How Loop Marketing Group Stays One Step Ahead of Ad Payments, Powered By Aspire Cards

The Company: Agency That Helps Drive ROI for Small Business Owners 

Established in 2018 by co-founders Christine Lim and Marxk Madhavan, Loop Marketing Group is an agency that’s passionate about helping small business owners, coaches and consultants to maximise their ROI. Loop Marketing’s solutions effectively nurture their client’s network of contacts via powerful digital marketing strategies and their very own SaaS platform. To date, their portfolio consists of entrepreneurs and small businesses from all walks of life. 

The Challenges: A finance solution that helped them track spends at client and project level

#1 Rigid nature of their traditional corporate card

As an agency that focuses on digital marketing, the team relied on a slew of marketing SaaS tools to launch ad campaigns for their clients. This meant having to deliver paid ads based on preset budgets and multiple subscriptions in various currencies. However, with more clients in their pipeline, the rigid nature of their traditional corporate cards only grew increasingly apparent.

Firstly, they had to make do with sharing one card across teams servicing multiple clients. Not only was this a security concern, it also gave them no visibility of spend on a client/ project level. Access to more cards required them to go through time consuming processes that involved extensive paperwork and additional sign-up fees. Conventional banks also required maintaining a minimum balance in order to get access to additional cards. This did not seem like a viable option for the Loop Marketing team.

#2 No real-time spend insights

In addition, the team found that relying on a traditional corporate card to facilitate ad payments was difficult due to its lack of real-time spend tracking. While one card was sufficient during the agency’s early days, it got much harder to keep track of how much was being spent:

1. Per client
2. Per project
3. Per merchant
4. Per team
   

Expenses were manually reconciled to each client/ team/ project at the end of each month. There was always room for surprises in the month end expense audit. What they wanted was a Spen that provided crucial ad spend insights whenever they needed it, especially during busy periods where preventive tweaks could make or break the goals of the campaign. 

#3 Lack of sophisticated control features

Over time, the Loop marketing team realized that they needed more sophisticated controls in place to ensure that ad and marketing spend does not go awry. This means having spending limits that keep budgets intact. As their volume of clients grew, they also wanted a security feature that only allows for certain merchants to be eligible for payments to avoid wrongfully charged transactions. Basically, they wanted a comprehensive expense management suite.

The Solution: Maximize control & visibility of account level spends with Aspire Expense Management

Faced with the struggles of a booming agency that has fast outgrown the rigid processes of a traditional corporate card, the team knew they needed an upgrade. One that’s designed with modern businesses like Loop Marketing in mind. 

This was where they turned to Aspire to modernize their business finance. As a result, they found a more flexible solution that would not only allow them to issue multiple cards assigned to each client, they could also leverage Aspire’s real-time spend insights, merchant locks and cashback perks. 

Here’s how.

#1 Issue multiple cards, assigned to each client

With the power of Aspire, the team was able to enjoy the flexibility of issuing as many cards as they wanted一without the extra costs or waiting period of a typical corporate card. This means they could now assign an Aspire card to each client or project instantly, making it easier to categorize payments and prepare billing whenever they needed to and at a much faster pace. 

For Loop Marketing Group, this was crucial in making sure that they remain on top of ad payments.

#2 A robust expense management solution

In the past, issuing multiple cards might seem daunting. However, Aspire provides the necessary features that do not compromise on control一no matter how many cards they’re currently using. One of which was Aspire’s spend limit feature. Setting a spend limit on each card according to the client’s budget or needs would mean that they would no longer have to worry about going over budget. 

What they also liked about the Aspire dashboard is the access to real-time spend insights, simply by logging in. They no longer had to wait until the end of the month to view their transaction history. This was a gamechanger as they could now make timely decisions to boost certain client projects without waiting till it was too late. 

#3 Comprehensive control over spending

For added peace of mind, the team also used Aspire’s merchant locks that only allow payments for a specific list of eligible merchants, customizable via Aspire’s all-in-one dashboard. This way, they would never have to face hiccups whereby a payment has been made that was later found to be an unauthorized purchase. By preventing this sort of misuse before it even happens, Aspire was able to help the team save more by keeping them one step ahead at all times.