James Bavington is Director and Partner at StrategiQ, an award-winning integrated digital agency with offices in Suffolk and Warwickshire, which received the award for best small integrated search agency in the UK.
In this episode of Velocitize Talks, Bavington shares his thoughts on digital integration, website design, and keeping values in storytelling.
Belief system (2:11)
It would be very easy just to come up with a creative piece of content, put [the client’s] name on it, put it out there and sort of hope for the best but what we try to do is really understand what makes our clients different, the areas they excel in, bring those to the surface, so maybe just their values and beliefs.
For a company to go above and beyond its mission, it needs to adhere to its values. An Edelman study on brand trust and found that almost two-thirds of consumers make purchases in accordance with their beliefs.
Show me what you’re made of (3:50)
Before you tell [clients] what you’re doing or how you’re doing it, ask why are you doing it, where are you, where are we going, what do you believe in. Help me help you by understanding that part first.
Bavington referenced a popular Ted Talks episode featuring author and motivational speaker Simon Sinek in which he discusses the “golden circle,” a theory exploring why certain organizations are able to generate inspiration and trust while others are not. According to Sinek, “People don’t buy what you do, they buy why you do it.”
Tell your story (4:40)
When [Triumph Motorcycles] originally came to us, they said we’d just like you guys to film it, capture it for us, and create a really cool video but when we actually worked with them to understand the storytelling it became a completely different video concept with interviews and a story that had a start, middle and end that resonated the purpose and the values of why Triumph.
Videos have become increasingly prominent in storytelling, outlined by purpose and values. StrategiQ created the following video marketing campaign for the annual Triumph Motorcycles and Movember Foundation ride raising money for prostate cancer research and men’s mental health. Last year they raised $5.8 million dollars.
Return customers (9:16)
I think websites will have to get a lot cleverer. The increasing demand of user experience, the analysis of conversion rate optimization—these are all things influencing websites and how they’re produced. There’s a lot more work that we’re doing, spending a lot more time incubating the project right at the start to to really capture people.
The staying power of any website, a key digital integration tool, depends heavily on keeping potential and returning consumers. A company’s website is also an ideal platform for telling your story. That said, web design is critical to your website’s success, as is mobile design. Research shows that it takes only 0.05 seconds for customers to form an opinion about your site.
Digital Integration and Collaborative Marketing (12:34)
There’s been a positive shift in how some individual specialists within our team, whether they’re a developer, videographer, SEO or paid marketer, everybody’s starting to break outside of the mold and soften the edges to work more closely, to collaborate with their colleagues on a unified campaign for our clients.
Organizational alignment internally leads to a smoother customer experience. It’s far too easy for teams to operate in silos instead of collaborating with the rest of the invested parties. In one survey, 86% of employees cited lack of collaboration for workplace failures.
To learn more about StrategiQ, visit their website, and follow them on LinkedIn and Twitter at @StrategiQ.
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