Why Efficiency and Agility Lets Marketers Shine

I could talk all day about the importance of data-driven creativity. It’s what we do at MOI, because it’s how you turn the heads of modern B2B buyers. But to enable a platform where people can consistently produce this head-turning work, you need to keep the gears greased with efficient operational and organisational structures.

Why?

With the world moving at a blistering speed, it’s difficult for businesses to understand what’s going on, let alone try to keep up. There are more channels and platforms than ever before, and they’re all intertwined in complex ways.

So, when a client needs to process large digital programmes at speed, they don’t want to first have to build a team from multiple agencies that all cover different disciplines. It’s inefficient and slow.

Those days are over, as proven by the rush for the advertising giants – with their child agencies competing rather than collaborating – to adapt to changing landscapes and client needs.

Global agility

Clients want to work with one unified team that can cover all the varied disciplines needed to produce a campaign, and one in which everyone believes in the same ethos. It makes everything simpler, through streamlined briefings, consistent best practices, enhanced global thinking and resource flexibility, clients know that whoever they are working with, in whatever city, our clients will get the brand, project and systems knowledge, enthusiasm and value without the pain of managing multiple teams.

And, importantly, it’s essential to achieve agility that can be scaled to a global level.

But getting global offices to work as one team doesn’t happen by accident. Agencies need the right operational structures in place. When business processes and models are consistent, measurable and easily scaled, we have everyone working towards the same goals.

This is a key step in building an agency culture that unifies teams working across continents. With the right working methodologies and training programmes in place, our offices are able to communicate more easily and collaborate faster. This provides a cohesive, agile and efficient platform which consistently creates global, head-turning marketing campaigns.

There are always challenges associated with working in a global business, not least communicating between multiple time zones. But when everyone has a flexible mindset, and they really believe in the same aims, they can use the efficiencies built into the agency to take these challenges in their stride.

Value for money

Clients increasingly demand that their agencies are transparent and that they’re getting value for money. That’s not a bad thing; it forces us to constantly up our game. When there’s nowhere to hide, we need to be able to prove that what we’re doing is working – if it’s not, we try to do better.

With all our processes running smoothly, we not only make more effective measurements, but know that our work is getting results that give people the confidence to keep bringing ideas to the table.

While it may be scary for some agencies, we are open and upfront about what we do, what the client’s getting for their money and how effective a campaign is.

Technology

Today, for an agency to develop an efficient organisational structure, the processes need to be supported by the right technology.

And, with literally thousands of martech solutions available today, there’s no excuse not to use technology. From optimisation to insight, from planning to productivity, there’s a tool for everything.

Of course, there’s no point paying for this technology if nobody knows how to use it. That’s why we have weekly ‘Lunch & Learn’ sessions at MOI – enabling our global team to stay ahead of the curve.

Efficiency is a win-win for everybody

The higher quality of work produced through efficient systems undoubtedly impacts our clients and boosts their marketing efforts, but our agency wins big too. Higher efficiency means higher performance, which results in attracting and winning more clients and the ability to recruit and retain inspirational and talented staff.

Ultimately, we do all this to make sure there’s more collaboration among ourselves and with our clients, and that we can scale the agency to continue producing head-turning work as business and client demands increase.

I hope I’ve given you some food for thought on the importance of efficiency, especially in an industry so focussed on creativity. Get in touch if you want to talk more about operational efficiency.

Andrea Allen