Accounts Management

Sustainable Development Goals (SDG)

• 5. Gender equality

Objectives

• Learn about the day-to-day operations of an agency's accounts department. What is account management?
• Familiarize yourself with the department's work tools and understand the agency-client relationship. What is a day-to-day job at an agency like? What does this professional relationship entail?
• Discover the role of the professional known as an "account manager." Who is this professional? What do they do? What tasks do they perform?
• Know how to solve briefings raised by the client.

Learning outcomes

• Identify the advertising and public relations theories, processes, structures, and techniques that inform the functions of the various departments of an advertising agency, creative boutique, consulting firm, or media center in conventional, virtual, and emerging environments.
• Examine environmental information from the knowledge and analysis of sources and information search and retrieval systems.
• Carry out the responsibilities of a company or institution's communications department, either within the company itself or through an external agency, through knowledge of the theory and practice of public relations and communications processes and structures. These responsibilities must include effective management and development, taking into account the evaluation of relations with the organization's publics, both internally and externally, with a proactive attitude and aptitude, as well as cognitive understanding of relations from a constructive and open-minded perspective.
• Apply different conventional and unconventional advertising communication techniques to deliver the message with the highest level of effectiveness, built on the parameters of creativity and innovation in a context that respects linguistic diversity and diverse social, cultural, gender, and economic realities.

Content

Block 1. Introduction to account management

• Agency: bases, foundations and management
• Historical review in the professional communications sector

Block 2. Basic aspects of account management

• The universal principle of account management
• Duties of an account manager
• Marketing plan
• From a global vision to the delegation of functions
• The dual management of the account director
• Internal relations with other departments

Block 3. Account planning

• Phases and development of a communication plan

Evaluation

Continuous evaluation

• Participation: 10%. This is assessed based on a case study presented as a group to the rest of the class. Non-recoverable.
• Follow-up activities: 15%. This 15% is divided into three exercises worth 5% each, in which students apply and connect the course concepts in a practical way. These exercises are group exercises and are completed with follow-up tutoring in the classroom. They are subsequently presented in class. Two out of three exercises may be retaken if they were initially graded with a score lower than 5.
• Specific test: 25%. A multiple-choice exam covering the subject content is administered. This test can be retaken. This test must be passed with a minimum grade of 5. Otherwise, the student must retake the exam.
• Work: 50%. This 50% is divided into two practical sessions of 30% and 20%, in which students delve into the subject's theory in a practical way by simulating an agency in groups. The professor delivers the briefing fictitious that they must solve.

Any assessment activity not completed, not submitted, or submitted late will receive a 0. Late submissions are not accepted.

Methodology

• The professor explains the theoretical knowledge of the different topics in sessions with the entire class, and then the corresponding practical cases are completed. Despite having a significant theoretical component that should allow students to properly grasp the basic concepts, this subject has a very practical focus.
• As a follow-up to the various assessment activities that require it, the teacher conducts various tutorials in the classroom.
• Students are required to dedicate a few hours of individual work each week to the subject in order to consolidate the knowledge acquired in the different topics. It is a process of continuous growth and monitoring. Most assessment activities require an oral presentation in class in front of the rest of the class. Late assignments are not accepted (unless there is a compelling reason and the teacher is informed in advance).
• It is necessary to perform a minimum of one workshop with invited professionals from the sector to develop real-life cases in the classroom.

Bibliography

Key references

• Medina, Pablo; Ferrer, Ignasi (2014). De director de Cuentas a director de agencia: 50 casos prácticos sobre Agencias de Publicidad. Dykinson.
• Medina, Pablo; Ferrer, Ignasi (2014). Dirección empresarial para publicitarios. Dykinson.
• Solanas, Isabel, Sabaté, Joan. (2008). Dirección de cuentas: Gestión y Planificación de cuentas en publicidad. Editorial UOC.
• Steel, Jon. (1998). Verdades, mentiras y publicidad. El arte de la planificación de cuentas. Eresma Celeste.

Further reading

Teachers will provide complementary bibliography and compulsory reading throughout the course via the Virtual Campus.