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How to build a thriving studio

Running a small creative business can be a joy and a privilege, but it’s certainly not a walk in the park. Right from the start you’re beset by challenges and big decisions, and as your business grows they’ll level up alongside you.

How to launch a creative business

Forewarned is forearmed, though, so we spoke to a collection of studio heads to get their insider knowledge on the various obstacles you’ll come up against when running your own business, and their tips on how to overcome them. Here’s what they had to say.

Recruit the best

Find out how to tempt talent away from large agencies

01. Focus on juniors

As a small creative business, it’s often easier to recruit juniors with potential and then develop them than to find fully formed talent. The Plant London is one agency that likes to nurture from below, according to founder Matt Utber. “One student who came straight to us from university ended up becoming our design director,” he recalls. “And we’ve had a few others over the years who’ve done similar things. It’s really lovely to nurture designers and see them grow like this.”

02. Draw on existing friendship groups

Friendship groups and existing contacts are another great way to find new talent. At SteadyGo, the Leeds agency he co-founded, Tom Wade tried running a recommendation policy for recruitment: “If an existing employee introduced a friend we’d pay them £250, or donate it to a charity. Quite a lot of people did the latter, which was nice.”

And the benefits of using friendship networks aren’t just about getting in good people, he adds. “Recruiting this way has led to a very friendly atmosphere. Everyone has these connections that transcend day-to-day agency life.”

03. Avoid using recruitment agencies

The sentiment of our panel was that recruitment agencies are best left as a last resort. Not only are they expensive, but they’re not always reliable. “Once we hired someone the agent had vetted and who interviewed okay, but had a CV that turned out to be complete fiction,” remembers Alec East, founder of Bedford agency Narrative Industries. “Recruitment fees are pretty big when you’re on the salaries we pay, and yet the work this guy did was so bad that in the end it wasn’t actually billable.”

04. Get out there and meet people

Updating LinkedIn is not enough to find the right talent. You have to physically venture out into the community, believes Joe Cecere of Minneapolis agency Little & Company.

“Our philosophy is that we’re always connecting and getting out there, talking to people,” he explains. “We’re speaking at events, we’re going to student portfolio shows. This keeps our name known. We use our network of employees and their past experience to keep in contact with people all around the country. So when opportunities come up, we’re able to bring people in.”

05. Join organisations

Joining professional organisations can seriously widen your recruiting net, says Utber. “Being part of YCN, a small collection of agencies and clients, has been very good in helping us find talent.” Check out local associations too, adds East. “Here in Bedfordshire, recruitment is more difficult than in London, so I got involved in Bedford Creative Arts. Part of their remit is to provide creative networking events, and they’ve proved very useful with freelancers or special commissions.”

06. Create the right studio culture

Create the right studio culture, and recruiting and retaining your staff becomes far easier. That’s certainly been the case at Chicago design agency 50,000feet, says Jim Misener. “Being a small business means we’ve been able to develop an incredibly collaborative – almost collectivist – culture,” he explains.

“We keep the hierarchy as flat as possible, and this has contributed to our ability to attract and retain talent, with many citing the environment, culture and an ability to make a difference within their teams, practices, and the agency overall as reasons for joining and staying.”

Next page: How to keep winning new work

Keep your business afloat by constantly winning new work

01. Specialise

If you’re a large agency, clients expect you to do everything, from marketing to branding through to web design and app development. Small agencies can’t compete with that – and nor should they, says East.

“When we first started, we’d take almost any job that came our way. But once we recognised what we did best and what we enjoyed the most, it became easier to specialise. This, in turn, made it easier to identify new business opportunities and win them.”

02. Be proactive

Small agencies often get work via word of mouth, but you can’t rely on that, argues Utber. “You need to be proactive. Personally I always do one thing a day. Make a phone call or reconnect to someone.” It’s also about getting your name out there. “We believe that raising our profile is a great way to attract clients, so we’re writing a lot more thought pieces, and doing a lot more talks and panels.”

03. Choose your work

For new Manchester agency BGN, chasing new business is all about going after the right type of work, says founder Antonio Giansante. “We’ve got a clear vision of the type of client we want, so that’s what we’re chasing. We’ve been building up a campaign to target that sector including a mixture of stuff: sponsoring some awards and events, print advertising, digital advertising, some social stuff, attending events, and some old-school DM.”

04. Avoid search firms

Traditional ad agencies often use a search or pitch firm to generate leads. But our panel generally sees that as an outdated model that’s too expensive for a small agency. “We went through a phase of working with a lead generation agency, where people would cold call for us,” recalls Wade. “But it cost quite a lot per month – pretty much one person’s wage. And I wouldn’t say the results were exactly amazing…”

05. Harness social media

Social media can be a useful tool to find new clients, says Wade. “At SteadyGo, I used the Twitter app Tweetdeck to serve me up tweets containing words from a list of 20 that were relevant to our business. I found quite a lot of work that way, and it made it easier to pick the kind of clients we wanted.”

06. Sort your legal status

One of the biggest questions freelancers have is whether to trade as a company or as an individual. The main factor that persuaded Dan Hett, a creative technologist and digital artist from Manchester, to register himself as a company was that it opened more doors. “I’ve got a couple of very large clients that I know won’t deal with people who aren’t set up as companies,” he says. “So for me, it was important I be registered as a company.”

Next page: How to keep hold of clients

Discover how to hang on to your clients and stop them defecting to rival companies.

01. Create a sense of trust

Beyond quality work, delivered in a timely manner, the main thing that will keep clients on side is trust and understanding. When you only have a small number of employees, that can be easier to achieve than in a huge, impersonal organisation, so make the most of it, says Wade. “Predominantly, it’s about a shared sense of what the brand needs, its trajectory, its future and becoming a genuine partner. Pursue that, as we did at SteadyGo, and you’ll end up with a lot of long-term clients as a result.”

02. Provide consistency

Clients like consistency, and that’s another thing you should be better positioned to provide as a small business. “In a big company, a client may get shifted through four designers through the progress of the work,” points out Cecere. “Or they may have an account director for six months, and then get a new one all of a sudden. In contrast, at Little & Company, you get a dedicated team that stay with you. We have decades-long relationships because of those strong bonds.”

03. Recognise you both want the same things

Just as you want a long-term relationship with a client, remember that they also want a long-term relationship with you. This came into sharp focus for Giansante this year when BGN was launched. He made it clear to each client that cashflow was crucial in these early days. “And everyone’s responded well and paid on the dot,” he says. “They were all saying: ‘We want to help you through it.’ So it’s always important to remember that these relationships work both ways.”

04. Be a good listener

Often, a client will come to a small agency because they feel that bigger companies don’t listen to them, or have time for them. So don’t disappoint. “At 50,000feet, great communication begins by listening,” says Misener. “Then, we focus on executing on clients’ specific challenges – quickly and beautifully. We approach every client interaction from a service-minded standpoint: what insight can we share, what inspiration can we offer, what confidence can we instill and what trust can we build.”

05. Be personable

One thing people like about small creative businesses is that they’re generally more easy-going and personable than big companies, so use that to your advantage, says John Spencer, founder of Middlesex agency Offthetopofmyhead. “I think you dramatically improve your chances by being approachable and friendly,” he explains. “Nobody wants to deal with an agency if they’re full of their own importance – and there are plenty of these agencies around. Clients want to enjoy the experience, and it’s up to us to make sure they do.”

06. Manage expectations

Even if you do everything possible right, don’t expect every client to stay with you forever, says Utber. “There’s natural attrition as well. When you work on a project basis, once the brand is developed, the client will often find someone in-house or a less expensive agency to handle things. That’s very much a fact of life.” So build in that expectation to your projection and if it happens, don’t dwell too much on it. If you’re always finding new clients, then losing old ones shouldn’t hurt as much.

Next page: How to stay on top of things

Get a firm hold on studio management, project management and cashflow.

01. Make cashflow king

“Cashflow is the main downfall for small creative businesses,” says Giansante. Yet making sure that there’s always cash in the bank to pay for everything is a big task, and easily forgotten amongst the more ‘fun’ aspects of agency work.”So as well as using tools like Xero, I’ve got a budget spreadsheet on my screen 24/7,” he says. “Everything we spend on a daily basis goes in there and I keep constant track.”

02. Be ruthless

In a small business, the person responsible for keeping clients happy may also be the person who needs to chase client payments, yet that can be problematic. “We don’t like talking about money, it’s a very British thing,” says East. “But you need to get over that, or you may end up in trouble. Of course, you need to have proper payment systems, but beyond that it’s largely a communication issue: you need to keep talking to clients about money, as well as everything else.”

03. Create an ‘all hands on deck’ culture

In a small business, everyone must be willing to pitch in with administrative tasks, believes Cecere. “We do have people that manage core areas of our business, but we’re also a 25-person firm, so we talk about wearing a lot of hats,” he says. “Even if you’re a leader in a certain area, no one is too big to do any kind of task. People help each other out; we all roll up our sleeves when we need to.”

04. Learn when to delegate

When you’re a small business, you can keep costs down by handling administrative tasks yourself. “But sometimes that’s a false economy, and it’s important to recognise where your energies are best spent,” says East. “We got a great bookkeeper after about two years and it was worth the cost, because she gave us so much more information about cashflow and we could do projections. So as with design, these things are often best left to someone who knows what they’re doing.”

05. Manage workflow

It’s the kind of problem everyone wants to have, but being over rather than under capacity can still be a serious problem for a small studio. “It’s a really fine line between having too little work and too much,” points out Giansante. “But that’s one of the biggest challenges you can have on the project management side, to strike that balance. It’s hard to say no to work from a cash point of view, but there are other options, like outsourcing to a pool of trusted freelancers.”

