SYSPRO puts TCC ahead of pack

From one pioneer to another: SYSPRO is helping The Creative Counsel Group (TCC) shift gear to the next phase in its already impressive history.

The Creative Counsel was founded in 2001, and today is the largest below-the-line advertising agency in South Africa. The company is first and foremost a sales and marketing solutions provider covering the full value chain of marketing services, such as: brand activations, shopper marketing, field marketing; merchandising, logistics, and warehousing.

The company has a specific focus on the fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG), cellular, and financial industries, boasting an impressive roster of blue-chip clients such as Nokia, Vodacom, Unilever, Colgate, Nestle, Nedbank, Clover, and Danone.

TCC employs over 600 full-time staff with offices in all major metropolitans, and places up to 15 000 promoters and field marketers nationally on any given day. The company promotes brands across all income brackets, and across all geographical locations - from urban centres to the most remote rural areas.

Since its inception, the business has experienced year-on-year growth. This phenomenal growth has always exceeded the existing systems and processes. As a result, the company has found itself continuously playing catch-up.

Gil Oved, TCC co-founder and CEO, explains: “Up until now we have had a variety of systems that we've used. These have generally comprised a combination of custom software, Microsoft Office, paper, and memory.”

This has resulted in each division in the business creating its own solution, and missing out on the advantages of shared learnings and best practices. Databases with key information on promoters and venues have historically not been shared - often resulting in the same data being captured three or four times over. Customer relationship management (CRM) is also currently managed on an ad hoc basis.

The business has reached a size which requires a much greater focus on quality control and the necessary systems and processes for achieving this. Industry trends are also moving toward a greater emphasis on reporting and feedback to clients.

“We decided we needed to implement a holistic solution which caters to the full ambit of our operations. This includes the promotions and activations side of our business as well as finance, warehousing, logistics, training, sourcing, and placement of promoters and field marketers,” says Oved. “After doing some homework, we realised that the only way to achieve this, combined with our need to remain dynamic and flexible, would be to develop a tailored solution.”

With the help of SYSPRO partner iPlan (Pty) Ltd - a firm of specialist IT consulting engineers, TCC has embarked on a multimillion-rand project focused on re-engineering their business, systems, and processes. The aim is to arrive at a solution which allows for optimum efficiency, and in so doing, creates a strategic advantage over competitors.

IPlan's Chief Operating Officer Johan Du Toit explains: “TCC's is a unique organisation with many unique operational processes in addition to standard business processes. This requires a business system that is able to support the standard processes as well as integrated software for the unique processes. SYSPRO was the obvious choice. It is a reputable and well-supported product and allows for easy integration. The final solution will be custom built for operational processes, with seamless integration into the standard financial process and back office functionality supported by SYSPRO.”

Currently, TCC management has no system visibility of operations, and information can only be gathered through a tedious and time-consuming process. The new solution will bring operational and financial data together, easily facilitating future decision-making and strategy determination.

“It has always been our philosophy to be super transparent with our clients. This system will give clients the same access as we have. They will be able to know and track what's happening at any given time,” says Oved. “Operationally we will be able to monitor tens-of-thousands of individuals across the country. We will be able to track them, measure their performance, pay them, and generate reports for ourselves and clients.”

Using SYSPRO places TCC on a widely used platform, with a number of support options and a proven future growth path. This stands the organisation in good stead to protect their market share and welcome in the next decade of healthy year-on year growth.