Friday afternoon in the Social+ studio, the kettle's on for the fourth time, and somebody has foolishly asked "which Friends character are you?" Two hours later we've missed a meeting, drawn a diagram on the whiteboard and nearly fallen out over who gets to be Chandler. For the sake of transparency, and because our client manager says personality builds trust, here is the official roster.
The cast list
- The Chandler: Our copywriter. Deflects every compliment with a joke. Writes headlines that convert and then apologises for them. Could she BE any more talented.
- The Monica: Project manager. Colour-coded Notion boards. Will reorganise your Google Drive without asking. We adore her. We are also slightly afraid.
- The Rachel: Our designer. Started "just doing socials" and now runs the entire brand identity arm. Iconic arc.
- The Joey: Our videographer. Would give you the shirt off his back. Has never once read an email in full.
- The Phoebe: The strategist. Says unhinged things in meetings that turn out to be correct six months later.
- The Ross: Our SEO lead. We love him. He is, however, the most Ross person alive. The man has opinions about schema markup.
Why we are telling you this
Because agencies love to hide behind "the team" like it's a Marvel villain. We'd rather you knew who's actually in the room when your campaign is being built. The best work happens when clients stop emailing info@ and start emailing Sarah, Jamie or Mo directly. Relationships beat retainers every time.
It also quietly makes a point about hiring. You don't want six Chandlers. You don't want six Monicas either (the studio would be immaculate and nothing would ever ship). You want a messy, opinionated, complementary mix of humans who challenge each other. That's how good campaigns get made. That's how bad ideas get killed before they reach your invoice.
Applying the Friends framework to your own team
Go on, do the audit. Who's your Monica? Who's your Joey? If you've got six Rosses, your meetings are long and your output is a PowerPoint. If you've got six Phoebes, your brand is chaotic but memorable. If you've got six Chandlers, nothing gets done but everyone's laughing. The sweet spot is a full house.
This same logic applies to your content. A feed that's all Monica is sterile. A feed that's all Phoebe is unhinged. You need variety in your content mix and a bit of humanity running through all of it.
The Gunther test
Every team has a Gunther. The person who quietly keeps the place running, knows where everything is, and never quite gets the credit. At Social+ that's our ops lead. If you're a business owner, find your Gunther and give them a pay rise today. You can thank us later.
Fancy meeting the cast?
Come and have a cuppa at the studio. We'll do a no-nonsense audit of your marketing and you can decide which Friends character we all are.
Book the auditWhy this matters more than it looks
Honestly, we could have written another thinkpiece about algorithm changes this week. But people buy from people, and people remember personality. If you're curious about how that personality translates into actual results, have a nose at why social media is a great tool for your business. It's the slightly more serious cousin of this post.
The one where Social+ roasted itself on the company blog. Ten points to anyone who spots themselves in the cast list. No points to Ross. Sorry, Ross.