06. Review everything you do regularly

With the constant hustle and bustle of agency work, it’s easy to forget to take a step back and examine how things are going. But it’s vital for the health of the company to do so, argues Misener. “We begin the week with a careful review of finance, operations, staffing and marketing across the entire business, developing a list of of goals for the week, along with any issues that we need to address,” he says. “By minding the store, we create a sustainable and creative environment.”

Next page: How to establish a good work-life balance

Retain your staff by offering them the right balance of work and play.

01. Facilitate good communications

The biggest cause of workplace stress is poor communication and bad planning, says East. As a small business, those problems should in theory be easier to overcome than in a huge bureaucracy, but this won’t happen automatically. You need to make the effort to be clear with your employees. “You need to ask difficult questions, be realistic about what’s achievable, be willing to say you don’t know (but can find out), and have good processes and workflows in place,” says East. “Sort this out and most of the problems melt away.”

02. Keep working hours realistic

People working for small companies are often asked to work long hours, and often end up doing so, but that can be counterproductive, lowering productivity and encouraging staff churn. So how can you avoid too many late nights or weekends stuck in the office? “Once you’re experienced enough to know how long things take, you set realistic timelines,” Utber says. Then it’s a case of communicating these timelines. “We find clients are very happy to let you take the lead on that, as long as you clearly tell them how long things will take. As a result, we very rarely work long hours.”

03. Be flexible

With a small business, you generally have more freedom to be flexible with staff than large organisations with a rigid HR department. And this can go a long way to making employees happier and more productive. “So while we have regular office hours,” says Cecere, “if you want to be home one day, you can do that. If you want to go to a coffee shop and work, you can do that. If your kid has a baseball game, go do that.”

04. Offer remote working

Offering your staff the possibility of remote working is another way to keep them on side. Giansante offers two examples. “One lad at BGN is working a day or two a week, following the recent birth of his new baby. And our creative director has got small children, so he leaves at 5pm every day, but then he’ll probably work 9 to 11pm at home. If you can fit work around people’s lives, it can really make the difference to work-life balance.”

05. Think about location

One of the worst things about being an employee is having a long or unpleasant commute, so minimising the negative effects of that can be a great way to improve employees’ work-life balance. “We’re always on the lookout for ways to improve the lives and livelihoods of our staff,” says Cecere. “Regarding commuting, we chose to locate our offices where there is easy public transportation from all directions, free parking, the ability to cycle, and for an increasing number of our staff, the ability to walk to work.”

06. Keep the hierarchy flat

One of the best ways to keep employees happy is to make them feel that as a business, you’re all striving together, towards a common goal. There’s no scientific method or step-by-step plan for making this happen, says Wade, but having a flat hierarchy can help. “At SteadyGo, we all had the same perks, staff and directors; we always kept things very flat as far as people were treated. And that led to a feeling of ‘we’re all in it to win it’.”

Next page: How to make sure you invest wisely

Make better decisions when it comes to office space and equipment.

01. Location isn’t everything

When it comes to office space, new agencies often start small and cheap. “We started in a craphole,” recalls Wade. “It looked like a taxi office. Really cheap rates and a shared kitchen between 300 people. But it was nice, it felt like grass roots.” Later the team upgraded, but he still doesn’t feel that boutique agencies necessarily need expensive city-centre offices. “What you need is to create kickass work and some great clients; that’s more important than the postcode,” he insists.

02. Do you need an office?

Does your studio actually need a traditional office? Hett runs a one-man business as a creative technologist and digital artist, and works out of an art studio. “Although it’s more bare bones in terms of space, it’s a lot cheaper than even renting a single desk in a shared office,” he says. “It’s literally just a white cube, but so far it’s working for me.”

03. Avoid false economies

When you start a business, you need to be frugal, but don’t want to take things too far, says East. “Any sizeable expense requires a cost-benefit analysis. If someone can work better, faster or easier with a certain piece of kit, then they can be more productive and generate more revenue.”

04. Lease, don’t buy

To make sure your staff have the latest kit, consider leasing instead of buying, recommends Giansante. “If we had to buy six brand new Macs for everyone, we’d be looking at around twenty grand’s worth of stuff, so we lease everything. Being able to budget and spread that across the next 24 months is perfect: I know exactly how much I’m paying. Everyone gets a brand new computer and if it breaks, it gets fixed at no extra cost.”

05. Listen to your staff

As a small business, you have the opportunity to talk to your staff, so take it, advises Misener. “Our approach has always been to listen to staff regarding what hardware and software they need and then develop a customised plan across the team. It’s always about being attentive and being willing to adapt to new innovations, work habits, or client and staff needs.”

06. Bring the fun

Sometimes it’s a good idea to spend a little money on things that aren’t strictly necessary. “It’s important to work in a space you enjoy,” says Spencer. “So a bloody good sound system and a cappuccino machine are essential. It’s also worth spending a little more on art, photography and design books and magazines. They’re invaluable for keeping up with what’s going on.”

This article originally appeared in Computer Arts issue 270; buy it here!

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