What Can a Digital Creative Agency Do For You?

A digital creative agency sounds like a mouthful– and for good reason. They offer an expansive list of services that enhance your digital presence. For agencies, it’s about more than building a website– it’s about helping brands thrive in the digital landscape.

Web Design vs. Digital Creative Agency: What’s the Difference?

So you need a new website. 

Maybe you’ve just started a business, or the last update you made to your site was in 1997. Or maybe something just isn’t working– you’re having difficulty driving traffic and making conversions. Maybe your current website isn’t being ranked by Google. 

There’s dozens of reasons why you might turn to an agency to revamp a website that just isn’t working anymore. You might be drawn to enlist the help of a web design company. But what about a digital creative agency (like Design in DC)?

Some brands just need an easy fix to a specific problem occurring on their website. But many brands want more. Brands want to ensure that their online presence is impactful. They want to tell their story in a way that’s clear and compelling. A creative digital agency has the power and resources to give your brand the facelift it deserves.

Why a Digital Creative Agency?

Design in DC believes that if you bring together a group of talented creatives, great things happen. We wanted to form an agency that fosters and supports our employee’s creative pursuits– inside and outside of the office. That resulted in a lively team of filmmakers, writers, artists and musicians.

But enough about us– what does this mean for you as a brand? There are a myriad of benefits that a digital creative agency can offer for brands who crave a more holistic approach. 

A New Set of Eyes on Your Brand 

A web design company looks at your website in a silo, addressing immediate problems related to design and development. For some companies, this is all they need! For others, it’s useful to have a team of experts looking at their website and brand strategy as an objective third-party. 

When you’re busy with the day-to-day work of running a business, it’s easy to lose track of your online presence and marketing strategy. Smaller companies, who often don’t have their own marketing teams can especially struggle with this important element of business. 

A digital creative agency provides companies with marketing tools to ensure that their site, and brand are successful. An agency will start with an analysis of your current website and brand. Then, they’ll offer creative tools such as illustrations, photography, video, and content writing, and enhance your visibility through SEO strategy, social media management, and email marketing campaigns. 

Often, creative agencies have a ton of experience under their belt working with companies in your very same industry. As a result, they can offer insider information that you might not otherwise get from just browsing your competition online.

A Strong Foundation Based in Research and Analysis

Often digital creative agencies will engage in a lengthy discovery process with their client. This process is collaborative, and is all about discovering (get it?) the core message of the brand. 

This might start with extensive meetings and interviews with the client to answer some basic questions, like… 

• What are the goals of your brand? 
• What message are you trying to communicate? 
• Who are you currently reaching with your website, and who are you trying to reach? 
• When a person comes to your website, what result are you hoping for? 

These questions may seem obvious, but they provide a solid foundation for building a website and a brand in tandem. 

Agencies will also conduct extensive competitive analysis, studying what works and what doesn’t work with your competitors. This can be crucial to help ensure that brands are meeting their client’s expectations. Additionally, it’s a great way to figure out what makes your brand unique in the market. 

Next, an agency might build out several pieces of information to give the designers context.

One example of this is user personas– which basically consist of a profile of a potential customer. The profile will highlight who they are, what they do, their likes, dislikes, and their familiarity with online platforms. This allows designers to put themselves in the shoes of your user as they work. Usually these personas are informed by user research data, making them a strong compass to guide the direction of your brand.

Another example is a user journey map. Again, through the collection of data from users and stakeholders within the company, an agency will create a map that lays out how the site will be navigated in order to reach that ultimate end goal– a conversion. 

Digital creative agencies use these methodologies to form a strategy for your brand and website. And arming yourself with a strategy and plan is a whole lot better than going in blind.

A Team of Experts that Have Your Back

The goal of a digital creative agency isn’t just to give you a bunch of stuff — a new website, creative collateral, a web app– and then send you on your way. The goal is to carefully look at your business needs, form a strategy, and help you implement it.

Agencies have a ton of resources at their fingertips, and can help your business with any number of goals. A team at an agency usually includes: 

• A Project Manager that acts as a main point of contact throughout the design and development process. PMs manage all aspects of the project, so you don’t have to. At Design in DC, our PMs use tools such as Slack, Google Drive and Asana to keep your assets organized and promote transparency throughout the project. 
• Creative Leadership that takes the reigns and offers creative design solutions while establishing a vision for your project. 
• A Creative Team that includes designers, illustrators, animators, photographers, videographers, writers and content strategists. They work together to create the content for your website and larger marketing scheme. 
• A Development Team made up of front-end and back-end developers to put your vision into motion and ensure your website runs smoothly. Development teams can also work to create web applications (where they are necessary) to enhance the functionality of your website and brand offerings. 
• An SEO Specialist who ensures that your website is running quality content that will get you ranked on Google.

Access to a Wealth of Creative Resources

Design in DC is a team of creators, and we like to think our combined skills come in handy when working with our clients. 

This is true of any agency. Our creative team includes visual artists (illustrators, animators, and graphic designers), filmmakers (photographers, videographers, and video editors) and writers (copywriters and editors). 

If you’re, say, an IT company, you may be seriously lacking in these creative resources that can help draw users to your work and drive conversions (and, most importantly, make you look good).  

The beauty of a digital creative agency is its ability to provide creative insight where it’s lacking. Just because you don’t employ any creatives, doesn’t mean your business won’t attract any. For this reason, it’s always important to consider the visual integrity of your brand and website. 

For all this and more, a digital creative agency is here to help.