2013 has seen the rules shift for both marketing agencies and clients when creating brand comms campaigns.

Here, Shay Boyd, MD and Creative Director for communications and marketing agency, Clay Group provides us with a snapshot of how customers will be dictating the pace and rhythm for brand comms in 2014 and beyond

If you are starting to develop an agency brief or are about to embark on the agency search and selection process, you may want to consider how to navigate through the process effectively as the market place is continuing to evolve.

Here are five areas to consider to help you strike up the best agency relationships.

Look for the listeners

All creative industries are exciting to work in, and you should feel excited by the opportunity to do great things for your business. Marketing is exciting. During your search for the most suitable agency partners you should ensure that the chemistry is good with the team you are going to work with. Agencies will of course be able to demonstrate their listening skills with their response to brief. If they are poor listeners, it will show. All of your agency suitors need to show depth and relevant experience of working with similar companies or customers to you. They must be excited by the challenge. If they have presented a clear path to reach customers through all channels this is what you will need.

Bells not whistles to communicate clearly

Communicating with customers is both an art and a science. Agency teams should be able to show you the best route to communicate with your customers through integrated plans. Delivering your message effectively will put you in the right place to start more dialogue in other channels. If the message is not getting through its time to stop and evaluate.

To save time and confusion later on it is advisable to have a set of metrics you can measure to gage the effectiveness of your plan as it develops. It pays to be creatively consistent even when it gets tough. If you reappraise your messaging to soon it can be costly and confusing for customers. Relevance is key at all times, and should be clear in the plans and creative that your partners present to you.

How long have we got to make an impression?

19 seconds. It's true apparently. Nineteen seconds is all the time we get before someone forms an opinion about you.

If we consider this principle when creating brand marketing work it would certainly focus our teams' minds. I am sure it takes us less than a quarter of that time-scale to form an opinion about social media and mobile messaging sent to us by brands. No teeth and eyes to check anyway, always a give-away if somebody is speaking with a fork tongue.

So what could help us deliver a stunning first impression, personally or on behalf of a business. Timing? Preparation? Message?

I think the same considerations drive our opinions in all situations. Immersion and not disruption is important. Try to always creat stimulating visual triggers, engaging contact or a conversation with interesting dialogue. Our minds can and do, rationalise all these factors in an instant . We can understand it, if it was what we expected, or when the sum of all the parts adds up to something we need to re-appraise.

First establish what will make people curious for further dialogue by connecting to a belief, benefit or aspiration. Don't wast time, words, actions or budgets.

By using a framework to set  boundaries for creating good brand marketing work we can define very clear communication objectives. This is key in measuring how close a brand is tracking to its ideal perception and values.

Try to make sure every element of your preparation and planning is ego neutral and creative central and it will work. Try it.

Do we need a big marketing agency for a big idea?

Agency teams are normally made up of a collective of individuals from all parts of the marketing mix. Bigger agencies are not a guaranteed route to bigger or better success. The marketing agency that is the right fit for you should be in tune with your customer. Servicing your requirements through an experienced team with a pool of people that can add value and expertise is a must. In 2014 we will continue to see servicing trends dominated by less direct meetings, quicker sign offs, more Skype calls and 18hr maximum turnarounds to client emails. We now see quicker client responses to evaluation outcomes and brand reaction to customer trends online, in forums and on the high street.

Be prepared to react in time

During a recent review of how agencies manage client work now in comparison to the last 3 years we can see some consistent themes. Agency teams are more experienced in all areas of client marketing. Senior agency directors now spend more day to day time helping with strategic planning. Clients now need a strong agency "knowledge pool" to draw on, who can not only trouble shoot campaigns, but identify and react to quick response opportunities.The customer is becoming the marketing department for many brands. The unique content which is generated by customers on a daily basis now needs to nurtured and utilised, not just evaluated pre and post campaign.