Building And Selling A Digital Marketing Agency

I used to co-own a marketing agency called HAD Digital in Brighton. I sold my share in 2023 because I far preferred the flexibility of working as a sole freelancer, but here is how it went.

Starting on my own

In 2019 I left a dental marketing agency to go solo. I built my first freelance website and had it ranking at the top of Google inside four months for freelance digital marketing terms in Bournemouth, then took a small PPC budget and started bidding on very specific search terms.

Within three months I had passed the salary I was on at the agency. Five months after that I had more than tripled it.

My first big client was Alliance Insurance Brokers, and my first retainer over £5,000 a month, which on its own was more than my old salary. That got the ball rolling.

Having worked very closely with Harry for over a year now on organic search and website projects, we are extremely happy with the results. We have seen a great increase in organic traffic to the website resulting in higher conversion rates on the website CTAs and increased lead to sale rate. Harry also took charge of the rebuild of the website making it more streamlined, professional and again increasing conversions. We have no hesitation in recommending Harry and his team. Very hard working and very professional.

Oliver B, Dynamic Heaters, Poole

Then COVID

The day after lockdown was announced, about 40% of my clients rang to cancel their direct debits. Within two weeks every one of them had gone.

It was not the work. They had to cut back and wind down because nothing was coming in, and the contractor is always first to go. No hard feelings.

I could not be furloughed and could not claim self employment grants, having no previous tax year, so I needed a plan. I spent that summer building a new website, new proposals, and incorporating the business, having been a sole trader until then.

I picked up a couple of clients in industries still allowed to operate, mostly trades. Plumbers and electricians were still needed, and those clients kept my head above water.

As lockdown eased, my Google rankings and word of mouth brought new clients in. Within six months of restrictions relaxing I was over £100,000 a year. Within twelve months of incorporating, I had hit six figures.

Expanding into HAD

HAD was formed out of necessity, with a freelance website designer called Adam who had managed the design team at the agency I used to work at and had gone freelance in 2019 too. I had passed him so much work that combining forces made sense.

The catch: I did not want to become another marketing agency. I wanted to keep serving agencies and individual businesses the way a freelancer does. So we built the team around three rules.

One point of contact. Whatever the project, clients dealt with one person. Me for digital marketing, Adam for design and development.

Keep costs and prices down. We had to undercut agencies. That suited the agencies, who could mark us up, and it suited businesses, who saved by coming direct.

White label. Account management, proposals, onboarding and everything else, all under the client agency’s brand.

It worked. Agencies reviewed us highly and handed over more and more of their client work. One agency had no team of its own at all and gave us every client they had.

Why I left

I still rate HAD Digital. They are running to this day and the niche is a good one. But I missed freelancing. As it grew I was spending less time making clients money and more time on company finances, teams, expansion and internal marketing projects.

So I sold my share to Adam and went back to working closely with individual clients.

My website online presence had slipped dramatically over the last few months, so I was looking for someone to rescue things and get the site back to a healthy position as quickly as possible. I was recommended to get in touch with Harry to see if he could help. Firstly, he’s a very nice guy, is very good at explaining what he’s doing and why, and most importantly he knows his stuff, which is why, a month or so down the road, I’m seeing great results with where my website is appearing already. It’s a weight off my mind knowing that the site is in safe hands and with Harry’s ongoing work I will continue to see the results I need in order to be able to just concentrate on running the business. I have no hesitation in recommending Harry to anyone who needs help in this complicated world of digital marketing.

Cate J, Driven 24-7