Italy launches manual for tenders and client-agency relationships

The Italian Advertisers’ Association (UPA) with The Italian Association of Communications Agencies (UNA) recently published a manual entitled La Buona Gara (“The Good Tender”) to guide both advertisers and agencies when conducting or participating in creative tenders and pitches. The long-term goal of this manual is to help foster transparent, honest and long-lasting partnerships.

The manual is divided into three parts:

• assessing the need to call for a creative tender, with pros and cons for both advertisers and agencies;
• exploring how to deal with a creative tender in all its steps;
• providing guidance on how to build a strong relationship between client and agency.

“UPA’s principles are based on the three pillars of innovation, transparency and responsibility. Creating a manual on "good tender" is part of the willingness of advertisers to establish a mature dialogue among different industry stakeholders. We recommend the use of tenders in looking for medium- or long-term partners and not just for a single creative campaign. We believe that too many agencies in a tender can increase the risk of superficial decisions”, UPA President Lorenzo Sassoli de Bianchi said.

It concludes with eight points that summarise the different concepts and tips within the manual:

1. Sometimes, launching a creative tender is not the only answer; there are alternative solutions out there.
2. It takes a lot of gravitas to launch a creative tender, and equally to participate in one.
3. It is not the quantity of competing agencies that makes the difference; it’s the quality.
4. A successful tender is dependent on clarity and the right information.
5. A successful tender implies transparency on every single aspect.
6. A successful tender has clear goals and guidelines to follow.
7. A successful tender ends with a winner, and reaching out to the runners-up to explain the decision taken.
8. A successful tender can start a good client-agency relationship that can potentially be long lasting.

The planned next steps include setting up an observatory to monitor creative tenders.

You can download the UPA manual (in Italian) here. For more information, please contact UPA.