Picture this: it's annual pay review time, and you're staring down the barrel of another gruelling week juggling spreadsheets, chasing recruitment consultants, and trying to make sense of conflicting salary data. Sound familiar? You're not alone.
For Mando Group, a 40-strong digital consultancy in Liverpool, this was their reality until recently. As a platinum Optimizely partner serving enterprise clients, they knew their people were their biggest asset. But proving their worth through fair compensation? That was proving to be quite the headache.
The Great British Salary Benchmarking Struggle
Let's be honest - the UK digital sector has been through the wringer lately. With pitch win rates falling to 52% (8% lower than last year), 84% of agencies reporting their biggest challenge is pressure on client budgets and average headcount dropping by 6%, getting compensation right has never been more critical. Digital marketers across the UK are commanding £50,000-£69,999 on average, with London and the South East pushing salaries 10-20% higher.
Add to that the post-pandemic shift to hybrid working - now embraced by 28% of UK workers - and you've got a perfect storm of challenges.
When talent is harder to attract and even harder to keep engaged, getting pay decisions spot-on isn't just nice to have - it's essential for survival.
The Old Way: Death by a Thousand Spreadsheets
Before discovering Compensation IQ, Mando Group's approach to salary benchmarking was, frankly, a bit of a nightmare. Deanne walked us through the process with the kind of hard-earned clarity that only comes from seeing it all before
Our process was always extraction of salary data into a spreadsheet. That spreadsheet had been produced by finance and gave us columns with things like whether they were part-time, total package including salaries, then it modelled what percentage pay increases would look like.
But that was just the beginning. The real slog involved:
- Ringing round recruitment agencies - only two or three on their books
- Trawling through Hays and Reed salary reports - hoping for something relevant
- Manually scanning job adverts for similar roles in similar-sized companies
- Playing detective to spot outliers and inconsistencies
"It was all generic information," Deanne explains. "Obviously the job adverts were a little bit more tailored, but it was just broad and very time-consuming."
How time-consuming? Try 2-3 solid days of intensive work. And even then, when presenting findings to the finance team, there was always that nagging doubt: is this data actually defensible?
The customer admits: "We are very lucky to have a stable workforce and therefore don't need to recruit much. When we do, or to support with promotions, it was difficult to find suitable benchmark data to ensure we were paying at the right rate."
Enter Compensation IQ: Right Place, Right Time
Sometimes timing is everything. Mando Group first heard about Compensation IQ through their membership with the British Interactive Media Association (BIMA) - just as they were gearing up for their annual pay review process.
To be honest, it came at the right time for us. I first spoke to the Compensation IQ team just as we were starting the pay review process. If it had come two or three months later, we'd have already been through this exercise and it wouldn't have been appropriate.
But here's the thing – what started as a solution for their immediate pay review needs quickly revealed itself to be so much more.
The transformation
The difference was immediate and dramatic. Where the old process took the better part of a week, Compensation IQ streamlined everything into a matter of hours.
Using the API to import the data was really useful because you don't need to cross-check and match everything. It's all there as it should be. It probably took a couple of hours just to double-check the alignment and make sure our quite niche job titles had parity.
But the real game-changer wasn't just the time saving – it was the quality of insights. For the first time, they had access to percentile data, not just basic salary bands.
We were able to see for a couple of roles where we were out of sync because we had the median and the percentiles. We could understand where we want to pay and then target and align where anybody was out of sync with that. We just didn't have that before.
Real results: the frontline reality
The proof, as they say, is in the pudding. When the HR Team presented their findings to the directors, they had some particularly telling cases including:
The Undervalued Star
"We knew there was value and we knew there was a pay increase coming. We probably wouldn't have known where to position that pay increase. The data showed that individual was underpaid compared to the rest of our percentiles, so we were able to bring that in line."
Deanne is refreshingly honest about the impact. "When that data was presented to directors alongside the performance reviews, we could say with confidence that this individual needs a salary increase of this amount because they're out of line with the rest of our profile. There was probably a slightly larger increase than they might have received without that data. We might have been more cautious and reserved."
Beyond the annual review: year-round value
Here's where things get really interesting. What Mando Group initially saw as an annual pay review tool quickly revealed its ongoing value throughout the year.
"We went into it as a pay review system, but there's more to it than that," the customer reflects. "We're now able to maximise the other information that's in there."
They're now using Compensation IQ for:
- Live recruitment benchmarking - "When we're putting our job adverts out, we know we're in the right ballpark"
- Quarterly business reporting - adding salary insights to regular stakeholder updates
- Absence cost analysis – "Previously, cost of absence was very intangible. Now we can say there is a cost based on day rate"
- Strategic workforce planning - understanding market trends before they hit
The Verdict? Compensation IQ delivered a Strategic Advantage
When asked about their overall experience, the Mando Group People team’s enthusiasm is palpable:
It's definitely saved us time. It's been interesting to cut that data in different ways. The opportunities... we've probably not fully explored it yet.
The transformation extends beyond just efficiency gains. They've moved from reactive, time-consuming salary reviews to proactive, strategic compensation management. "I think the more we can use it in different ways, the more we show that value rather than it being a once-a-year tool. The ability to extract that data, to cut it and get it out, is really helpful."
So how likely are you to recommend Compensation IQ to a colleague?
Mando Group gives Compensation IQ a solid 9 out of 10. The only thing preventing a perfect score? They'd love to see benefits benchmarking added to the platform!
"I think the onboarding, the ease of use, the data sets that are in there... the insights are just great."
The Bigger Picture: Thriving in Challenging Times
Mando Group's story isn't just about finding a better salary benchmarking tool – it's about how smart companies are adapting to thrive in challenging market conditions. In a sector where nearly half of agencies are struggling, having confidence in your compensation decisions can be the difference between losing talent to competitors and building a team that drives growth.
As Deanne Walsh, HRBP puts it:
We focused on doing the pay review and getting that across the line, which it was helpful. But Elinor (Summers, Office Manager) and I have looked at it and thought about ways we can incorporate it into our quarterly reporting – to give different perspectives into anything that might benefit the business.
For UK digital agencies and consultancies grappling with similar challenges – whether it's post-pandemic culture shifts, hybrid working complexities, or fierce competition for talent – Mando Group's transformation shows there's a better way forward.
Frequently Asked Questions
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