Melbourne,  January 7th, 2021.

With offices all over Australia, Luminary is an independent Australian digital agency that specialises in the implementation of large-scale digital projects.

It has a portfolio that includes some of the biggest names in Australian government, retail and the corporate sector, with a recognised knowledge and understanding of the digital world.

The agency was founded by Marty Drill, who is its CEO, when he was only 21-years old.

In an interview with TIA, he described a regular day in his shoes and the main features of the agency, with members from 26 cultural backgrounds.

He shared some of Luminary’s recent work and looked ahead to upcoming initiatives. 

What do you love about your city and what makes it great to do business?

Melbourne is a dynamic city and is the home of many innovative companies. Its GDP is larger than Hong Kong’s and is on par with Singapore. The city loves design and brands that are authentic.

Originally a manufacturing city, Melbourne has reinvented itself to be a sizeable service-based economy. As a result, it has a huge reliance on being consumer centric, so designing great user experiences is critical.

As a founder, what was the process of starting your own company?

I was 21 years old when we started Luminary. Passionate and naïve, we set out to help small businesses take advantage of the web. We thought we would be tech millionaires and sell out within 2-3 years. Lol.

This sheer enthusiasm (and reckless abandon) created a company that somehow continues 21 years later. I would love to suggest that it was complicated or heavily involved. The reality is that I went to the Business Names office in Flinders St, in April 1999, and filled out a form. About 20 minutes later I had the business name and I registered the domain name using their WIFI. 

How would you describe a regular day in your shoes?

Mostly my role is about removing roadblocks for people and ensuring that they are empowered. People are driven to seek work that is inspiring to them.

Our role is to do our best to provide people with the opportunity for purpose, mastery and autonomy. The day is spent coaching and training people, working on strategies for clients and ensuring teams are high performing and have what they need. 

How do you manage different cultures to build teams that match businesses?

We have team members from 26 different cultural backgrounds. We have become adept at working with different cultures and ensuring that the right team is matched with the right client. The basis of how we foster teamwork is through our social contract.

Together we created a social contract that forms the basis of how we interact as a team. We also create a specific social contract with the client for the project team. This allows each team to have an agreement that relates specifically to their circumstances.

Can you share some recent work that you’re most proud of?

PGH Bricks & Pavers, a leading Australian brick manufacturer, needed a tool to help new home builders select bricks. The Visualiser app allows the user to change the colour of the bricks, pavers and roof on the house. The user can save their design as an option for consideration and share with friends and family.

The best part is that they can put on VR glasses and see what they have created! It has recently been recognised as a winner in the Good Design Awards, and received an Honourable Mention in the Sitecore Awards. 

What upcoming initiatives do you find particularly exciting?

We have some exciting new projects that we have recently won. This includes a major trucking company who are looking to reposition their newest line. 

An existing project that we are creating at the moment will revolutionise the way people plan the electrical fitout of houses. Really looking forward to sharing it.

In terms of team engagement, one of our recent initiatives was to announce a policy that the team can work from anywhere. We believe that this flexibility will support the team and their families and we are all really excited about it. 

How would you describe the digital industry in Melbourne (or Australia in general) compared to other major cities or design capitals?

Digital in Melbourne and Sydney is largely linked to the major companies headquartered in both cities.

Despite the current differences between the States due to major differences in the number of coronavirus cases (and subsequent restrictions), cross cultural issues are largely limited to small nuances around aspirations and how they are portrayed in positioning.

For example, Melbourne is keen to be seen as sophisticated, while Sydney is a lot more flamboyant. Overall the core Australian values of authenticity, fair go, achievement in sport, humour and generosity have influenced both perceptions of companies and subsequently their brand identity.

In terms of managing them, the opportunity is to find the market who believes what your brand believes and align yourself with them. Being all things to all people, never really works. 

In your opinion, what are the key factors that have helped bring Australian agencies to this level?

Customer expectations of digital have advanced dramatically in the last decade. As larger companies seek to modernise their digital interfaces, the need for and rise of the digital agency has been significant.

Many organisations were already struggling with their customer interactions and understanding the key touch points. However, expectations drastically increased and the customer journey map expanded to include digital as the primary engagement for many customers. 

The need to redevelop legacy systems or build new interfaces quickly, meant that agencies were in the ideal situation to solve these challenges.

The ways of working also changed. Agile could be far more easily implemented within a team by engaging an agency who was adept with this way of working. The focus on developing a minimum viable product allowed organisations to implement change faster than the traditional approach of a major release at the end of the project.

Agencies have a far greater role to play in modern Australian organisations, even with the advent of developing internal teams. The impacts of COVID on internal product teams are likely to see a greater reliance on agencies. 

We know you have a particular interest in the application of voice technology. What role do you think it’ll have in the near future and which industries might take the most advantage of it?

I particularly like the idea of being able to control an autonomous car with your voice. The old saying of ‘Home James and don’t spare the horses’ would be a cool way to end the evening. Ultimately voice will have a major impact on many industries.

In the short term, it will largely focus on ordering. This is already happening with ecommerce, though it may be a novel way (albeit regrettable) to order in a restaurant instead of having a waiter. As restaurants reopen and seek to reduce interaction, voice ordering may be a strategy they employ.

The organisations that are likely to get the biggest short-term boost from voice are charities. The ability to donate to a charity using voice is likely to take off as it is easier than completing an online form, ‘OK Google, donate $50 to the Heart Foundation’. When sequences are shortened, barriers reduce and conversion increases. Welcome to voice. 

Three (or as many as you want) highlight moments in your career-path so far

We have had many milestones and projects that stand out. I think the satisfaction of still being independent on our 20th birthday was quite significant. We were awarded the 12th best place to work in 2018 which was awesome. There have been many projects over the years but the greatest highlight is the people who I have got to work with. 

Imagine you had the chance to travel back in time and give yourself a piece of advice, what would it be?

Never drink red wine. 

Can you share a fun fact people would be surprised to learn about you?

When I was 15 years old I had a Paper Round and was hit by a car. Due to the fact that I had just dropped off my last paper, technically I was on the way home from work.
So WorkCover covered me rather than the Transport Accident Commission. I was paid 80% of my weekly wage for about 18 months while recovering from my injuries. I found out years later that the $13.80 per week that they paid me, meant I was the youngest recipient of WorkCover in their history (at the time).

Thanks Marty!

Learn more about Luminary

Follow Marty Drill on social media: 
LinkedIn

Twitter

Follow Luminary on social media:
Facebook
Twitter
LinkedIn

agenciesbrandsclientsdigitalfutureinteractionMelbournePeopleSingaporeSydneyteamsVR