Greg Brooks’ post about how stupid it is for an ad agency to pitch for an account using an ‘unauthorized’ commercial, makes an important point: that it is bad business practice, no matter whether it falls under marketing (selling the agency) or business development.

If you want to find out what a guerilla marketing tactic looks like when it loses focus on the goal, read this. It’s a sobering thought to anyone who thinks that setting up a special web site, will ‘send a message’ to the client. The site, called Project Hijack (how smart is that, when the agency declares that it wants to ‘hikack’ the process?) states they want to:

“hijack the pitch process so that our little agency can get our big idea on the table.”

The agency, Vaughn Whelan & Partners, was pitching for the Molson beer account. They actually ran a TV commercial they created, and paid for the airtime, according to the New York Post story (linked from the agency Web site.) Maybe they are really, really short of a strategic planner, and a copywriter. How else could someone have the guts to write that:

“Rather than pitch to the boardroom, VWPA elects to make positive noise.”

Clients –and I can speak as one, even though I tend to speak for the other side more often– don’t want ‘noise,’ for sure. Even when accompanied by very ‘edgy’ tactics.