It's been a wild ride for online media for San Franciso over the past decade. The crazy days of Mediaplex, Lot 21, March 1st, Exile on 7th, SFO Interactive, etc. All those ad agency brands are gone and far away. Some like Mediaplex just changed the strategy.
That was understandable, as 98% of all the media dollars came from IPO or VC capital, and bound to soften or get killed until the big brands embraced the web. Well, as we all know, it's all big brands on the web today... and once again a very robust industry.
What concerns and puzzles me is why, for the most part, are the big brands leaving their SF based ad agencies. VISA is now in LA. HP is now in Chicago. Sprint is in NYC (remember way back when Organic had the biz in SF), Fox in LA. Seems like a slow and sure exodus, and is likely causing some agency brain drain locally. NYC & LA seem to be winning the most new business, while Chicago & Boston are holding their own.
I certainly hope that our local ad agency community survives and thrives. There are so many great online agency people here in SF!! It's weird, as so many internet start ups, and success stories are born right here, you would think the agencies would be able to attract clients based on their close proximity to some of the hottest internet companies...
Let me know if you know why this is happening?
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