Sadly, Listening Is Now a Competitive Advantage

There’s a hollowness at the heart of most agency-client relationships. Meetings filled with talk but no understanding. Briefs delivered, nodded at, and misunderstood. Strategies are presented before anyone’s even finished explaining the problem.

New clients have told me this firsthand. They’re genuinely surprised when someone takes the time to really listen.

It’s not that people aren’t talking. It’s that no one’s really listening.

I picture an awkward, ambient kind of silence – the one that hangs there after a client has said something important, something real, and the agency across the table doesn’t quite hear it. Or worse, they nod and move on, like waiters pretending to write down an order they’ve already decided isn’t on the menu.

It Shouldn’t Be Like This. But Here We Are.

A decade ago, agencies differentiated themselves by mastering new platforms. By building tech stacks and retargeting funnels and shiny decks with five-stage pyramids and splashy verbs. That stuff still exists. But it’s no longer impressive. It’s expected. Like asking a plumber if they have a wrench.

So what makes one agency stand out from another?

It turns out the bar is on the floor. And it’s wearing noise-cancelling headphones.

The Cliché Crisis

There’s no shortage of agencies with award-winning design. Strategic thinkers. Performance ninjas. Full-service 360-degree data-driven storytellers. It’s all wallpaper now. You can’t throw a stress ball in a WeWork without hitting someone who can “optimise a funnel” or “drive full-funnel growth.”

The problem is, none of it means anything anymore – not on its own.

Clients are tired. Not in the “I worked through lunch” way. In the “I’ve spent six figures on ads and don’t know if it made a difference” kind of way. They’ve been told repeatedly that their last agency was bad and that this next one is different. But then the kickoff meeting feels eerily familiar. A five-minute icebreaker. A slide deck template. A rush to the tactics.

I can almost hear the collective groan that I’m sure follows when they realise they’re not going to be asked a single question they haven’t answered before.

The Differentiator You Can’t Automate

Here’s the dirty secret: listening – actually, truly listening – is one of the most powerful forms of differentiation left. And it’s hardly ever done well.

It’s not just hearing the words. It’s hearing what’s behind the words. Picking up on the things they’re not saying because they don’t know how. Or they’re embarrassed. Or they’ve tried explaining it to the last three agencies and got PowerPointed into submission.

It’s pausing long enough to understand the human underneath the KPI.

It’s asking, “What’s really going on in your business?” and staying quiet long enough to make it safe to answer.

You don’t need a plugin for that. You don’t need a certified badge or a paid version. You need time, humility, and the willingness to stop seeing people as user personas.

If you listen well, really listen and want to, people will tell you everything you need to know.

Not just about the campaign, but about their stress, their boss, their career, their doubts. They’ll tell you what success feels like. They’ll tell you the real stakes. They’ll show you how to win their trust – and maybe even their loyalty.

But you have to want to hear it.

The Performance of Empathy

There’s a growing market for performative empathy. You’ve seen it. Warm lighting on Zoom. WFH banter about dogs. An emphasis on “culture fit” and “checking in.” It’s all fine. But it’s not listening. It’s branding.

The real kind of listening is inconvenient. It throws off timelines. It complicates briefs. It means pushing back on deliverables when you realise the client’s actual problem isn’t awareness – it’s clarity. Or confidence. Or internal politics.

It means not sending that quote until you’ve had a second, longer, unstructured conversation that wasn’t scoped but was necessary.

And that’s where the sadness creeps in. Because none of this should be exceptional.

Listening Is Free (But Nobody’s Buying)

If it feels like clients are crying out for someone to just understand them, it’s because they are. In the same way customers want to be understood by brands. The same way we all want to feel like someone is genuinely interested in what we have to say.

This is backed by research, too. According to the Harvard Business Review, empathic listening is directly correlated with better client outcomes and long-term trust. Another study from Salesforce found that 84% of customers say being treated like a person, not a number, is very important to winning their business.

But the irony is, while everyone talks about “building trust,” most agencies act like trust is something you buy with slick branding and big words.

Real trust? That comes from listening first. Then doing something useful with what you heard.

So Why Don’t More Agencies Do It?

Because listening slows things down. And in a world obsessed with speed, scale, and efficiencies, that’s a problem.

Agencies are under pressure. Hit targets. Launch fast. Keep the margins. So they move quickly from problem to pitch to proposal. The brief gets condensed, the client’s pain becomes a bullet point, and the work becomes a package.

It’s easier to productise than to personalise.

But easier isn’t always better. And fast isn’t always forward.

What Happens When You Actually Listen

When you listen, you uncover root problems – not just symptoms. That makes your work sharper. Less scattershot. More effective.

When you listen, you become a partner, not a vendor. That changes the relationship. Budgets shift. Retainers grow. Loyalty forms.

When you listen, people relax. They start to hope again. They believe this time might actually be different. And if you’re honest, empathetic, and competent, then it will be.

Let’s Be Honest

If all it takes to stand out in this industry is to actually listen – to take the time to understand what matters to you, your business, your pressures – then something’s gone wrong somewhere.

Because listening shouldn’t be a differentiator. It should be the baseline.

But the truth is, too many agencies rush in with answers before they’ve understood the question. They treat your challenges like just another task list. And somewhere along the way, the human part – the bit that makes the strategy actually work – gets flattened.

The reality? If someone doesn’t enjoy listening to clients, they’re in the wrong business. If they’re not empathetic – genuinely curious about what’s keeping you up at night, what success means to you, what’s riding on this quarter – then no tech stack or flashy creative will make up for that.

You shouldn’t have to teach an agency how to care.

But if you’ve been burned before, you know how rare that kind of care can be.

One Last Thing

At Friday, we’re not going to tell you we’re different. We’re going to show you by listening to you first. No generic pitch decks. No “discovery workshops” with 14 post-its and a timer.

Just an honest conversation about what’s really going on.

Let’s talk. We’ll do the listening.