A Conversation With Tom Salmon

Tom Salmon confronts the structural squeeze facing independent agencies head-on. Design used to be defensible — now a junior can use Figma. Video used to be defensible — now you can use Sora. The execution layer that agencies have sold for decades is collapsing in price.

This commoditisation of creative pushes the entire industry upstream. If you can't differentiate on making things, you must differentiate on thinking about what to make and why. Independent agencies are squeezed from below by commoditised tools and from above by big networks with scale and AI-powered production.

Tom argues that smaller agencies need to be ruthlessly specialist — not generalist. The opportunity is to own strategic value that AI cannot replicate. The agencies that survive will be the ones that move upstream and own the thinking, not just the doing.