While most shops can relate at least one unpleasant encounter with a marketer’s procurement department, the once-palpable tension between the two parties seems to be subsiding.

Agencies of late have also felt more empowered to negotiate on their own behalf rather than adopt a take-it-or-leave-it stance on terms procurement departments propose. “The best agency says, ‘If you want the most strategic and creative people in our company, it’s going to cost X,” said Greg Paull, principal and co-found of R3 consulting firm. “If you want us to use our trans creation partner [meaning companies such as MediaMonks or Hogarth] to do some basic content work, it’s going to cost Y. If we offshore to Columbia, it’s going to cost Z.”

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