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Dedicated Team

How Ogilvy Social.Lab scaled from 1 to 20 specialists in under 4 months at 35% lower cost

Project Overview

Organisation

Ogilvy Social.Lab

Industry

Advertising / Performance Marketing

Location

16 global markets

Specialists

600+

Markets Served

16

Products / Services Used

  • Dedicated Team
  • Paid Search
  • Paid Social
  • Programmatic
  • SEO

Ogilvy Social.Lab is Ogilvy's digital-first performance arm. It is built to turn big ideas into business revenue. Since launching in South Africa back in 2018, they’ve exploded into a global team of over 600 specialists across 16 markets.

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That kind of growth requires speed, consistency, and senior-level expertise.

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But when client demand began moving faster than their internal hiring process, they reached an impasse. They needed a flexible resourcing model that could keep up with massive new wins, without watering down the premium quality clients expect from the Ogilvy name.

Performance Insights

Key results for the client

35%

Cost savings vs in-house

20x

Team growth in 4 months

15

Days to deploy specialists

4

Disciplines fully covered

Client objectives

The challenges Ogilvy Social.Lab faced

1.
Severe talent shortage

The performance marketing specialists Ogilvy needed were either scarce in-region or already locked into long-term roles. This made local hiring slow and unpredictable. 

2.
High in-house overheads

Hiring internally meant drowning in HR headaches, heavy overhead, and fixed costs - a fixed-cost model that refused to budge when client demands shifted.

3.
Retention risks

Turnover across global hubs was creating mid-project instability. Handovers were eating into delivery timelines and client momentum.

4.
Freelancing unreliability

Short-term freelance fixes patched immediate gaps but carried zero accountability for long-term client outcomes or strategic continuity.

5.
Time zone friction

Onshore teams across 16 markets needed delivery support that aligned with their working hours.

Mavlers Strategy

How we delivered results at global scale

1.
Rapid deployment from a pre-vetted bench

With a network of 100+ performance marketing pros on standby, we bypassed the usual recruitment loop and slow ramp-up time. The right people were matched, onboarded, and working within 15 days. 

2.
Mid-to-senior team composition

The team was built with a deliberate balance - senior specialists owning strategy, mid-level operators driving execution. Ogilvy got both planning depth and hands-on velocity from day one.

3.
Full-discipline coverage under one partner

Specialists came in across the four pillars driving Ogilvy's performance demand: Paid Search, Paid Social, Programmatic, and SEO. One contract replaced what would have taken four vendor relationships.

4.
Always-on attrition buffer

1–2 standby resources stayed on a warm bench, activated within hours when someone went on leave or rotated out. Delivery never paused, even as the team flexed.

5.
Cultural and time zone integration

Specialists worked inside Ogilvy's pods. Same rituals, same channels, same client cadence. So onshore teams treated them as colleagues, not as outsourced support.

Team Structure Deployed
9

Paid Search Specialist

6

Paid Social Media Specialist

4

Programmatic Specialist

1

SEO Specialist

Results

What Ogilvy Social.Lab achieved

Team scale - before vs after Cost efficiency - before vs after
Before: 1 specialist ~35% lower cost vs in-house hiring in global hubs
After: 20 specialists Zero overhead expansion required
Timeline: under 4 months
New client accounts went live weeks ahead of original onboarding timelines.
Zero delivery gaps through attrition or leave, thanks to the standby buffer.
Campaign quality earned direct recognition from Ogilvy's global leads.
Bandwidth wasn’t the reason anymore to turn down new business.
Plus:
Resourcing shifted from a bottleneck to a competitive advantage. Faster campaigns, lower cost base, more stable delivery than either in-house or freelance models could offer.

You guys were great! Thank you! Very professional, very polite, and really helped in a tricky situation.

Sandra Field
Sandra Field

Assistant Project Manager

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