing, and JDA Solutions will be a part of the service JDA provides to Transperth,” he said.

“We’ll be recommending to Transperth that we place more emphasis on segmentation and then use different strategies for different segments.”

JDA has mapped out a strategic plan for Transperth, based on research and an understanding of the trigger points that lead to the use of public transport.

“Transperth is innovative with new buses and new routes and we’re really optimistic we can increase usage.”

Mr Donaldson said he had not been advised of any planned cuts to the Transperth advertising account in line with the proposed 30 per cent cut to the State Government’s advertising budget.

“One thing we can say is what Transperth does is provide information to people so they can select public transport as a strong viable option,” Mr Donaldson said.

“It’s certainly not the sort of advertising people criticise for branding – this is about public information.