Flickr, the online photo management and sharing application, started life as an online role-playing game that included the option to upload your own picture. That feature proved to be so popular that it drove traffic, even among users who didn't care for the game. Lesson learned: Innovation doesn't stop when the initial web design project ends. That's a favorite story of Howard Tiersky, who led Capgemini's digital media capabilities practice for North America before founding his own firm, Moving Interactive. To learn more, Consulting One on One recently sat down with Tiersky.
Consulting: What's the unique value proposition of your firm?
Tiersky: We're an end-to-end consulting firm, providing strategy through implementation. But we're highly focused on digital products for media companies.
Consulting: How do you get hired for a typical project?
Tiersky: Recently, a client came to us with an idea for an online sweepstakes. The concept was simply a Flash-driven online roulette wheel. First, we helped the client determine whether it was a good idea, by putting together a business case. We worked to get internal funding and establish the creative design requirements. We stayed with the project through the technology build, infrastructure hosting, marketing, and then helped the client formulate marketing and branding campaigns. The client came to us as if we were an online design agency, but we distinguished ourselves by attacking it first like a strategy consulting firm and carrying it all the way through implementation like an operations and IT consulting firm.
Consulting: How is what you're doing now different from what the services being offered the much larger, global firms?
Tiersky: Most large consulting companies struggle to make a truly integrated approach. When working with a client on a long-term product development engagement, there is risk moving the project from point B to point C—especially when clients bring in multiple firms for each stage. We think we have a leg up because we're here to help through all stages.
Consulting: How have clients reacted to your approach?
Tiersky: We started the company three years ago with just three to four people. Today, we've got about 100 employees. Demand is good.
Consulting: And you credit your 'single throat to choke' model for that growth?
Tiersky: That's the biggest factor. When you have different vendors, there's potential leakage. Like kids playing the telephone game, when one firm takes over a project from another, there's the risk of a little leakage from the original idea at each step until completion. At any step, you run the risk that a new firm can take a slightly different route then was initially envisioned. Then you get to the end product and the client says, "this isn't really the product we hoped to build. What happened?' The truth is that everyone did exactly what he or she was supposed to do, and yet it didn't end up in the right place. Clients have gotten used to breaking projects up and bidding out each stage because they want best of breed. But because of our narrow focus, we can be excellent at each stage.
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