We know web design and development is a sensitive topic. As agency owners, CD’s and designers around the world eye-roll their way to the poor-house at the thought of delivering client web projects, we talk to Agency owner and Blutui founder Charlie Cooper about what it takes to make a buck out of web.

How do you know what it’s like to be agency side?

“We are a web development platform with its feet firmly planted in adland. Our founders all have digital agency pedigrees and we’ve been building sites for agency clients on Blutui for years”, says agency owner and Blutui CTO Charlie Cooper.

“When we started out with Blutui it was after years of fighting inefficiency and fragmentation, discontinued code and endless scope creep”, says Charlie. “These factors guided our development and have formed the basis of what we believe to be the only genuine platform for agency”.

After extensive research both locally and overseas, including an ECD forum at Cannes Lions where we interviewed some of the worlds most demanding ECD’s and agency C-suite execs, we set about to build the Blutui platform specifically for creative agency web development.

What makes Blutui special? 

“Two things; Control and Freedom”, says Cooper.

Control

The team at Blutui know what ‘out of control’ looks like from their previous agency experience so have built project controls into the platform to provide value and insights for agency management. Everything from controlling talent access to client permissions, creative execution, project delivery, instant security certificates and lightning fast publishing are all controlled by agency.  In terms of productivity and earning power, because Blutui is super efficient to build with, an agency front-end developer typically generates 5 to 6 times their wage in web revenue meaning you have more control over your bottom line'.'

Freedom

Creative freedom is crucial for your creative team, client and for front-end developers alike. With Blutui the platform is wide open in terms of design parameters. Unlike old, heavily plug-in and template-reliant technologies like WordPress or SquareSpace, Drupal or any of the myriad others used currently for client projects.

Freedom to create anything, literally anything. All you need as an agency is a talented front-end developer on your team or access to a freelancer. They’ll need to have an understanding of HTML and CSS, pretty standard, and be smart, understanding the creative brief, the platform takes care of everything else.

“Let’s be clear, this is not a DIY tool for dummies, Blutui is a professional platform for you guessed it . . . making good revenue”. Charlie says. “When we designed Blutui it was for a very clear purpose. To give creative agencies the toolset to take control of their website delivery and provide a frictionless experience for front-end developers and clients alike.

One such client is a fast growing New Zealand talent agency. The short brief:

A website that is both beautiful and beautifully easy to manage - their team of content managers are constantly requiring talent bio’s to be uploaded quickly, often on the fly. The client had previously been battling with a SquareSpace site that was perfect for a start up but wouldn’t scale, the had quickly outgrown its native capabilities:

“I was sold on Squarespace. Then I discovered Blutui. Blutui the clear winner. No contest”.

Shaun O’Neill, CEO. Essential Talent. www.essentialtalent.co.nz

“A further reason for building Blutui is to give our creative agency friends and colleagues a valuable industry-centric point of difference that is easy to manage”, says Charlie. “Clients are rightly sceptical of paying through the nose for a site built in a ‘generalist’, free or DIY piece of off-the-shelfware and would expect that, for the agency fees incurred, their site would surely be built in a specialist technology”. 

Blutui has been built with an agency entry point in mind so that the value proposition can be easily communicated, understood and leveraged. The Blutui experience means clients place more value on the build, on the UX, the speed and the total Blutui package. “Why would a client feel compelled to pay agency rates for a WordPress site?”, says Charlie. “Sure you can probably build what you need in WordPress once you’ve found all the plugins and themes but it’ll never be the site you want, that would be a Blutui site”.

Start taking control of your clients web development today and start enjoying better project control and resulting revenue. Contact the agency friendly team at Blutui for a discussion or a workshop at your agency.