We have a team of people who have worked at top London marketing agencies over the course of their careers. We have delivered high quality work for blue chip corporate clients on big budget projects. We now wish to offer our services to help well-funded start-up enterprises and ambitious small to medium-sized businesses. We know you value strategic competence, creative excellence, professional delivery and value for money - and that is what we offer.
Our process delivers a strong foundation for our work because it offers a flexible framework that we are able to execute in a way that is most appropriate to the bespoke needs of individual clients. The amount of time required for each activity is determined by many factors. These factors can include the financial objectives a client is seeking to achieve, the complexity of the marketplace in which they operate, the position from where they are starting, the sophistication of competitor activities, the demographics of the customer base, the internal sales pipeline processes they have in place, and so on.
We prefer to do this via a face-to-face briefing session, where it is possible to do so, but conference calls suffice for national and international clients. The aim is to get a clearer idea of where the client has come from, where they are now, and where they want to go. We find out everything we need to know about their business, in terms of its customers, competitors, and products and services. Ideally, we will have access to business plans, sales forecasts and any other relevant documentation and support materials. We identify the stakeholders involved in the decision-making process and get a clearer idea on budgets and timescales. Finally, we identify any other relevant details that are specific to the client’s needs and requirements.
The second stage in the process is research. We read and analyse any documents we have been given, including business plans, sales forecasts, sales materials and marketing collateral.
We know from previous experience that we must continue to search for ways to improve the solutions we are delivering for clients on an ongoing basis. We see our six-step planning process as existing within a continuum, rather than being a one-off event. That is why this last step in the process is so important to the efficacy of our work. We follow an ongoing process of improvement through measurement, analysis, assessment and recommendation, to ensure that performance always remain optimised. Only by doing so are we able to deliver the best possible solutions for our clients. We recognise that we do not operate in a vacuum and that external market forces are always at work. We work in close collaboration with clients as we believe that partnership delivers the best possible solutions.
Although we believe that we are extremely good at what we do – strategically, creatively, and executionally – we also believe that it is always possible to improve. Our focus on continual personal development (CPD) means that we are always looking for opportunities to hone our existing skills, as well as to learn new ones.
This is because responsibility is often handed over to a junior member of the team once a contract has been won. At Abacus, project management is always delivered by a director, who is able to provide ongoing analysis, insights and recommendations during the delivery process.
We are polite and personable people who are respectful and considerate. We try to stand in our clients’ shoes in order to see the world from their perspective. We are not ‘yes people’ and will always offer alternative options. We are renowned for our attention to detail.
If you wish to deliver a value add service, then there has to be some mechanism in place in order to measure what you do against the cost of doing it. We look at both sides of the equation and constantly seek to improve what we do.
