Unicorn's Digital Marketing Team Turned Into a Winning Independent Firm
Menta Global: Doron Dvir, Yonatan Shafir, Dor Shutov. Photography: Ben Itzhaki
Doron Dvir, CEO of the digital firm Menta Global, talks about the team that has accompanied him since the days of Lemonade, clarifies what is the uniqueness of the firm in the industry, and recommends that start-ups invest more in marketing and less in product development or improvement, especially during this period.
BrandVoice | January 2023
When Doron Dvir, CEO of Menta Global, decided to establish his digital firm, he did not aim to be just another agency. In his vision, he saw something else – something of unique value, one that would create a clear differentiation from the existing solutions in the market. Therefore, he recruited the members of the team he worked so closely with from the time when he founded and managed the digital marketing department at the start-up in question Lemonade (LMND).
“In our field,” explains Dvir, “the professionals usually start their professional career in an agency and later on move to work on the client’s side. In other words, professional experience is built at the expense of the agency’s clients. In our case, it’s just the other way around. Having already accumulated about 30 years of cumulative experience and many success stories including the success of Lemonade, we brought our experience to the table working with clients instead of producing it at their expense.
“There is something very strong about working with the same team for years”, he adds. “Our blind understanding of each other, the feeling that we can trust each other with our eyes closed, and above all the confidence that we have been going through fire and water together for years – allow us as a business to create a synergy that in a normal company takes a very long time, if at all, to produce, in light of the intense turnover of employees in the field.”
According to Dvir, the focus on efficiency and profitability is given secondary priority at Menta, and values such as uncompromising respect for independence, the freedom to do other things beyond work, and, of course, the balance between work/life, are the main ones that enable a healthy and long-term relationship. On top of all these, an inspiring reward model of profit sharing is added. “We are all kind of partners here,” he emphasizes. “If the business is growing, there’s no reason why everyone shouldn’t benefit from it.”
Producing success stories
Menta Global provides digital marketing services to companies and startups at various stages, and in the year and a half since its establishment, it has already worked with dozens of startups from Israel and globally.
“I came to know,” explains Dvir, “that there is a great appreciation for the digital marketing capabilities that come out of ‘Startup Nation’. Over the past year and a half, we have had the opportunity to work with insurance companies and digital banks from the US, Canada and Europe, despite the hour differences and local existing alternatives. When companies from the other side of the world choose to work with an Israeli digital agency, and it’s not because we are cheaper than the local alternatives, it certainly fills the heart with pride.”
Regarding the current situation in the high-tech market, Doron actually manages to find bright spots: “There is a cyclical behavior here that repeats itself every few years, in which a bubble is created and after which the market corrects itself. Those who are strong emerge from the crisis even stronger, and those who failed to produce a profitable business model from the start – disappear.
According to him, he experienced working with start-ups that were very challenging to succeed with, but today he gets to choose the clients he works with and tries to identify those you really have a good chance of succeeding. “We are not in a place of working on masses of clients, but to produce success stories,” he emphasizes. “In order for an activity to become a success story, there must be a strong ‘product market fit’, as well as full cooperation on the part of the startup to help us realize our digital strategy that will lead to growth.
Companies recorded a breakthrough precisely during a crisis.
As for the new opportunities in this period, Doron reveals that there are indeed companies that lower budgets, but there are also those that increase activity. “For us, as a service provider, opportunities actually open up when companies actually cut the existing workforce and spend their marketing budgets outside, and this is where we come into the picture.”
Dvir believes that precisely in such a period, the marketing activity must continue, and companies must continue to show growth and not just an improvement in profitability that results from cutting the company’s expenses. “After all, those companies that cut back now will have to prepare for raising rounds in 2023, and their chances of success in raising money will depend a lot on the growth potential they present and not only on saving expenses. Those who fail to recruit will simply be left without money and forced to close, which may lead to an even wider wave of layoffs. Therefore, if I make decisions in a start-up today, I invest most of the efforts and resources during this period precisely in marketing and less in developing or improving the product. If we look back, there are quite a few success stories of companies that made their breakthrough precisely in times of crisis, precisely when their competitors that were the market leaders, were shuffling and downshifting.”
“Today we work with a wide variety of clients in different and various fields and industries. Starting from eCommerce, to fintech companies, insurtech and B2B clients with marketing activity in the LinkedIn arena,” Doron Dvir concludes. “We look towards 2023 with great expectations for the recovery of the market and the exit from the crisis, and of course, we look forward to helping companies successfully navigate this period and come out of it stronger and better.”
Company website: www.mentaglobal.co
Doron Dvir, Founder & CEO : doron@mentaglobal.co
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