By Darren Gilbert

No one believes that more than Charlie Stewart, co-founder and CEO of digital marketing consultancy, Rogerwilco. He explains: “Creativity is the point at which you attract attention and stand out from the crowd,” he says. “But it doesn’t help if you’re standing out but not getting the crowd to take the action that you want them to take.”

Stewart pinpoints Rogerwilco’s very own history as the perfect example of this. Before everyone knew them as Rogerwilco, they were 2Stroke Interactive and focused on web development through the Drupal platform. They were creating great websites and had a number of big clients on their books. However, as Stewart readily admits, they were, to a large extent, creating white elephants.

“These websites were serving a purpose but they weren’t attracting people or getting the visibility that we wanted,” Stewart says. And so, he and his business partner, Jakes Redelinghuys, set about incorporating and incubating various marketing tactics to assist them to deliver results for their clients. “SEO was one of these,” adds Stewart, “but we realised that there was so much more that we could do by joining strategy and creativity with results-driven executional ability.”

In order to do that, 2Stroke had to become Rogerwilco. “After doing research, it became apparent that people felt the name – 2Stroke – sounded a bit dirty. While it resonated at an executional level, it didn’t deliver on the strategic or creative fronts so we found it hard to persuade big brand managers to work with us,” explains Stewart. Thus, in 2014, the agency rebranded. Ever since, they’ve been met with great success. And especially so in the content marketing space, where clients are looking for campaigns that revolve around content that delivers engagement and drives results.

The fact that they picked Drupal as their platform so early on certainly helped to set them up. Back when they did choose it, there hadn’t been a great deal of work done around it. It was huge overseas but not so much in South Africa. But Stewart sensed that the market would evolve and if the agency could position itself as front runners, the work would flow to them.

His instincts where spot on. Not only has Rogerwilco been able to build more traction around the Drupal part of their business but it has also opened the door to more work with big brands. This includes international business. “We essentially wanted to make sure we could evolve from picking the crumbs up from underneath the table, to sitting at the big table, to presenting ourselves as an agency that understands the business case,” says Stewart; “And I think we’ve managed to do that.”

Having said that, it would be easy to rest on one’s laurels. And especially so if you’re regarded as the best SEO company in South Africa. However, Stewart isn’t one to sit back. Neither is Rogerwilco as they are gearing up for growth with a few changes, including the opening of an office in Johannesburg.

“Johannesburg accounts for about 40% of our business so it was crazy not to do it,” explains Stewart. For now, the intent is to keep production in Cape Town, says Stewart, while client services and business development needs are beefed up, up country. However, there are plans, should everything go well, to move some production resources up country.

That isn’t where their new developments end.

Rogerwilco’s Cape Town office recently welcomed a chief operation officer in the form of Reghardt Marais who joins from Saatchi & Saatchi Synergize. “Jakes and I felt that the business had got to a point where we needed to bring in a COO who had a very strong operational background. Reghardt is perfect because he understands the industry and the core service offering that we have.”

The added plus to Marais’ appointment is that it frees up Redelinghuys to incubate some of the other ventures that Rogerwilco intends to pursue. The Cradle – a platform aimed at entrepreneurs across Africa – is one such project. It will be a slow build, admits Stewart, but there is a dream to make it a hub for deal-making and to engage with entrepreneurs across the continent.

As Stewart believes, the fact that there is an international interest in South Africa thanks to our competitive currency, favourable timezones and cultural affinity to the West means local agencies can compete on a global scale. With its skills in SEO and Drupal and the ability to plan and execute projects, Rogerwilco appears perfectly poised to take advantage.

For more information, visit www.rogerwilco.co.za. Alternatively, connect with them on Facebook or on Twitter.