SMALL, BUT MIGHTY: CHALLENGES AS OPPORTUNITIES FOR VALUE GROWTH

Forge is a high-performance team that cranks out premium brand marketing and strategy. As a small marketing agency, there are expected challenges, such as fierce competition and difficulty in attracting and retaining clients. However, there are some economies of scale found in the solutions. For the past few months, I’ve been ingrained in the Forge Worldwide team to see firsthand how challenges become opportunities for value growth.

Let’s briefly dive into the problems facing small marketing agencies in 2024 when it comes to earning potential. The first is fierce competition. For each RFP, there are many hundreds of marketing agencies that could be equipped to handle the project, and it’s a mad dash to stand out and win the project. Once secured, another challenge begins with retaining clients and, for some clients, growing existing projects to maximize impact. The nature of a marketing agency is for clients’ needs to ebb and flow, but the consistency remains in the relationships and the many times when clients return.

Grounded in the following solutions, Forge Worldwide was able to remain strong in the face of unforeseen challenges, and discover solutions. The first solution is a high-performance team – Forge Worldwide has instant communication and synchronism across its entire team, as the core individuals work as a single machine to execute high quality projects efficiently. McKinsey explains that while high-performing teams have long been revered, the ideal team size is 6-10 people to allow for enough diversity, but to also maintain effectiveness. To break it down on a personal level, with a small team of people there is generally greater trust, respect, accountability, collaboration and agility. Ultimately, Harvard Business Review shows productivity increase by 50% at high-trust companies. The more that colleagues feel psychologically safe in their environment and have trust-based vulnerability with their team, the more intrinsically motivated they are to excel.

Over the last few months, I have witnessed the high-performance, small-sized Forge team in every phase of their client work, from proposal writing to final edits on brand videos. I’m consistently impressed and motivated by the personal stake that each member of the team feels and the genuine care they express to each other over the final delivery of client projects and the impact their clients can have on the world. It is the difference between a partnership with the client and simply providing a service. The same teams that write the pitches for clients are on the phones during meetings and executing the work itself. As Caroline DiStefano, the VP of Accounts & Strategy explains, “Forge’s team size and entrepreneurial spirit has granted me opportunities to grow as a brand strategist, account lead, and manager at a pivotal point in my career. What’s more, our structure enables us to work directly and consistently with our clients, rather than simply setting up a project and leaving execution to someone who may be further from the work. Our clients tell us time and time again that we feel more like partners or colleagues than an outside vendor.”

Secondly, small marketing agencies can’t do everything, but they can produce very high quality strategies and materials for specific markets. Digital marketing agencies can find value in reputation and revenue through specializing. As Adam Smith famously said, “The greatest improvement in the productive powers of labour, and the greater part of the skill, dexterity, and judgement with which it is any where directed, or applied, seem to have been the effects of the division of labour, “ (Wealth of Nations, I:I, p.13.). If you haven’t heard this quote before, Smith, the Father of Modern Economics, explained that when it comes to productivity of labor, specialization has the greatest effect. For example, Forge Worldwide is specialized in the healthcare, higher education and non-profit sectors, where they have the most experience. While our clients span many industries, we are committed to specialized sectors in order to bring more narrowed expertise and higher productivity to the clients within those sectors, driving loyalty and strong relationships. 

While COVID had taken a disproportionate toll on small businesses and budget constraints and ROI measurement remain a challenge for many small marketing agencies, new agency business was expected to rise during 2024. Challenges gave Forge Worldwide the opportunity to grow their business, define value in size and specialization. Grounded in persistence and a close-knit team, the Forge Worldwide name is not an accident:

[ FORGE ]

/fôrj/ Verb

To shape metal by heating it in a fire and hammering it into a useful shape. To forge swords from steel.

To form or make, especially by concentrated effort: To forge friendships through mutual trust

Taking observations and insights and hammering them into strong, long-lasting ideas and marketing tools is why we’re called Forge. In case you were wondering.