Des Odell started a SEO business in 2006 with Jeremy Bolt - they were the only staff and worked out of a room in a friend’s office in Sydney’s CBD. Today, as CEO of Resolution Digital, he oversees 360 staff all over Australia.
The fledgling company, Bruce Clay Australia, merged with Resolution Media Australia in 2013 to create a national search and digital marketing business.
Looking back at the past decade, Odell told AdNews success doesn’t happen overnight but there are critical factors.
“Focus on hiring the best team you can, focus on hiring a diverse team, focus on building long-term relationships with your clients and your staff, be 100% transparent with your clients and your staff.”
In 2019, Bolt left Resolution to become CEO of Omnicom Media agency Hearts & Science and Odell continued running Resolution.
It has been eight years since Odell sold his business and joined Omnicom. One of the key reasons he has continued working at Omnicom is that he feels that they are well positioned to be one of the winners in the digital space due to the breadth of digital services, the tight levels of integration and the skills they have in executing millions of dollars in campaigns and using data and insights to tweak those campaigns on the fly.
In 2020 Resolution Media rebranded and repositioned to Resolution Digital, a full-service digital agency, with the mission of driving remarkable results through identifying, crafting and optimising all touchpoints on the digital user journey.
Odell says the agency has managed to grow through a once-in-a-lifetime crisis that has been the COVID pandemic and is on track to come out the other side stronger and more resilient than ever.
“We have been able to transition to working 100% remotely with very few issues and are continuing to deliver remarkable results to our clients. We’ve continued to grow steadily through 2020 and 2021.”
While some of the agency’s clients have been impacted, such as those in the travel sector, those in other sectors such as financial services, FMCG, retail, supermarkets, insurance, and pureplay online have done well.
Odell says ecommerce consulting and the implementation of ecommerce have increased over the past 18 months.
“The whole ecommerce landscape has changed. There has been a push of media spend from traditional to digital, as well as a growth in building remarkable experiences online. Clients want to provide personalised experiences when people come to their website or app.”
Odell can impart valuable advice to others beginning their journey in digital.
“It all comes down to the team really, if you don’t have a good team then you cannot continue to deliver to clients and if you can’t deliver to clients you don’t have a business.”
Odell expects Resolution Digital to grow to 400 staff by the end of the year but says finding digital staff with the right experience and skills is difficult because of current travel restrictions to and from Australia.
“Our biggest challenge facing us next year is that lack of digital staff and ongoing complexity in the digital ecosystems.”
The complexity of digital keeps Odell and his team on their toes, but this creates opportunities:
“We’ve now got so many digital experts in so many fields that we can really solve clients’ digital problems and add value to their businesses.”
Resolution Digital’s milestones include:
• GA360 certification in 2014
• Launching Facilitator with some Brand Science services and centralised Ad Ops in 2016
• Adding Digital Experience Platform (DXP) capabilities in 2018
• Rolling out Rich Media & Creative services in 2019
• Setting up Resolution Kinetic, a full-stack Google Marketing Platform Partner, in 2020 - a global OMG first
• Awarded Agency of the Year Award in Google’s Honours program in 2021, for the third year in a row
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