Digital Media Complexity and Basic Business Economics

If you’re serious about running a digital media department, you already know this: producing digital creative and related services is far more complex and expensive than anything you’d find in traditional media advertising. That’s not just an opinion, it's a global reality, and it's not changing any time soon. New platforms and tools are popping up faster than you can say “pivot to Reels,” adding layers of cost, complexity, and chaos.

You can almost hear the faint cries of exhausted developers echoing in the night, if you stop and listen. Strangely, many agencies (especially at the local level) seem to overlook this fact. The result? A stream of half-baked work flooding the market, much like an overworked sewer system. This happens when agencies fail to support or even understand the demands of their own industry.

It’s kind of tragic, really. We’ve got more designers than you can poke a Wacom pen at, but good programmers are rarer than a quiet Slack channel. Experienced devs are in high demand, but their true value is often underestimated, ignored, or... worse, outsourced into oblivion. In the process, digital media developers and business economists are quietly sabotaging themselves.

So, what can we do?

There are practical ways advertisers, marketers, consultants, creatives, and developers (and the agencies that house them) can build more efficient, productive relationships. The key? Communication, research, and basic business sense. Not exactly groundbreaking, but you'd be amazed how often it's skipped.

Start by getting familiar with backend realities. That means business groups, finance departments, and local markets need to understand how digital funding actually works. Account managers involved in staffing and budgeting discussions need to factor in the depth of effort and time that real digital work takes.

Silos? Smash them. While tidy organizational charts might look great in PowerPoint, your media and marketing departments need to adjust fluidly with budget fluctuations and market shifts. Flexibility is essential, not just in planning, but also in dealing with shifting client expectations and “urgent” requests that pop up two hours before a deadline.

Here’s another tip: resist the urge to include every person remotely related to the project in every conversation. Yes, collaboration is great. But too many cooks will absolutely spoil the digital broth. Especially when agencies bring in their extended network of “partnered associates” with their own cross-tier services, everything becomes muddled. Clear roles equal clearer results.

True professionals know that managing digital strategy, service delivery, and program development requires strategic thinking and experienced leadership. Everyone involved... from interns to C-suite... should understand how their actions affect project costs, quality, and profitability. That’s how sustainable, quality-focused businesses thrive.

Be smart. A realistic approach to digital transformation means understanding what you’re investing in, prioritizing critical sales drivers, and reigning in costs, whether local or global. Agencies that pump out as many “apps” as possible just because the web says it’s easy often end up with irrelevant, financially draining results.

Now, about the in-house vs outsourcing debate. The “right” choice depends on your goals. If you're promising clients groundbreaking digital work with tight strategy and seamless creative collaboration, then outsourcing might backfire. But if your deliverables are basic, like standard landing pages or animated banners, in-house might be the better play, so long as it's managed properly.

And efficiency? That’s a non-negotiable. We’re in 2025. If your team is still bogged down by meetings that exist solely to stroke someone's ego, you’re doing it wrong. You can talk to your nan for free on video chat, surely we can streamline a project kickoff call. Let’s not waste precious hours that could be spent building great work.

Finally, just because the web lets you build fancy, dynamic, real-time experiences with CRM integrations, tracking dashboards, and auto-generated performance reports, doesn’t mean you always should. Offer these tools when they make business sense. Otherwise, keep it simple. Clean, user-friendly, and strategic still wins.

Digital strategy isn’t magic. But it does require maturity, experience, and brutal honesty about your team’s capabilities. The real challenge is getting everyone, internally and externally, on the same page, so we stop treating digital like it’s some mysterious, misunderstood beast.

Let’s simplify the conversation. Let’s professionalize the industry. And let’s get on with the job.

First published in Bisnis Indonesia Magazine, 2012, refreshed for 2025 relevance