Big Media’s “Rollo Tomasi” moment.

For starters, if you’ve never seen LA Confidential, you should. Like, tonight. Such a great movie.

But without giving too much away, there’s one critical scene where a character realizes his colleague is lying to him the minute the colleague utters the name “Rollo Tomasi.”

There’s a similar scene in lots of films, a moment when the hero realizes that someone they deeply trust is deceiving them. The vibe shifts, the plot twists, and everything’s turned upside down.

Today, if you’re a client sitting on a Zoom call, your media buying team recommends you buy a little X (aka the artist formerly known as Twitter), that just might be a Rollo Tomasi moment.

Because, thanks to the way the world suddenly works, you have to wonder why they’re saying it. Is it because the objective data says Twitter is a smart place to connect with your customer? Or is it because their holding company merger is being threatened by a certain kajillionare with connections at the FTC? 

In other words, are they recommending Twitter because it’s good for you and your business, or because it’s good for them and their business?

There’s an even bigger Rollo Tomasi moment out there, because the large media companies are now leaning hard into the practice of principal media buying. Now, principal media buying is a funny business model. The agency, let’s call them, say, Publicis. Now, instead of buying the media for the client like a normal media company does, Publicis buys the media for themselves, and then resells the media to the client. 

Maybe they mark it up a little, maybe they mark it up a lot. Impossible to say, because there’s no transparency. And either way, clients are now left on their own in a highly competitive market with every other media client at that particular agency fighting for that particular media. And some client might just wind up paying too much for it… is it gonna be you?

So when this hypothetical Publicis or Omnicom or WPP is sitting across from the client, ostensibly offering “objective recommendations” on what to buy, what they’re often, maybe, possibly doing is trying to get their client to buy something at a premium that they bought at a discount, or off-board something they paid too much for, like, say, some toxic X inventory.

When you think about this, the contradiction is clear: a client hires a media company to bring them the best value, but the media company’s real boss probably wants to hear that they resold it for the maximum price. Seems like a built in contradiction, doesn’t it?

Some who will say that principal media buying does serve the client in that it gets them access to potentially cheaper inventory or exclusive deals. But who knows! I mean, can you really believe them? Really? If I’m the client, I’d like to know “Well, if you could buy it at a discount, why didn’t you buy it at a discount for me?” But they can’t ask that, because - again - there’s no transparency. Mark Read likened principal-based media buying to "black-box media models." ie the social algorithms and Google's ad network inner works, etc. The difference is Google is clearly working for Google, whereas Mark Read is supposed to be working for his clients. 

Now, I’m sympathetic to the big media companies. They’re being challenged by the independents, their profit margins are being squeezed and now they’ve got the trenchcoat goons at Twitter threatening to sic the Feds on them. It’s tough out there. 

But if I’m a client, I’ve now got a queasy feeling that my ol’ best friend, partner, good buddy, big media pal maybe isn’t really putting me first anymore. They’re taking care of themselves. And so maybe, if I’m a client, I’m thinking about calling one of those more independent agencies, where they aren’t trying to please Elon Musk or Paris HQ or London, where they still try to serve the client first.

Because in the world of independent agencies, I can assure you, things aren’t quite so Rollo Tomasi.