Case Studies

Portent Interactive

Meet Ian Lurie…

Ian is the owner and CEO of Portent Interactive - a successful, growing Internet Marketing Agency in Seattle, WA. With his success he has experienced the typical challenges that any business has when it has grown beyond the ability of the owner(s) to be involved with every customer, project and employee; the fires, the customer calls, the dropped balls, the lost sleep…

All this prevented Ian from getting to where he knew he wanted to go: He wanted to continue to grow his business, leveraging his time through his executive staff. This would allow him to focus on strategy versus tactics and on more personally rewarding pursuits such as speaking and authoring a sequel to his book 'Conversation Marketing.' Ian recognized that he could achieve his goals more quickly and efficiently with the help of someone knowledgeable and experienced in growing business operations. I was referred to Ian as that resource.

The Process:

I began with a Phase-I review - a short term commitment for both of us with guaranteed tangible results. This review consisted of me spending one-on-one time with Ian, his COO and his key managers and staff over a period of a few days to understand where his business was and what they had to work with resource-wise. As a result, I was able to provide Ian with several recommendations in the areas of Customer Service, Project Management, Staff Management, Information Systems and Finance/Administration. I focused on practical, achievable initiatives along with high-level action plans for implementing them. I highlighted and prioritized my top five recommendations. These provided focus for implementation, quick ROI and a solid foundation for moving ahead with the other initiatives I recommended.

Ian and his young, newly promoted COO were capable of leading the process of change, but lacked the background and experience needed to implement the key initiatives efficiently. As a Phase-II engagement, Ian asked me to take on the role of coach and mentor to his COO as he implemented some of the key recommendations I had made.

We met weekly for a period of time and focused on:

• Improving communication with the management team, staff and customers
• Creating more effective and useful management reports
• Setting realistic goals for himself and his management team
• Measuring progress and creating accountability for achieving results
• Improving staff productivity management and tracking
• Improving the project management and billing processes

The Results:

Ian saw immediate improvements. As he puts it: "We went from a bunch of smart people to an effectively-led team."

Overall, his COO was communicating more effectively, new reporting was put into place and measurement (with accountability) became consistent. There was a cascading impact on the organization:

• Daily stress on the management team fell to a fraction of where it was and overall morale improved
• Information regarding status and progress of customer projects flowed more efficiently and accurately and customer service improved
• Productivity was being measured more accurately, more billable time was being captured and cash flow improved

I also provided Ian with an experienced and understanding ear to use as a sounding board when he was dealing with the many challenges of building and running a business (an outlet that many business owners don't have). All in all, our work together gave Ian the foundation and confidence to scale his business, grow more quickly and effectively and move toward his goals.

Portent Interactive is a great company with great people doing great things that significantly improve their customers' results from internet marketing. It is both very gratifying and a pleasure for me to contribute to the growth and success of Portent Interactive and other companies like it.

Posted: 14 February, 2007 Permalink | Comments (0)