N2 is not a “bad” company to work for - it’s far from it - but it’s not perfect either, and I want to share my perspective having worked for them through the rapid growth of 2014-2018, as well as the plateau of the past several years. I believe that a vast majority of the people working at this company are well-intentioned, and I hope that my insights will help explain why I am calling this position a stepping stone opportunity.
I probably could have just left this section at “low pay” and moved on, but let’s take a deeper dive:
1. Low pay: It’s no secret among Home Office team members that low pay has always been a point of contention. The below-average salaries are whitewashed with non-monetary benefits like access to a fitness instructor and nutritionist, remote work, wellness stipends, a friendly, people-centric work culture, and more common corporate benefits such as 401k match and health insurance. Recently, sabbaticals have been added for employees who have worked there for longer than 4 years. It’s as if upper level management is trying to do everything they can to avoid directly addressing the most common frustration that their employees bring up.
In eight years working for this company, I never received a merit or cost of living increase. I went almost three years making the exact same salary before requesting a raise in 2021; I received a 3% increase and was told that I was now making the most I could possibly make in my position, regardless of quantitative or qualitative output.
At time of writing, the ad designer salary starts around $40k/year and caps (they might tell you that there’s no cap, but there is) at $50k with the opportunity to make up to $4,500/year in bonuses if you average 40+ ad touches per day with > 95% accuracy. It equates to working approximately 30-40% more than the required workload for a 9-10% bonus.
If you get promoted to lead one of these teams, you can expect your salary to land somewhere within the mid/high $40k to mid $50k range (yes, this means that some of the more tenured designers on your team will probably be making more than you - plus you’ll forfeit your ability to earn bonuses). Many mid-level leaders - even those who have worked for N2 for over a decade - still haven’t cracked through $60k.
A lot of employees (team leaders included) work part-time jobs or freelance in addition to working for N2. One of the company’s “core values” is a work/life balance, so I find it contentious that a significant percentage of the workforce feels the need to seek out supplemental income with added “work” during what is supposed to be their “life” time.
As with previous reviews noting low pay, it is likely that somebody from their PR team will reply to this review and reference their pay analysis software, Payscale. If you look at N2’s profile page on the Payscale website (Google “N2 Publishing Payscale”), the company currently earns a "Fair Pay" rating of 2.4 out of 5 stars for their compensation packages. My understanding from talking with former colleagues who have worked directly with the software is that it is utilized to hone in on the low end of a salary range rather than to truly compensate competitively.
2. Lack of advancement opportunities: The ad team of about 25-30 designers is headed up by three team leads, so there is very little room for career advancement unless you decide to change departments or a leader leaves or transitions into a different role. However, as I previously noted, promotions don’t necessarily garner a significant pay increase; my salary as an ad designer was higher than some of the leaders that I reported to, as well as those who managed teams in other departments.
3. Field and Clients frustrated with ad quality: Something that has become more vocalized in the past few years is complaints from clients and the Field (Area Directors, their teams, and even the company’s President/Co-Owner on an impromptu Zoom call with the design team) is that they are frustrated with the quality and effectiveness of N2-designed ads.
A quick look at N2’s reviews on Google would have previously confirmed that many clients don’t receive a single direct lead during their 12 to 36 month contracts; however, they appear to now be pulling strings on the backend of their Google Business page to make it more difficult to locate this influx of negative reviews.
I believe this issue stems primarily from the company historically seeking out designers based on their abilities to use creative software rather than hiring those with backgrounds in marketing and advertising. This long term oversight has since caught up with them, and the design team has subsequently been pressed to both learn and teach marketing, advertising, and brand management concepts on the fly.
