Most stories start with ups and downs, struggle, and uncertainty. A lot of uncertainty. We'd like to share ODILA's first months and the road to where we stand today.
It all started with trust
ODILA's earliest beginnings took shape at the 12urenloop, the annual relay event where students run laps for twelve hours straight on Sint-Pietersplein in Ghent. We were both crew members of Ghent's 12urenloop, and that's how we met. Mattis was in charge of finance, Tialys of marketing and communications.
After the event, Mattis cautiously shared that he'd been thinking about starting something for a while. He wanted to begin doing Odoo implementations, but was looking for someone with drive to back him up. He casually asked Tialys if she'd be open to helping out.
Tialys responded enthusiastically: she was absolutely in. It quickly became clear that we wanted to build this together, as a team. We started with trust as our foundation. We aligned on the values we wanted to run the business by, and how we saw the collaboration. Clear, open communication from day one.
Getting started
In May, we reached out to Odoo about a partnership. By the end of June, we'd officially signed a partnership agreement. Odoo assigned us a partner manager, and from then on the three of us sat down together regularly.
One of the first important things when starting a business is, of course, the name. In the beginning, we always referred to the company as "the baby", because as any founder will tell you, your business is constantly on your mind. You nurture it, take care of it, and do everything you can to help it grow strong and healthy. While brainstorming names, we thought: what if we just looked up baby names? That's how we found ODILA, on a list of baby names.
"The best of both worlds."
A name? Check. Now we could really get on with shaping ODILA. As we did our market research, we noticed that almost no one offers the combination of Odoo implementation and marketing.
"Why would you implement software without the communication and marketing around it?"
Tialys suggested adding marketing to the story. Most partners focus purely on the software. Most marketing agencies don't have deep knowledge of software. With ODILA, we didn't want to offer two separate services. We bring digitalization and marketing together as one story.
We spent the next three months building out ODILA: what we wanted to stand for, and how we'd concretely help clients. By the end of summer, ODILA had two founders, a fully shaped mission, and a clear vision.
In October, we officially kicked off with our first projects: Vloerwerken Verzelen, Kine Sofie Stichelbout, and Indee. No classic prospecting campaign. Just connections that led us to the work.
Proof of concept
What stood out was that clients were actually more enthusiastic than we'd expected. Not because they happened to come by, but because they understood the value of working with ODILA. Every business's story matters to us, because every company is unique. With ODILA, we want to really immerse ourselves in how the client can grow and how we can guide them through it.
How we really stand apart
ODILA isn't a company that implements Odoo and then throws in some marketing advice. It also isn't a marketing agency that happens to dabble in tech. It's the place where both worlds meet, just like we did at the 12urenloop.
Every new project leaves us genuinely excited and curious about how we can help others move forward. Because that really is our core goal: working alongside you so your business runs more efficiently and effectively, both internally and externally. We want you to be able to focus fully on your passion. Because beyond all the hard work, that's ultimately why we do this: to bring ambition to life and help others move forward, by turning our drive into action.