Sydney independent digital agency Wonderful has launched a new initiative offering $25,000 worth of strategy, research, UX, design and technology services to an Australian organisation working to create positive social impact.
The initiative is the first major expression of the agency’s new positioning, ‘Digital experiences that move organisations forward’, which aims to shift the agency’s focus from selling specific digital solutions to identifying and solving the business problems behind a brief.
The winning organisation will receive up to $25,000 in Wonderful’s expertise to address a digital challenge standing in the way of its mission. The initiative is open to not-for-profits, social enterprises, healthcare and education providers, community groups and purpose-led businesses.
Wonderful founder and managing director Matt Barbelli said the initiative had come from a recurring pattern the agency had seen among clients.
“Clients understandably come to agencies saying they need a new website, a new platform, better UX or a particular piece of technology,” Barbelli said. “But ‘we need a new website’ isn’t really a problem, it’s a proposed solution. The question we’re much more interested in is, what’s happening in the business that makes you think you need one?”
According to Barbelli, the agency’s new positioning is designed to encourage a more problem-led approach, rather than assuming the solution from the outset.
“One of the easiest mistakes to make in our industry is to become very good at solving the problem we were handed, rather than asking whether it’s the right problem to solve,” he said.“If you start with the solution, everything that follows is designed to justify it. If you start with the problem, you give yourself permission to arrive somewhere else.”
Wonderful, which launched in January 2023, will continue to offer digital strategy, customer research, UX, design, technology, analytics and experimentation, but said it would no longer assume one particular discipline is the answer at the beginning of a project.
Barbelli said the approach reflected a broader shift in how the agency viewed the role of digital.
“Businesses don’t have UX problems, CMS problems or website problems in isolation. They have growth problems, customer problems, operational problems and moments of change,” he said.
“Digital is one of the ways we respond to them.”
Through Wonderful Possibilities, the agency is looking to apply that approach to an organisation where digital improvements could help increase its social impact.
“Wonderful Possibilities is a very practical expression of what our new positioning is about,” Barbelli said.
“There are Australian social purpose organisations doing incredibly important work that have digital challenges standing in the way of their impact.
“Giving one of them $25,000 of our strategy, research, UX, design and technology expertise gives us the opportunity to help solve a real problem, rather than simply build something for the sake of it.”
Applications for Wonderful Possibilities are now open, with one organisation to receive up to $25,000 worth of services from Wonderful.
