Communications agencies are all now awaking to the fact that the digital component is a growing part of their business, or needs to be, as their clients are looking for one-stop-shop solutions.

However, there is often internal confusion as to what the digital offering should be, how it should be implemented within the current company infrastructure and how it can deliver profits.

Consultants at Catalyst MDC come from backgrounds in traditional communications agencies and have also worked in successful digital marketing companies. They have witnessed many experiments (and disasters) with digital offerings and have come to an understanding of how agencies should deliver for their clients through digital channels, without changing their business fundamentally or opening themselves up to unnecessary risk.

We have developed an approach for effective ‘digitalisation’ of an agency that fast tracks companies to a credible and profitable position for delivering digital communications as part of the marketing mix to their clients.

Catalyst delivers support in both the planning and implementation phases of the digital offering. These comprise:

• Business Plan - delivering a robust plan that covers :
• Business model - including pricing and forecasting
• Offering - extent of services
• Positioning - how these dovetail with the existing company
• Resourcing - how the new services should be staffed - how far this can be delivered organically and what level of recruitment or supplier partnership is required
• Process definition - how to ensure slick delivery of any digital services within the current production infrastructure


• Implementation - helping manage the internal development through:
  • Internal communication - helping to position the development of the company as an opportunity for existing staff - this step includes a digital ‘amnesty’ - an opportunity for staff at all levels to ask anonymous questions about digital marketing they feel they should already know the answers to.
  • Staff training - concise workshops, with useful reference material, that allow staff to very quickly start to acquire new skills - from digital copywriting skills to digital data analysis, from best practice training for management to integrated planning for strategists.
  Process definition - providing a blueprint for a digital planning and production process which is tailored to your current set up
  
  • Recruitment & affiliate negotiation - identifying suitable candidates for key digital roles and identifying potential production suppliers complementary to the agency’s offering.