Honda UK
As part of their supplier management policies, Honda needed to review the provision of their CRM Agency.
The challenge
As part of their supplier management policies, Honda needed to review the provision of their CRM Agency. Conducting RFPs is no marketer’s idea of fun: producing the briefing and requirements documents; finding the right agencies to approach; fielding the agency’s questions; spending hours going through the responses; sitting in endless pitch meetings. It’s a necessarily evil in making sure you’ve got the right partner agency on board.
With a Marketing team already spread thinly delivering BAU, there wasn’t capacity in-house to write the RFPs, or subsequently manage the response and pitch process. In addition, the team hadn’t previously run an RFP and so there were no established processes or documentation in place that could be replicated.
“The Data Works were brilliant with the recent Honda CRM pitch. Really clear overall plan and timings, considerate of agency workloads. They shared sufficient detail to get a good understanding of what was being asked and it was a thorough examination of all aspects of data-driven marketing, showing that they themselves are experts in this space. While it was really helpful as an agency to have The Data Works involved I’m sure it was even more helpful for Honda in selecting, comparing and choosing the right agency for them.”
Will Lowe, Chief Data Officer at Engine Transformation
How we helped
Honda therefore approached us to run the process for them. After a detailed Discovery process to understand both the team and wider stakeholder requirements and aspirations, we were able to write the RFI and RFP documents. From there we managed the whole process, from generating the agency long list, through scoring the agency responses, on to the pitches, and then finally to successful appointment of a new agency.
Having previously responded to RFPs when working agency side, we were able to design a process and documents that worked both for Honda, and for the agencies involved. And with that same insider knowledge of the agency world, we were able to probe behind the agency sales speak to really understand their ability to meet Honda’s requirements.
The results
Thanks in no small part to the efficiency of Honda’s Procurement team in conducting the negotiation, we went from receiving the initial brief to appointing the new agency in 4 months. The new agency has only recently been appointed, so it’s too early to tell whether they’ll hit the KPIs we defined in the RFP, but all of the team at Honda are confident that they’ve found the right agency partner to meet their objectives.