Local case on: Beetoqs – Bangladeshi advertising agency

Background of the firm:

Beetoqs is an advertising agency situated in Dhaka, Bangladesh. It is run by some fresh blooded
organizers, film makers, photographers, and graphic designers. All of them are young, for which
it makes them able to generate unique ideas and create extraordinary things. Its service business
includes creating, planning, and handling advertising for its clients. This agency has worked with
Brother International Corporation, Rin Bangladesh, UNDP Bangladesh, UCEP Bangladesh,
SureCash, Prothom Alo Digital Media, Internet Society Bangladesh Chapter, Bangladesh Open
Source Network – BdOSN and IPDC. Advertising agency uses various types of media to
showcase different products and services to customers. Mainly different companies and products
are their clients. They make personalized advertisements for every company. The agencies
mainly analyses the customer data and knows more about the customer preferences and choice
and the budget of the client and come up with a new way to grab the attention of the customers.
The main concern of the agencies is managing with the client’s budget as the budget is very
important in this concern. However, Beetoqs faced such problems which I have described below.
But like other advertising agencies in BD, Beetoqs faced same hurdle. Meeting client’s
expectations is the main concern here. Knowing that the customer is asking for and delivering
that accordingly gives the customer an opportunity to rely solely on the agency’s taste. However,
sitting with the client and coming up with something exactly what a client was looking for gives
the pure satisfaction as well as well payment. In Bangladesh, currently the leading agencies are
doing great works and competition with them Beetoqs must deliver it’s best and they are trying
to do that with whole heart.

Personal story of the founder:

Masudul Haq, the founder of Beetoqs is a young entrepreneur, photographer, and film maker. He
graduated from Stamford University Bangladesh. Currently he is 26 years old and he has been
directing short films, documentary videos for 8 years. He has been also working as a
Photojournalist at Prothom Alo since 2013, Director at Magic Film Factory since 2012, Festival
Organizing Committee Member at Children's Film Society Bangladesh since 2013 and he is the
Founding General Secretary of Kishor Alo Film & Photography Club. The proprietor of Beetoqs,
Masudul Haq has a passion for film making. Besides short film making he use to make
documentary videos, promotional videos for different agencies as a freelancer. But freelancers
get less paid and get less recognition than the ones who have an agency or a company. And he
also had a dream to work creatively with the youngsters and wanted to build a community where
young filmmakers will have the scope to learn and work in different projects, establish a network
and be self-dependent. So, he thought to turn his passion into his career and started the journey
of the advertising agency “Beetoqs”. The idea of the name Beetoqs came from the term “bee”
and “talks”. Like buzzing bees, he wanted to talk about the stories of different people around the
world by making documentary videos; hence he named his agency Beetoqs.
Critical success factor:

As an advertising agency Beetoqs produces television advertisements, radio advertisements,

online advertisements, out-of-home advertisements, mobile marketing, and AR advertising for
commercial and non-commercial purposes and is independent from the client and provides an
outside point of view to the effort of selling the client's products or services. Most of the
employees of Beetoqs are part timers as most of them are the students of different school,
college, and universities. So currently among 20 people only 8 employees are permanent. This
creative team consisting of copywriters, designers, art directors and creative directors is the heart
of this agency. They’re the team responsible for conceptualizing and designing the final assets
that need to be placed in various forums.

As a startup company Beetoqs is doing project-based work mostly. In this case, each “project”
stands on its own and is priced and managed accordingly. Beetoqs also works as a consultant and
vendor for Audio-Visual support for other organizations. For every project they take 30% - 50%
advance payment and then start their production. After production they show the output to the
clients and after getting feedback from the clients, they deliver the final output and get the full
payment. They had some initial challenges like:

Selecting the Location: Beetoqs realized that the rent of any commercial area is very high and
being a start up with single proprietorship, it was not feasible for Beetoqs to rent an apartment or
office in a commercialized area. So Beetoqs decided to set up their office in a residential
apartment which is less costly. But the problem they faced was during renting an apartment. The
landlords were interested renting their flats to family only.

Acquiring Trade License: This was another challenge for the owner of Beetoqs. After setting up
an office in a residential area Beetoqs applied for trade license. The trade license authority
objected about the location and argued that trade license can’t be provided because the office is
in a residential area. This was a signal to Masudul Haq to provide them some bribe. But
Masaudul Haq had connections with some of his powerful friends and he got the license.

Bank Problem: Masudul Haq opened account in Dutch Bangla Bank- Fast Track (Mirpur)
against Beetoqs. He asked the bank manager if he could do transaction in dual currency. The
manager told it is possible after collecting a visa card. Masudul Haq applied for it in Mirpur
branch and went to the main branch of the bank. There the head manager told he hadn’t applied
for visa card yet. So Masudul Haq again applied there and collected a visa card after 7 days.
Then when wanted to buy domain and host, the bank manager informed him about the system of
dual currency is obsolete now, Govt. had stopped it.

For initial challenges Beetoqs solved the problems in the following ways:

For solving the issue of residential flat renting- Masudul Haq had to search a lot and finally got
an apartment in Mirpur which is less costly compared to other regions. For solving the issue of
trade license - Masudul Haq took help from his friend who has political association. He did not
have to provide any bribe later. In case of Dutch Bangla Bank- Masusul Haq had to take help
from his Australian Friend who helped him with his international visa card. With this he bought
the domain and proceeded later. To prevent any kind delayed payment from customers Beetoqs
started taking 50% advance payments.

Beetoqs tries to work with new ideas, that’s why they are giving their employees enough
freedom so that they can work freely. The owner himself is very helpful and is usually honored
as “Vaiya” by any employee. They also provide free dinner to employee of the month. Yearly
outing is also organized by them. Employees get a 2-3% incentive for every client they bring in.
So, as a startup Beetoqs is doing well in terms of revenue generation. If Beetoqs can follow the
recommendation, then they are expected to develop more in future.

Secondary resources:

Website Link: https://beetoqs.com/

Facebook Link: https://www.facebook.com/beetoqs

Appendix:

Business Card: