Amphibia: Celebrating 10 YEARS of blood, sweat and glory

Amphibia Digital turns 10, and ADOI Magazine rocks the house by reminiscing their past while looking into the Amphibian crystal ball to what the future holds for this vibrant and hungry bunch of digital junkies. ADOI’s Andrea Mathew speaks to founders CEO Gary Tay and Deputy CEO Harish Subramaniam.

"Looking back at the past 10 years, the agency really began to take shape only in the last 3 years when we began re-structuring. It was only in 2008 we transformed into a digital and interactive marketing agency and we have been seeing encouraging growth ever since," begins Gary.

After all these years, Harish who is a member of the International Advertising Association, lists the three biggest challenges facing any digital agency as people, proprietary tools and its internal processes.

"Over the past 2 years, we have been strengthening our team to ensure we have the right kind of resources across all departments. Due to the shortage of digital talents in the industry, as an agency we have to continually focus on training both internally and externally. Being the first digital agency in the 4As Council and holding Council and Secretary positions in the Malaysia Digital Association (MDA), we continue to actively push industry programs to encourage talent growth, education and efforts to bring fresh new talents into our industry,” explains Harish on the pursue of moulding the right people.

Providing the best services and staying ahead of the game means possessing the best tools in the market. Harish shares about their latest partnerships which will benefit clients. "We have just started working with Social Bakers which provides Facebook Fan Page & App tracking, JamiQ which monitors social media across Asian languages and market and acquired various tools to offer Social Monitoring for our clients."

He adds, "While clients begin to embark on the social platform, it is equally important to enable proper monitoring beyond creating engagement and conversations on these platforms. We will also be working with Movideo in the near future to enable dynamic video streaming, but more importantly to tap their video analytics capabilities. Clients need to have a more holistic view of their online strategy and work towards long term plans. Analytics and measurement are key, especially in monitoring results as effective engagement is critical for a campaign’s success."

On the creative front, veteran award winning Creative Director, Bobby Chan joined the team to lead the creative department. “We are glad to have got Bobby on board to bring some maturity to the creative department", commented Gary. “While Bobby comes from a traditional advertising background, at the root of it all, it is still about effective communications.” Harish adds, “Now we’re just getting him to think in pixels!”

Speaking about the challenges that lie ahead, Bobby says, "Last year we managed 2 merits in Kancils for work on DiGi. This year we are focusing on improving the consistency and quality of work, and both Harish and Gary has given me a tougher assignment to ensure we see broad-stroke improvements across all our work."

Of course, no agency can claim sole glory without giving credit to their clients. Amphibia boasts a host of clients who have enjoyed a long fruitful relationship with them. Among others are Al Rajhi Bank, Aeon Credit service, Sledgehammer, DiGi and more recently Malaysia Airlines, Wah Seong, AKPK, Guocera Tiles, Sony Music Malaysia, Se7en Sunday Films, Homefinder Magazine, Subang SkyPark, MSA, 4A’s and Pos Malaysia for PostMe.

They have been running a variety of Facebook campaigns which include an Avril Lavigne Facebook contest which grew the Sony Music Malaysia’s fans by over 10%, and most recently launched the ‘Know your Britney’ contest. “Concurrently we’re running a DiGi Eff-bee Nations program on Facebook,” says Gary.

With their list of clientele growing, the need for a strong marketing team is clear. Harish explains that over the past few years, though the baton has changed hands a few times, Amphibia Labs is now led by Harish himself and is gaining momentum. The sister company of Amphibia Labs now has a strong offering of online advertising representation, database marketing, SEO/SEM and also social media marketing.

With 10 years behind them, the Amphibia team still braces every challenge as if it is their first day at work. The adventure continues as we face off with Gary and Harish on the following pages ...