Yet another ‘Good’ agency

I’ll let you in on a little secret… 

Sometimes, when I’m explaining what we do at MakeGood, I cringe a little. I have a little internal voice saying “oh here we go, another agency claiming to be ‘doing good’.” 

It’s just starting to feel a little bit *eyeroll* isn’t it? A little bit overdone.

That feeling started a couple of years ago, and intensified when we reviewed our competitors as part of our recent brand refresh. We discovered an almost alarming amount of agencies out there positioning themselves as things like ‘ethical’, ‘purpose driven’ or ‘values led’. So many of them, like us, talk about ‘making things better’ or ‘creating a better world’ etc etc

This niggling feeling sparked a discussion in the studio about how we should be positioning ourselves. We realised that merely committing to ‘making good’ wasn’t enough to stand out. It felt a little disappointing, to be honest—we sort of thought we were special!

However, this observation was important. It pushed us to look even deeper, beyond our ethical credentials, to redefine how we should position ourselves. As a result, we’re really happy with where we landed and how we now talk about MakeGood and all the other ways we are genuinely special (more about that here if you’re interested).

But what about the cringe?

Well, that needs to stop. 

We realised that our niche becoming increasingly crowded is, in fact, a wonderful thing. Actually, we should be celebrating and shouting from the rooftops: “The more the merrier!”

If we truly believe in using our skills to create positive change, and we’re genuinely not ‘purpose-washing’, then this is a trend that needs to be celebrated with open arms – the more overdone it feels, the more we’ll know there’s a collective shift in what business as usual looks like.

We’re imagining a world where everyone with design and marketing skills simply refuses to use their talents to further the destruction of our planet or contribute to the suffering and exploitation of the vulnerable.

If we have any hope of changing this world for the better, Good cannot be a fad or passing trend. Surely, Good must become the norm.