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Anicca adopts a new multi-channel approach to project and team management to improve customer service for our clients

We are making some big changes to the way we structure our technical teams and run our clients’ projects; so we thought it would be useful to explain our new approach and the benefits to existing and new clients.

The demand for multi-channel projects has been increasing

Over the past 12-18 months many of Anicca’s clients have requested more holistic projects with some or all of the marketing channels that we offer (including SEO, PPC, social media, PR, content marketing, Analytics and CRO).

Their focus is to have an integrated approach to maximising revenue or generating leads, rather than just focusing on a single solution of PPC or SEO. This is particularly relevant as many of the techniques we use work synergistically with each other, for example social and search, PR and SEO, CRO and paid etc.

Our technical heads of department

Traditionally agencies are divided into departments based on their specialism or channel.  Below is a list of our Heads of departments, who will continue to be the ambassadors and technical expert of the service channel they specialise in:

  • Head of Paid media – Lorene Le Dizet
  • Head of SEO – Sukh Singh
  • Head of Social Media – Samantha Hearn
  • Head of Analytics and technical support – Ed Truman
  • Director of PR and content marketing – Caroline Spence.

The heads of department will ensure that the quality of the work is still state of the art and that there is a designated member of the senior management team responsible for the quality of service across all our projects for each channel.

Advantages and disadvantages of having technical or channel based departments

Having technical or channel based teams has the benefit of encouraging strong technical knowledge within each team but the disadvantage that teams can become “siloed” and/or less commercial than a client focused approach.

We wanted to get the best of both worlds by still retaining our technical departments and introducing a type of “matrix management”, where we will overlay a new “portfolio account management”, with client facing teams or “pods”.

Introducing our new “portfolio account management” structure

With so many clients needing multi-channel services, we have decided to enhance our client services team and adopt “portfolio account management”, i.e. a management structure that is often used by PR agencies.

This customer–centric approach will mean that every client will have a dedicated account director (i.e. portfolio manager) and a team of specialists consisting of members from each of the different technical teams.  These client-facing teams or “pods” will be responsible for clients from their initial contact with Anicca and throughout the life of the project and any subsequent projects.

Who are the new portfolio managers?

The portfolio managers have been selected from some of our most experienced and senior staff. Each has a main technical speciality as well as a good understanding of the commercial aspects of running an ecommerce or lead generation website.

The new portfolio managers are;

  • Neil Hannam – Neil has been working at Anicca for 3 years and his technical speciality is SEO.
  • Gurpreet Bassi – Gurpreet is our longest serving member of the team having started at Anicca in 2009 – her speciality is paid media (both in search and social) and she was previously head of PPC
  • Harjeet Kalsi – is our newest member of the team having recently joined Anicca from Creare. His previous role was a SEO consultant and manager of the SEO and team.

Note: A small number of existing clients will continue to be managed by Caroline Spence (Director of PR and Content marketing) and Sukh Singh (Head of SEO). Find out more about of portfolio managers on our meet the team page.

New Head of client services

We are pleased to announce that myself (Angie Longman) has recently joined Anicca to take on the new role of Head of Client Services. A large part of my responsibilities will be to coordinate and support the new portfolio managers and to oversee all other HR activities, such as implementing our new training and management program.

I will try to speak to all clients directly over the next few weeks and I am also planning a series of client events so you can get up to speed with the latest techniques and meet the members of the team.

The role of the portfolio managers

The role of the portfolio managers is to:

  • work with each client to gain an understanding of their business requirements and to agree commercial targets and KPI.
  • oversee the collaboration and communication process with each client as well as coordinating the monthly reports and quarterly reviews.
  • ensure that the service Anicca provides is delivered on time and to a high standard.
  • Inform the client of the status of the project as well as any industry changes that may affect the performance of their digital marketing campaigns.
  • present new opportunities and additional techniques or technology that could be used to meet the clients targets and KPI.

If you are already a client of Anicca, then your new portfolio manager, will contact you in the next few days to organise a meeting/call in order to review the current status of your project.

The new “pods” or client focused departments

Each portfolio manager will lead a team of channel specialists that will deliver the different aspects of the project. These cross-departmental teams or “pods” will work together on their clients’ projects.

The main advantage of this new structure is that the day to day management of staff will be centred around clients rather than channels. However, depending on their technical specialism, they will still work with the other technical specialists and the technical head of department to ensure the highest standards of work in their channel.

Working with Anicca for the first time – the benefits of our new approach!

Once you make an enquiry to work with Anicca, we will ensure that there is a good match and that we can help you with your project and growing your business.

After this initial qualification process you will be allocated an account director/portfolio manager who will coordinate the initial discovery phase, where we will carry out a range of audits on your site:

  • to understand your objectives and your audiences
  • to benchmark the current performance of your site
  • to determine the effectiveness of your marketing across all the relevant
    channels
  • to identify additional opportunities for income generation and increased
    customer lifetime value.

Your portfolio manager will then present our findings and recommendations during a practical meeting or workshop with your team. This will also include plans on improving the technical aspects of your site and how to implement the agreed marketing strategy.

You can then opt to carry out the strategy yourself or we can work with you on a monthly retainer to implement and manage the marketing strategy on your behalf. Your project manager will be there right from the start by providing ongoing client communications and to ensure that the technical teams meet your targets and KPI.

Want to know more?

If you would like to know more, please feel free to contact any one of our amazing team at Anicca   0116 298 7488 or email myself, Angie Longman at [email protected] .

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