Figures compiled by New Media Age for its Top 100 Interactive Agencies 2006 guide showed that only three web design & build agencies and three digital marketing agencies had managed to maintain consistent levels of efficiency - that is, they were ranked among the top ten most efficient agencies, based on the amount of turnover that each employee delivers, two years in a row. Web Liquid is one of the three digital marketing agencies to achieve this feat.

Alain Portmann, one of our founding partners was invited by Jennifer Whitehead to provide his perspective on the topic of Agency Efficiency. His comments where part of a feature published by New Media Age on the 8th of March 2007. An excerpt of Alain’s comments is provided below. Read the full Agency Efficiency article.

“Most agencies are incredibly inefficient. There are usually a lot of people in them trying to justify their jobs.” He puts this down in part to the fact that agencies, by their nature, are required to hire a lot of specialists, which leads to them being structured in silos. This is compounded by hiring young people who are given specialised jobs from day one, meaning they don’t have a full understanding of everything else that goes on at the business. Portmann feels this is detrimental to agencies, as well as to the people who work there.

“Agencies have a duty to their employees to help them diversify their skills,” he says. In a full-service agency this can help efficiency in simple ways, such as by allowing the media people to have a conversation with the clients and take a creative brief, if necessary. But it needs to be part of the agency’s culture and can’t be taught through training or classes. That means having the resources to get people to sit down and share their knowledge with the rest of the team. It also means rejecting the idea of induction for new staff being a one-off learning experience, but rather an ongoing process.

“The most valuable thing is passing on knowledge,” says Portmann. “Ideally you want your team to be as knowledgeable as you. That makes good business sense.” At Web Liquid, this can mean a weekly brainstorm or chats about topics like affiliate marketing and search.

agency efficiency, new media age, interactive agencies, digital marketing agencies, advertising agencies, efficiency, web liquid