The more vendors you hold across production, advertising, and systems, the greater the coordination burden inside the company grows. The cause is that the language and assumptions each company uses don't mesh. As the translator between vendors, tentus consolidates the point of contact into one and eliminates the burden of the company having to keep translating in every direction.
What follows are questions about the troubles that arise as the number of companies involved—production companies, advertising agencies, systems companies—grows.
Q. We're a manufacturer, and we deal with multiple vendors—a production company, an advertising agency, a systems company. Honestly, the coordination alone is wearing us out.
I understand that feeling very well. When vendors increase, it isn't the hands-on work that grows but the coordination. And that coordination usually concentrates on a single person inside the company. Explaining the same background to each company over and over, translating Company A's words for Company B, managing deadlines and who's holding the ball at any moment… You end up spending more time on that traffic control than on the substance of the marketing you actually want to do. This isn't a matter of the person being poorly organized; it's something that happens structurally.
Q. Why does coordination become so demanding as vendors increase?
The reason is that the scope each company sees and the language they use are different. A production company speaks in the context of design and implementation, an advertising agency in the context of numbers and media, a systems company in the context of specifications and maintenance. Each is correct, yet the assumptions don't mesh. The 'translation' that bridges this mismatch is usually shouldered, unpaid, by the client company. This bites as a hidden cost. In fact, with manufacturing clients it's not unusual for five or six vendors to be running in parallel across production, advertising, and systems. When that's the case, the company ends up translating in five or six directions on an ongoing basis.
Q. If we engage you, how does that coordination change?
tentus consolidates the point of contact into one and takes on the role of translator between vendors. You only need to speak with us, and we absorb the rollout and coordination with each company on our side. Because we've worked in production and operation for BtoB and professional-services clients from the start, we understand the language of design, advertising, and systems alike. That's precisely why we can serve as the translator. The state in which your person in charge was attending to five or six directions is reduced to one. Just this alone changes the felt burden considerably.
Q. Do we have to switch out all of our existing vendors?
No—tentus doesn't assume that existing vendors will be replaced. If anything, in many cases we come in as a hub between them while keeping your current lineup intact. Suppliers that are working well can stay as they are. What we do is stand between that group of vendors and your company and organize the flow of information and the ball. Rather than a large-scale wholesale replacement, please think of it as shifting the center of gravity of coordination from the company to us.
Q. If you consolidate the point of contact, won't that spot become a bottleneck instead?
This is where the quasi-delegation (junin'nin) way of engaging proves effective. With a per-project 'ask and it comes back' relationship, the point of contact does indeed tend to become a bottleneck; but because tentus comes in continuously as a function within the company, we can keep things running while grasping the situation day to day. Since there's no need to explain from scratch for each project, the flow actually becomes faster. The image is not that the hub clogs up, but that having a hub reduces waiting time everywhere.