Creating Passionate and Great Interactive Marketing Agencies

I was looking at vivid studios's Methodology Manual v1.1 today. (the link is a link to the memorial site; the actual site no longer exists). It brought something into sharp focus for me. vivid studios was a top notch interactive agency that created a deep and authentically passionate company culture amongst its employees, while delivering top notch online collateral to clients in the San Francisco Bay Area -- and core to the creation of this was a shared methodology.

This comes to mind as I see a mounting crisis in studios that offer Internet Marketing expertise. I am seeing brands that are paper thin constructs of the parent corporation and entire internal departments that feel left out of the game. In these interactive agencies, the production team may have it's methodology (maybe something captured in a Microsoft Project template). The marketing team may have its expertise (CRM experience for example), the account managers theirs (a culture with a certain style of client handling), and so on across the departments. But there is no esprit de corps.

Often, in its place, there is a frantic effort - between billable client work - to create a branded company website that shows a perky professionalism, and an attempt by HR to get the free beer out on Fridays. What is missing is a methodology to bind and brand the company.

The methodology is a statement of intent and reflects a studio's soul.

Creating it forces the company to commit to a mission down to its bones. It is a manifesto captured in description of processes, teams and the job descriptions of the individuals. It's character shines on (or dulls) product, client services and the company brand.

vivid's manual clearly speaks to it's user-centric approach and the company's cohesion between the disciplines. In contrast I feel that the organizations I have seen lately have a brand that is lain over it by HR and the new business development team, and is comprised of departments that are out of sync with each other.

Even worse it leads to disciplines that secretly suspect that each other really doesn't "get it."

--- designers who feel left out by account managers they see as playing at being designers themselves; account managers who feel abused by capricious engineers; project managers who wonder why their product expertise is never tapped by the strategists.

As an antidote you might see calls to arms - simple epitaphs ; "we love our customers!", "we have a unique culture!", "we get the job done!", "we're the best place to work!". The hope is to bind the company with bubbly-ness.

*sigh*

These corporate enculturation efforts don't cut to the bone in the way that a clear vision for how-you-make-things does. A company that has a clear vision for its methodology gets to self branding and morale by speaking to process. Good people will find in the shelter of this methodology the opportunity to express their passion. Great work created by these people will shape a competitive brand.

Passion does not need to be mandated.

And clients get great product (and an education). vivid understood this. So did the Eames. I think IDEO does as well.

These are the great agencies.