Customer Reviews

The Art of Client Service

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3 star:		(3)
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I'm a creative and I heard about this book from an article in Communication Arts. I got plenty of powerful knowledge from it, and from my experience, many of you will, too.

It provides advice and lessons that can better the creative development process, help stave client defections, and basically make life, our jobs and our clients' jobs easier.

It's earned a place on my shelf alongside my annuals and creative books. I hope you'll please keep it handy, too.

This book should be on every client service person's shelf and should be a mandatory read when entering the business and then yearly thereafter as a refresher.

We use the book with all of our agency folks (not just the AEs). With a deeper understanding for client relationship management, The Art of Client Service has facilitated better communication and collaboration agency-wide, helping to focus us on "why", not just "what."

More so, the broader value of this book is it serves as a blueprint to help client service managers begin to establish a mindset of true, long-term account management, not just the effective project manager. So needed!

This is an absolute must read for anyone in the ad agency or graphic design studio business. It's a short, easy read but packed with very valuable information. While it's written by an Account Exec, it gives insights that are enlightening for anyone in this business: designers, copywriters, project managers, etc. I've read a lot of books like this that are all the same -- fluff and hype -- but not so with this one. It contains very practical, down to earth advice with situational examples to back it up.

Although I already practiced most of what this book teaches, I found it a very useful tool to teach others how to treat clients. You can read through this book very, very quickly and is well worth your time.

A lot of these books where each chapter is a career tip or hint are mundane to read and only express the author's opinion on why the theory is applicable for others. This read was quick, easy, and even fun. The author gives anecdotes of things that actually have happened to him throughout his career, and the tone is casual and not overbearing.

I highly recommend this book. I have been a creative director for large Madison Avenue advertising agencies for over twenty years. So it might surprise you that I would recommend (or even read) a book about client service. Well, if nothing else, after two decades, I've learned that a close relationship with a client is the only way to sell great creative work. This book is very valuable no matter what industry you're in, as long as you have clients (and we all do). The Art of Client Service is a quick read and the lessons learned will help you for a long time.

Robert Solomon's book is 100% common sense, expressed simply, proudly, directly, clearly. Interestingly, his common sense is so uncommon in the agency biz. Every account person should read this book over and over. Not just once. Even the great account people need a clear reminder on how to excel at their jobs. While reading, there were so many times I said 'ok I'm guilty as charged' and now must set about to improve. That's the sign of a great book- it evokes real change, not just bookshelf filler.

I recently developed a third year college course titled Account & Brand Management. After thoroughly researching a multitude of traditional textbooks I found that The Art of Client Service is by far the best out there for best practices in account management. Now that I'm teaching the course with this book, the feedback from the students has been resoundingly positive. The students enjoy the straight forward approach and find that Robert Solomon's outstanding examples provide a real-world perspective hard to find in many college courses. For my students, The Art of Client Service is a handbook that will guide them as they prepare to enter the ranks of working marketing professionals.

For all of those young account coordinators and account managers working in the Ad biz, this book is your official textbook. And it is required reading!

As you know, the days of training are over. The good news is that everything you need to know to be a great AE is in this little book. It's a quick read so you have no excuse. And once you've read it, you'll know what it takes for your clients to love you, and for the creatives to respect you.

Don't just read this book. Live by it.

Matt Neren
Director of Account Service
Cultivator Advertising & Design

DON'T BUY THIS BOOK IF YOU ALREADY OWN "BRAIN SURGERY FOR SUITS." This book is excellent, but it is almost the exact same book as "Brain Surgery for Suits," another book by Robert Solomon. When I saw that he'd come out with a new title, I was very excited to purchase his new book. But when it arrived, and I saw that it was the same thing as the old book, I felt robbed. I can't be the only person this has happened to.