Archive notice: This article was originally published on April 24, 2008. Links and embedded videos are preserved as part of the historical record.
Accordingly, employee growth, at almost 24 percent, was even higher than revenue growth. As in previous years, T-Systems Multimedia Solutions remains number one in the ranking, followed by Pixelpark, which has moved up one place – not least because of its acquisition of Elephant Seven and XPlain. The only fly in the ointment for the service provider sector remains the increasingly difficult search for suitable staff. In total, more than 230 agencies and service providers took part in the survey.
The order situation in the digital economy remains at a consistently high level. With average revenue growth of 19 percent, service providers once again surpassed the previous year’s already very positive result last year. They were thus only slightly below their own forecast of 22 percent. However, they exceeded their own plans for permanent hiring. At almost 24 percent, the companies were above last year’s forecast of 18.4 percent. The top 30 in the New Media Service Ranking (NMSR) in particular emerged as drivers of this development. Their employee growth was substantially more pronounced at an astonishing 30.7 percent, while revenues also rose at an above-average rate of 20.3 percent. According to the respondents’ assessments, this development will continue in the current year. Companies expect average revenue increases of 21.2 percent in 2008. Employee numbers are expected to rise by another 16.7 percent.
Skilled Staff Problem Continues to Worsen
As some experts feared last year, the search for suitable staff has not become any easier. On the contrary: from the companies’ perspective, the problem has become even more acute. Although the educational offerings of universities are still perceived as a problem, respondents see this as only one of several causes. The fact that criticism has at least not increased can be taken as an indication of this. Fortunately, the same cannot be said of the willingness to hire older employees (over 45). Willingness has never been as great as in 2008. “This shows that our initiatives to provide tailored qualification measures through the Academy of the Digital Economy are on the right track,” says BVDW Managing Director Tanja Feller.
Plenty of Movement in the Top Ten of the New Media Service Ranking
A look at the current ranking shows that quite a lot has changed in the top ten compared with the previous year. From second place onwards, there are only climbers or new entrants such as Euroweb Internet GmbH, which participated for the first time and is listed in seventh place. The Plan.Net Group benefited most from the upward movement and, jumping from seventh place, now occupies the position behind the two leaders. Among the established names in the ranking, Bassier, Bergmann und Kindler (14 to 9) and imc information multimedia communication AG (15 to 10) gained the most places within the top ten. The shooting stars of the top 50 are nexum AG (56 to 28) and mediascale (72 to 41). Neue Digitale recorded the largest percentage increase. Not only did revenues grow by 90.4 percent last year, but as a result the company’s workforce more than doubled (104.7 percent).
Efficiency and Growth: Hallmarks of the Agency Certificate
The certified agencies delivered particularly good results. Only two agencies each lost one place; all the others among the total of 14 full-service agencies gained places. The sole exception here is industry leader T-Systems MMS in first place. It is particularly encouraging that the agencies increased their fee revenues by an average of 25 percent compared with 2006. kernpunkt GmbH, for example, made the jump into the top 100 with growth of 99.4 percent. denkwerk (17 to 12), TWT Interactive (43 to 33), New Identity (52 to 44), Berger, Baader, Hermes (53 to 46) and KMF Werbung (71 to 55) were able to use the positive effects of the certificate. With revenue per head of 108,000 euros (overall average 97,000 euros), the certificate also demonstrates the companies’ efficiency.
Although some companies did not submit figures this year or were not included because of missing or insufficient attestations, almost three quarters (72 percent) of agencies and service providers overall also took part in the New Media Service Ranking the previous year. Among the top 100, the proportion is as high as 83 percent. The ranking thus remains a reliable fixture in the study landscape and provides unique data enabling long-term comparisons. Industry indicators for the sector’s long-term economic and technological development will be presented shortly. For the first time, this year’s differentiated survey of the service portfolio allows subrankings for individual areas of focus. Among application areas, these are primarily e-commerce and e-marketing, each accounting for an average of 21 percent of all fee revenues. In addition, the service portfolio survey has helped tie the ranking more closely once again to the production of interactive media, which has been its focus since the New Media Service Ranking began. The ranking therefore includes only full-service agencies or service providers with a broad range of offerings. To better reflect the relevance of specialist providers in online marketing in future, a separate Online Marketing Services Ranking is currently being developed in consultation with the BVDW’s Performance Marketing specialist group. The aim is to present the ranking at online-marketing-düsseldorf in September 2008.
