The perfect outcome for a project of any type can only happen if certain pieces are in place. An agency must understand a client’s needs, goals and understand their business processes inside and out. Client and agency must then manage the project with clarity of communication and with the right setup for that communication to take place. It’s also important for the client to understand how the agency approaches challenges, how they are organized and how they plan to move ahead.
For the client
Let the agency into your most intimate processes and tell them your deepest secrets about what isn’t working and why. The earlier you do this, the more the agency can incorporate into their plan. The more detail you provide, however irrelevant you might think it to be, could be of help to an experienced agency better placed to make that judgement.
Prepare a conduit for transferring information from your side to their side as well as from them to any other stakeholders on your side. Waqa Studios will have one person responsible for communicating with a client and that person will be acting as project manager. The client should replicate this setup on their side, with a single point of contact. This is very important if the client’s organization is made up of more than one decision maker or input provider – this single person should facilitate communication between the agency and the other members of the client’s team.
For Waqa Studios
We’ll want to be provided with as much detail as possible about what your pain points are and what you want to achieve. We’ll do the same with intricate and often overwhelming details about what we recommend and why, how the project will be planned out and what will happen and when.
We don’t expect a client to be expert in the techniques we want to use, the creative process or things specific to our internal processes… but we do want you to have it documented what we’re doing and why. At the very least we find this helps clients formulate questions that they otherwise wouldn’t know how to ask. It also provides a foundation to build upon for future tasks and expansions.
The Process
Our processes have been developed alongside our growing experience over the course of more than a decade. 99% of the value we offer is rooted in our strategies, methods and ideas. We want you to get the best value for the time, energy and money invested in working with us. You should trust in our processes for the best results, but this doesn’t mean you shouldn’t push back. Pushback is a key part of the process and is in fact expected and built-in.
Be straightforward. Critical, Up-front and detailed. Provide criticism and ask questions.