In July 2006, IF was launched by myself and Brian as an integrated creative agency – offering advertising and brand strategy with the bite of sales promotion to deliver ‘ideas that sell’. Whilst we were busy setting our office up, some other businesses were hitting their stride too. Facebook first opened up to commercial business in 2006, while a quirky little outfit called Twitter sent out the first tweet and Daniel Craig made his debut as James Bond.

10 years later and IF has developed into one of Manchester’s most respected creative agencies. Some amazing people have worked (and many still work!) on some of the UK’s most famous brands – from first direct to Paddy Power, Knowsley Safari to Odeon to name but a few.

Our ambition was fairly straight forward; do some great work, have fun and earn some money. Aligning those planets hasn’t always been possible and like many agencies, there have been times when the fun
and/or the money have seemed in short supply!

Over the last decade, we’ve seen the fall of banks, retailers, prime ministers and governments. In 2006, Wii, Myspace and Blackberry Messenger were all the rage. Launching a couple of years ahead of the
financial crash in 2008 wasn’t exactly the best timing and it certainly hasn’t been all plain sailing.

But for the most part we are extremely proud of what we’ve achieved and I thought I’d try and capture what I think has helped us to grow and stay relevant during one of the most turbulent periods in our industry’s history.

ten ways to keep your business young and beautiful

1. Act like a start up

Not exactly original thinking but the best way to ensure you don’t get stale. Start-ups take risks but above all they are optimistic and excited by the future.

2. Be flexible, but always be true

Funnily enough, things don’t always go to plan and that’s a good thing. Unexpected challenges or changes in client preferences stretch an agency to innovate. Our initial attempts at social promotions through facebook were highly organised and structured. Then the rules changed and we had to learn to be more responsive to customer engagement. The initial challenge was more than compensated for by improved results and a more dynamic agency process. Having said that, flexibility needs to be around a core of consistent truth otherwise your team and your clients will lose any sense of bearing as to who you are or what you stand for.

3. Like. And be liked.

“it’s nothing personal, just business” is something I’ve never said and hopefully never will. There’s nothing more unattractive in a business than a mentality that it’s all about the money at any cost. It’s actually about people, real people. Great practitioners in our industry have something above all; empathy. They use it to make genuine relationships with their colleagues, their clients and their target audiences. It’s true that you can’t be liked by everyone. But you can try!

4. Practise what you preach

We probably did around 30 brand proposition workshops before we did our own. When we finally got round to it, our subsequent client workshops were so much better. Our mantra became ‘Inspirational Response’ and gave us a lens through which to judge our work, our people and our environment.

5. Share the good and the bad

I still struggle with this one even though I know how important it is. Getting the team together to share good news is easy, but when it’s not so good, there always seems to be a valid reason to postpone the weekly team meet! Your team aren’t dumb, they know when things aren’t great. Whilst they don’t want to see the MD with head in hands crying out for help, they do appreciate honesty. If that’s served up with some ideas as to how things could get better, (followed up by an action plan), all the better.

6. Spend time together

Our last agency night out at Chester races wasn’t the healthiest way to spend an evening, but it was extremely rewarding in many ways! Spending time together away from the day to day is hard these days, everyone seems to have so many responsibilities outside of work. But it’s vital to build the lasting relationships within the team that are needed to get through the tough times and really enjoy the good.

7. Constant evolution

Over 10 years, so much has changed and it feels to me that it’s all happened so very quickly. The reality is, seismic changes in attitudes or trends rarely happen overnight. So it’s important to sit down regularly and review what you’re doing and how you do it, making adaptations and improvements every time you do. Occasionally you might find something fundamentally wrong and that will require some form of re-invention. But on the whole, evolution, not revolution is the more effective agency path.

8. New beats improved

OK, so now to build on the previous point (and open myself up to be accused of contradiction) our industry craves anything New and always has. So whilst you need to constantly look to evolve, every now and again you need to bring out a whopping new tool! It’s been vital for us to review what we do in light of a changing market place. Clients are wresting overwhelming data issues and craving more insight about customers or channel effectiveness, so to stay relevant, we introduced IF’s Data Analytics offer. It’s a great service for our clients but it’s also a great signal to the team and prospective clients or colleagues, that we are a contemporary agency, prepared and able to adapt for the future.

9. A valued colleague always trumps a valuable client

We’ve all taken a call at some time that makes your heart sink. The client call that says they don’t rate, or like one of your team and that you need to get them off the account. But what if you believe that colleague is in the right; that they are doing a great job and just got lumbered with a difficult client? Well, the worst thing you can do is ignore it. Next worst is just accept it and move your colleague off. Chances are, it won’t be long before you get another call and this time it may not be an individual but the whole agency your client wants to change. Back your best colleagues every time, they are far more likely to be able to help you deliver the work, the fun and the rewards than a difficult client, however much that client is worth in the short term.

10. Don’t take yourself too seriously

And finally, having written far too many serious points in this feature, I’ve saved the most important ‘til last. It’s fine to take your business seriously, but at the end of the day, we’re not heart surgeons, lawyers or even plumbers. We are in a game that’s all about influencing people to do something they otherwise wouldn’t have. We are the informers, the persuaders, we’re entertainers. It’s a glorious industry full of character and good humour – as much today as there was in 2006 and I’m sure it’ll always be the same. And that’s enough to keep a smile on my face for many years to come.

Thank you for reading and thank you to all the people who’ve helped IF over the last 10 years. To colleagues, clients and collaborators past and present, we’ve done some great work, we’ve had plenty of fun and……..well you can’t have everything I guess.