21
de Desembre
de
2015
Act.
22
de Desembre
de
2015
"I realised that I didn't want to work in a traditional company and so when I was 24 I set up Cyberclick," says DavidTomás, in one of the CEOTalks periodically organised by Delvy Asesores. That was in 1999, and what began as a two-man operation is today an established business group with almost 60 employees and an estimated turnover of six million euros for 2015. Talking to David Tomás, it is easy to see that one of the things about the company that brings him most pleasure is attaining first place in the SME category of the Best Workplaces ranking for 2014. It is a distinction that the company has just repeated for 2015. And, if there is one thing that characterises Cyberclick it is the particular way it manages its team. Tomás is a firm defender of making the company a happy place to work. "The idea is to get up on a Monday morning with an appetite to get things done," he tells VIA Empresa before the event.
Coming first is sometimes too soon
"The idea of Cyberclick came from analysing companies in the United States and Japan to see what they were doing in advertising. We looked at different business models and saw that results-based publicity did not exist on the market in Spanish," remembers David Tomás. So, they decided to create the first company to do results-based advertising online. "We measured the hits and the hit conversions made," he says.
At that time, in 1999, "there was no competition and in being the first we got all the credit." However, Tomás admits that "perhaps we began too early, as sometimes we had to send online proposals by fax!" In those days a lot of people had no understanding of digital advertising. Nevertheless, the rise of dotcoms allowed them to get moving, until the bubble burst, that is. "Everyone began to fail and we suffered a significant number of payment defaults."
Luckily for Cyberclick a week before the Nasdaq crashed, unleashing the crisis, it had secured a tranche of investment worth a million euros which helped it "survive the time in the desert in 2000, 2001 and 2002". Tomás remembers that "we had no clients in Spain, but we made some international clients and companies in the offline sector who were beginning to come up with formulas to attract their customers online."
Specialisation
"We began with digital publicity in performance. At first it did not work very well because the market disappeared and we began to do other things," says Tomàs on the origin of the different services the company has gone on to create. In 2007, the investors fled the company and "we had to create all those business areas as an independent company." The result is that today Grup Cyberclick is made up of five companies. The original one continues to do results-based marketing for large companies doing email marketing campaigns and publicity on social networks and through releasing content.
Gauss&Neumann specialises in doing advertising on Google for large companies with an annual investment of more than 100,000 euros a year. Meanwhile, CoRegistros.com finds users by organising online competitions and draws. For its part, DigitalResponse is devoted to helping brands manage digital loyalty, and InboundCycle covers inbound marketing.
"We saw that it makes no sense to be one company that does 10 different things. We specialised in one thing and created a group of companies," says David Tomás. Now that the current group is established, he says that the challenge is "maintaining the business culture and continuing to create digital publicity companies."
A happy employee is more productive
When Tomás is asked what motivates his employees, straight away he replies that "there is no need to motivate anyone, what you have to do is avoid demotivating them." The Best Workplaces prizes for 2014 and 2015 are just rewards for a long effort in treating the people who make up the company differently.
"We have done a lot of things; it is a long process, but the first thing to do is instil values, behaviour and attitudes in the company that makes the taking of decisions very clear," he says. In 2008, the whole team sat down to define what they wanted from the people who make up the company. "Some 60 attitudes we liked came out of it and 45 we didn't. If it is hard for believers to remember 10 commandments, imagine what it is to remember 60!" says Tomás ironically. To simplify things, Cyberclick summarises the values that help in taking decisions in three basic values.
The first is 'admire people'. "We want people who listen, who have respect, who try to help others, this is the humanist value," says Tomás. The second is 'always find a better way'. "We have to question ourselves and try to improve without just accepting the status quo," he says, before detailing the third value: 'customer experience freaks'. "We want our clients to see that we are the best company to work with, the one that gets the best results," he concludes.
To his understanding it is fundamental that the people who join the company share these three values. "They have to be on the same page because if you create a company with a series of values and someone is out of step, you will end up with a company that is not happy." That is why everyone gets a say when it comes to employing new people, and if there are employees who do not see how that person will fit in, they are not taken on.
Trust and responsibility
In Cyberclick, holidays are free and everyone can take them when they want and for as long as they think necessary. "All you have to do is ask your workmates for advice. If they think it is fine it is because they trust you and because they will be the ones covering your work. The same thing that you will do for them," says Tomás. This system can obviously only work if there is an environment of trust.
"We had one case of a person who took advantage and so we invited them to leave," says David Tomás. However, he points out that "what normally happens is that when there is one person who does not take advantage, it annoys the others. We do things the other way round."
Moreover, every morning everyone does a happiness test symbolised by traffic lights, in which they can point to something that is bothering them. "That takes time but it is time well spent. When we are doing work we like, everything goes better. For 10 minutes a week we look at the traffic light situation, you don't need anything else. That improves the productivity of the company because you begin to identify the things holding the team back. And without spending money!" says the founder of the company.
