TSL case studies

The brief

Re-structure our operation to bring efficiencies, scale for growth, a profitable P&L and teams/personnel who are fulfilling the correct roles and responsibilities.

The challenge

• Re-organise the business after the economic downturn
• Re-structure the team to deliver quicker in-market collateral
• Integrate with the larger agency offering for a TTL position
• Increase margin by 17% in six months
• Bring process, methodology and control to purchasing and financial aspects of the business
• Align the offering into key strategic offering and production

How TSL helped

P&L

• 17% margin delivered in four months
• Larger network integration with clear visibility of time reconciliation and actualisation
• Manage and implementation of robust staff cost ratio vs. outsource and freelance needs – 15% drop on staff cost ratio with better deliverability

Team and partners

• The lowering of the overall cost of the service to the business. Including reducing the work scope, defining quality levels, re-pricing, re-negotiation, cost re-structuring
• Improve quality — Achieved a steep change in quality through contracting out the service with a new service level agreement
• Knowledge — Easier access to intellectual property and wider experience and knowledge
• Achieving access to a larger talent pool and a sustainable source of skills, in particular in production and delivery
• Capacity management — An improved method of capacity management of services and technology where the risk in providing the excess capacity is borne by business skill vs. outsourcing
• Reduce time to market — The acceleration of the development or production of a product through the additional capability brought by the supplier

The future

• A partnership to set-up a Europe-wide digital production platform
• 20% margin by 2011

Hey, I'm the 'cs2' div!

The brief

We really need the quality that TSL brings to all their production work. Can you please bring your offer on-site and work with our project management and production teams to ensure that nothing leaves our building with a mistake in it ever again?

The challenge

• Set up a new quality operation
• Bring brand, editorial and functional testing capabilities
• Educate us on the value of QA
• Not only QA the work but establish client documentation, including brand guidelines and glossary of terms
• Bring QA process and rigour and establish this from day one

How TSL helped

Process

• A full QA process and strategy has been rolled out as a platform for the business to grow on
• QA is now an integral part of the business and is being used as a mechanism to grow clients
• Content, functional and technical standards and rigour have been brought to each client and project

Knowledge management

• All clients have a QA team that understands their brands and applies this learning to each project
• Glossaries of terms have been produced for each client, meaning consistency of editorial delivery
• Internal (ATL channels) and external partners are using the QA team to bring a consistency of knowledge to other channels and to other areas of the business

Savings

• Getting it right first time has saved 80% extra time on each project being fixed
• With the operation being on-site personal and operational expenses have been saved
• Brand, functional and technical QA is on-site

The brief

Set-up online production business so we can become a full service production network to fulfil client requirements, which will also complement our pure play digital agencies, in effect becoming their digital supply chain.

The challenge

• Set up a new operation while delivering daily production
• Deliver stability to a transient team and staff
• Clients are ready to leave as decoupling is occurring
• Deliver a technical infrastructure, knowledge and archive of work
• Integrate with agency creative and strategic teams
• Bring process and quality to everything we do

How TSL helped

P&L

• Full creative agency, infrastructure and financial integration
• 2,500% growth in production revenues
• 20% margin made 2008 - 2009 and 2010 currently 32.5%
• Cap-ex management including technology, new business and other set-up investments

Team and partners

• TSL On-site delivery experts: PM, operations and technology
• Supporting, integrating and educating existing delivery and creative capabilities
• Client contact, presentation and SATs measurement
• A robust digital supply chain offering production, data, email/SMS fulfilment
• Managing digital production for 75+ markets globally
• Established an integrated delivery platform: workflow, asset management and automation

The future

• Clients have been retained and are now growing accounts from quality of deliveries
• North America operation has been launched
• TSL inside with Gutenberg networks are the Omnicom digital production partner
• Client savings and network stability are delivered

The brief

Build and deliver 3,500 banners to multiple local markets, media agencies and technical partners, including agency teams and client representatives.

The challenge

• To deliver and serve a full campaign of 3,500 banners in an eight-week period
• Briefing to take place on a bank holiday weekend
• Managing markets and media agencies in 25 markets for 20 products
• Basic to rich media executions
• Asset management and workflow across all collateral, media, market, creative and CIT involvement
• Deliver localisations and adaptations from multiple creative agencies, in and out of the same networks

How TSL helped

Team mobilisation

• Team of 14 production staff mobilised in one day to commence work
• Full bank holiday / Easter weekend working – 24 hours per day
• Three-month delivery team inside client

Central programme management

• Central scope, management and delivery of all production
• One team leader, two project directors and four project managers
• Mix of design mastering as well as adaptations and localisation
• Workflow and asset management delivery

Value and costs

• Total of 2,750 banners. Cost saving of 65% through central management
• TSL internal deliver team managing all aspects, including ad serving
• One point of contact for each market and media agency
• Centralised QA on each

The brief

Deliver a centralised European CRM platform enabling Esso to create a dialogue with their customers.

The challenge

• Set-up email CRM and blast in three months to begin European wide programme of work
• Legacy email CRM tool needing replacement
• Disparate, unstructured and uncleansed data source
• Multiple technology partners with a manual system and process
• Ageing databases across five European hubs with 15 million recipient records
• Delivering to six markets and eight language localisations

How TSL helped

Process

• New process definition; creative, design, production, QA, blast, analytics and post launch
• Roles and responsibilities creation for each party involved in the CRM programme
• Full strategic scoping and annual planning for client CRM activity

Technology and data

• New data structure definition and data extract format
• Automated data transfer from data partner
• Email blast tool set-up and integration/ISP accreditation
• Platform to allow for SMS/device CRM – convergence
• Build and localisation of all emails in multiple languages – 20 templates in total

ROI

• Instant go to market, automated offering
• Removal of market budget and centralised with one core team fulfilling
• 50% time reduction from master email build, data extract and blast from 2008 model
• One team enabling European management, delivery and analytics

The brief

Deliver annual brand awareness campaigns for Asia, Europe and North America, including managing technology partners, internal teams and media agencies. We need a team, skills and production ASAP to begin managing and delivering.

The challenge

• Deliver a true TTL campaign
• Produce a solution offering scoping, mastering, banners, website, video, WAP, device centric
• Adaptations and localisations in Europe and APAC
• Working with technology partners in India and USA
• Working with central client, ecommerce client and creative agency and managing three parties
• Phasing the launch over nine months and across each online platform at each stage

How TSL helped

Centralised core team

• Technology, project management, design and delivery built to manage programmes
• Scoping, production, mastering and localisations
• Central media management and fulfilment
• Programme planning on a quarterly basis
• Conduit between creative agency and technology partners

Scoping and planning

• Information architecture across website, advertising and WAP (full online offering)
• Technical specifications and implementation guides for CMS and template build
• Run creative concept, production of all assets to technical roll-out and media fulfilment

Knowledge management

• Core team holding knowledge of all online tools, methodologies and technologies
• Weekly global status meetings and central risk management
• Online owner (on comms roll-out) of all third parties; internal client and external parties
• Glossary of terms, localisation techniques, website technology specs and market specific needs