Digithoughts

Top Agencies Update Portfolio Sites, Leave Flash Behind

May 28, 2009 by James Touhey 2009 has definitely been a year of big change. The Web sites of digital marketing agencies are no exception. Since the beginning of the year, EVB, Big Spaceship, Odopod and Juxt Interactive have all launched new portfolio sites. This is to be expected, of course. The average turnaround on a site is usually less than two years, while many agencies update their look every year. But what has grabbed our attention was not the fresh design (although they are pretty good), but rather the technology behind it all: Wordpress. So what's all the hype about? I suppose most of us just didn't expect agencies of this caliber to fall prey to something so common. Large agencies have always produced flashy, over-the-top sites to showcase their work; it was practically a standard for anyone running a digital shop. This was especially true if you specialized in Flash. Your agency’s portfolio site was revered as a playground to "show-off" and impress clients with all the eye candy your team could must. Those days, I'm afraid, are quickly becoming a memory (except maybe for 2Advanced Studios, a high-end design agency, which we actually wouldn't mind seeing built on WordPress). Of course, there's been speculation amongst the team here at Digitaria as to why agencies are choosing to abandon their full (or mostly full) Flash sites. Digitaria is currently in the process of redesigning its main site and there's been plenty of discussion about Wordpress and the recent changes made by the aforementioned agencies. Here are just a few opinions heard around the office this week: • Large agencies need a more efficient way to update their site content and there's no need to build a custom CMS if there is a perfectly capable—and free—version available • Budgets have been cut and there aren't as many internal resources to leverage • People are lazy and don't want to put the extra effort in to making something amazing (this one came from our Sr. Flash Developer, go figure) • A site redesign can be handled with a few tweaks to the CSS •The social media plug-in goodies are too sweet to ignore • Agencies want to know what people think about their work- in real time, via comments and polls • The sites are only temporary until their copywriters can consolidate their portfolio case studies down to 140 characters or less (yes, the next big move is 'micro agencies' on Twitter) • This is the age of socialism, power to the employees! Via blog contributions and 'lab' areas of the sites. So is this a sign that digital agencies are going soft? Not really. If you browse through these agencies work, you'll see they are still using Flash to build client Web sites, but in a smarter, more hybrid fashion. Our industry—along with the economy—is in a tremendous cycle of change and this is just one sign of how agencies are adopting to the times. I think it's safe to say it will be an interesting year in Agency-ville.