Other benefits for the Cyberclick employees are having a training budget they can spend on what they like, as well as enjoying a bonus in the form of profit sharing based on a specified percentage of the company's results. "Everything from this goes directly to the team," says a proud David Tomás.
In short, he declares that in general "there is no culture of asking how you feel at work. If we were to adopt one, things would work much better. It is good to stop and look at what we can do to make things better." So, if one thing is for sure it is that all those you see with a miserable face on Monday mornings do not belong at Cyberclick. There, every Monday is a good day at the office.
Coming first is sometimes too soon
"The idea of Cyberclick came from analysing companies in the United States and Japan to see what they were doing in advertising. We looked at different business models and saw that results-based publicity did not exist on the market in Spanish," remembers David Tomás. So, they decided to create the first company to do results-based advertising online. "We measured the hits and the hit conversions made," he says.
At that time, in 1999, "there was no competition and in being the first we got all the credit." However, Tomás admits that "perhaps we began too early, as sometimes we had to send online proposals by fax!" In those days a lot of people had no understanding of digital advertising. Nevertheless, the rise of dotcoms allowed them to get moving, until the bubble burst, that is. "Everyone began to fail and we suffered a significant number of payment defaults."
Luckily for Cyberclick a week before the Nasdaq crashed, unleashing the crisis, it had secured a tranche of investment worth a million euros which helped it "survive the time in the desert in 2000, 2001 and 2002". Tomás remembers that "we had no clients in Spain, but we made some international clients and companies in the offline sector who were beginning to come up with formulas to attract their customers online."
Specialisation
"We began with digital publicity in performance. At first it did not work very well because the market disappeared and we began to do other things," says Tomàs on the origin of the different services the company has gone on to create. In 2007, the investors fled the company and "we had to create all those business areas as an independent company." The result is that today Grup Cyberclick is made up of five companies. The original one continues to do results-based marketing for large companies doing email marketing campaigns and publicity on social networks and through releasing content.
Gauss&Neumann specialises in doing advertising on Google for large companies with an annual investment of more than 100,000 euros a year. Meanwhile, CoRegistros.com finds users by organising online competitions and draws. For its part, DigitalResponse is devoted to helping brands manage digital loyalty, and InboundCycle covers inbound marketing.
"We saw that it makes no sense to be one company that does 10 different things. We specialised in one thing and created a group of companies," says David Tomás. Now that the current group is established, he says that the challenge is "maintaining the business culture and continuing to create digital publicity companies."
A happy employee is more productive
When Tomás is asked what motivates his employees, straight away he replies that "there is no need to motivate anyone, what you have to do is avoid demotivating them." The Best Workplaces prizes for 2014 and 2015 are just rewards for a long effort in treating the people who make up the company differently.
"We have done a lot of things; it is a long process, but the first thing to do is instil values, behaviour and attitudes in the company that makes the taking of decisions very clear," he says. In 2008, the whole team sat down to define what they wanted from the people who make up the company. "Some 60 attitudes we liked came out of it and 45 we didn't. If it is hard for believers to remember 10 commandments, imagine what it is to remember 60!" says Tomás ironically. To simplify things, Cyberclick summarises the values that help in taking decisions in three basic values.
The first is 'admire people'. "We want people who listen, who have respect, who try to help others, this is the humanist value," says Tomás. The second is 'always find a better way'. "We have to question ourselves and try to improve without just accepting the status quo," he says, before detailing the third value: 'customer experience freaks'. "We want our clients to see that we are the best company to work with, the one that gets the best results," he concludes.
To his understanding it is fundamental that the people who join the company share these three values. "They have to be on the same page because if you create a company with a series of values and someone is out of step, you will end up with a company that is not happy." That is why everyone gets a say when it comes to employing new people, and if there are employees who do not see how that person will fit in, they are not taken on.
Trust and responsibility
In Cyberclick, holidays are free and everyone can take them when they want and for as long as they think necessary. "All you have to do is ask your workmates for advice. If they think it is fine it is because they trust you and because they will be the ones covering your work. The same thing that you will do for them," says Tomás. This system can obviously only work if there is an environment of trust.
"We had one case of a person who took advantage and so we invited them to leave," says David Tomás. However, he points out that "what normally happens is that when there is one person who does not take advantage, it annoys the others. We do things the other way round."
Moreover, every morning everyone does a happiness test symbolised by traffic lights, in which they can point to something that is bothering them. "That takes time but it is time well spent. When we are doing work we like, everything goes better. For 10 minutes a week we look at the traffic light situation, you don't need anything else. That improves the productivity of the company because you begin to identify the things holding the team back. And without spending money!" says the founder of the company.
Other benefits for the Cyberclick employees are having a training budget they can spend on what they like, as well as enjoying a bonus in the form of profit sharing based on a specified percentage of the company's results. "Everything from this goes directly to the team," says a proud David Tomás.
In short, he declares that in general "there is no culture of asking how you feel at work. If we were to adopt one, things would work much better. It is good to stop and look at what we can do to make things better." So, if one thing is for sure it is that all those you see with a miserable face on Monday mornings do not belong at Cyberclick. There, every Monday is a good day at the office.