#AOTYAwards 2022 Spills: OOm's CEO Ian Cheow on agency's success

This post is sponsored by OOm

MARKETING-INTERACTIVE’s Agency of the Year Awards is a renowned premier event held in Singapore to recognise and reward the industry’s top performing agencies annually. For the past two years, the awards have taken place online due to the global pandemic that rendered it necessary to implement stay at home and safe distancing measures. Fast forward to 2022, where COVID-19 restrictions have lifted tremendously, MARKETING-INTERACTIVE is yet again, able to hold its awards ceremony in person at the glamorous Shangri-La hotel.

A slew of agencies won many different awards and some even bagged multiple at one go. One of which was OOm, a leading digital marketing agency in Singapore. Established since 2006, OOm offers a full suite of digital marketing solutions to provide their clients with the support they need when it comes to their online campaigns. From their SEO services to SEM integrations and much more, the digital agency has proven itself to be an industry leader, unrivalled in expertise. In this interview article, we reveal insights from OOm’s CEO and Co-founder, Ian Cheow, to find out how his successes came to be.

Tell us about your agency and what distinguishes it from the rest?

Apart from our PSG grant digital marketing packages, we provide end-to-end, full-fledged digital marketing services for our clients by being there across all touchpoints, from the start to end of their digitalisation journey. For instance, websites are crucial to new businesses, and so we help them with their website development. After which, promoting is key so we utilise various digital marketing strategies including SEO, SEM, social media and content marketing services. Think of us as your one-stop digital solutions partner. Empowering convenience and cohesiveness, this beats having to source for multiple agencies that only specialises in one area of digitalisation.

How do you feel about bagging eight wins and what do they symbolise for you?

It was indeed a very special night and our team felt really proud of the accomplishments. Nights and achievements like this is what keeps us going as an award winning digital marketing agency, making all the years of sweat and hard work worthwhile. What made the night even more memorable was coming back physically after two years of attending the awards online. The ambience and being able to connect and engage with other agencies face-to-face made it a surreal experience.

How do you attract the right talent, balancing work competence and attitude?

Providing a conducive workplace environment is definitely the first step to attracting the right talent and keeping them motivated.

At OOm, we pride ourselves on being an open communication and collaborative digital marketing agency. Sharing thoughts and opinions is highly encouraged as we believe it helps us evolve and improve. In addition, we have also tapped on productivity tools to automate workflow, increasing efficiency and competency. This allows us to focus on more critical business needs while saving time on other areas.

What are some elements that empower more meaningful client-agency relationships today?

I think trust and transparency is imperative in creating more meaningful client-agency relationships today. One of the ways we achieve this is by having an open communication style with our clients.

As a digital marketing company, we need to be able to prove our worth to gain our clients’ trust.

Every partnership will come with its concerns and when this occurs, an open communication and transparency is key to addressing and solving potential issues. For instance, we grant all our clients access to their accounts so they can see exactly where their money is being spent and how well they are performing. 

What are some core capabilities you strive to build on as we venture into 2023?

We are constantly enhancing our internal systems and processes to empower greater efficiency for our team. As the digital landscape is ever-evolving and ever-changing, there is no room for stagnancy. We cannot have things remain the way they are just because they are working well now.

To keep ourselves abreast, we consistently look into upgrading better CRMs, software and process, serving as a strong competitive advantage for digital marketing agencies to compete.