Make Agency

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the director of Spotlight Sports Group. It’s a collection of a number of brand content houses and publications. Historically, it was a horse racing publication but we’ve expanded and acquired business where we now cover content across horse racing, greyhound sport, and US sports. In my role, I look after all of our B2B activities and relationships.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Make Agency?

We hired them to build a number of sales websites. We have our own B2B platform, which has a lot of data, as well as our own tech team. However, we wanted to showcase our products and demonstrate what we could do for customers. Essentially, we wanted a platform that could scale and change quickly depending on the audience.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Originally, Make Agency built one website for us, and we then extended that to a number of various sites over the years. Mainly, the websites were on WordPress. Their team also did design and graphics work using Adobe InDesign, Microsoft PowerPoint, or videos we required to accompany standard pictures.

What is the team composition?

We work with two directors, account managers, for both front- and backend, and dedicated staff members. We’ve had consistent people working on our projects so they understand who we are and how we like to be portrayed.

How did you come to work with Make Agency?

We didn’t have any technical web or graphics team members available. I looked for an agency that’d be reactive to the things I needed; in essence, someone who could turn tasks around quickly and build out our collateral.

I came across Make Agency online and gave them a small project to start with. The relationship developed from there, and they’ve been doing work for both our B2B and B2C sides.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve invested more than $300,000 with them.

What is the status of this engagement?

Our ongoing engagement started in March 2015. We’ve developed our own capabilities in-house, but they still work across a number of our sites.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?

The microsites have driven traffic and the sales websites and collateral have been very successful. We’ve seen a lot of improvement in the number of customers coming to us as we expand our product. The deliverables are good and work very well.

How did Make Agency perform from a project management standpoint?

Project management has gone well. We’ve always had a dedicated account manager. The only criticism is on us. At the start, the briefing and scope of work was light on our side; it should have been a lot more detailed. In fairness, they did very well at the start by understanding our requirements and expanding our business very quickly. Their team could take a verbal pitch or brief and create it without a huge amount of documentation. They deserve a lot of credit.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Make Agency has been extremely responsive from the start. We felt like a big client to them; we were getting a lot of attention. They reacted to our requests and weren’t just trying to build up for each next phone call. We developed a good relationship where they’d come and work from our offices sometimes. It’s clear that they understood our business very quickly and were invested in our success.

Are there any areas they could improve?

They could’ve been more proactive in other things they could’ve done for us; either other developments in design or more ideas on how to improve our products. I imagine they probably didn’t want to step on our toes, but we would’ve welcomed more input from them.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

They’re a very passionate team and managed to scale the business. However, they still feel like a very small and dedicated agency where you’ll be able to have good access to directors and your account manager. Make sure to collect input into the process. From a design and creative perspective, they’re excellent. We should have leaned on them more for their ideas and direction.