What the hell is an advertising agency for?

According to a recently published survey, most advertisers don't know. Fifty clients, responsible for 103 advertising accounts, put creativity' as an agency's most important quality. They also ranked JWT as the leading "main creative agency." CDP was a close second and Saatchi & Saatchi Garland Compton third.
BUT: nobody seemed to know what creativity was. The most agreed description was "An ability to produce memorable advertising" And since nobody in the world has ever yet demonstrated any direct relationship between memorability and effectiveness, that definition seems, to say the least of it, rum. The same respondents also voted JWT "top agency," defined as a mixture of size, creativity and overall capability.

BUT: 78 per cent of these respondents "thought that advertising's key function was to accomplish offer tasks than seeling". And the first conclusion of the author of the report was "Advertising is not primarily expected to sell' So, in Berkeley Square, we're baffled. We came top, according to this particular survey, on what advertisers believe to be most important in an agency. But we totally disagree with most of those advertisers' views about advertising. Of the fifty clients interviewed, just one defined creativity as advertising that works. Whoever you are: thank you. If you'd like to talk to people who agree with you, send us the coupon. And if you're one of the other forty-nine, maybe you should send it as well. We've got more information than anyone else about how advertising works- in both the short and long term- and what can happen to the profits of a company when that advertising stops But if you really are totally convinced that advertising "is not vital to marketing" and your mind is forever closed on the subject, then maybe you shouldn't bother with our coupon.
We wouldn't get on at all.