Small Spark Theory: a marginal gains approach to new business and marketing

I have met many agencies over the years who have had ideas for spinning out their own products.  The outcomes have been varied. From those who have successfully launched and created additional revenue streams, to those who have continued to scale and ultimately sell their product business. For many though, the constant pull of client projects and the day to day demands of running an agency me...

How much of your agency revenue comes from overseas clients? Did you know that the US is the largest recipient of UK exports, receiving £3.9bn worth of advertising and market research services, – a value that has more than tripled since 2020? In this episode I chat to  Kat Thay , co-founder of  K&C and co-president of the  Austin Advertising Federation . Since moving to Texas in...

Understanding how clients are buying agency services is fundamental to how we shape our new business and marketing strategies and processes. In recent episodes we’ve heard perspectives from procurement expert Tina Fegent and lead generation expert Alex Sibille, so it feels only fitting to add an intermediary point of view into the mix. Dominic Glenn heads up the Brand Services offer at Ingenuity a...

Winning new clients has never been straightforward. But after the upheaval of the last few years, last year in particular we saw an added complication – resource. And of course that scarcity of talent naturally increased salary expectations, meaning that profit margins on new and existing projects were being squeezed even further.  For this episode I speak to Manish Dudharejia , founder...

I feel as though we’ve been skirting around the edges of a beast of a topic for some time on this podcast, namely emergent technology and its impact on agencies. Of course, no single episode is going to unpick the labyrinth of challenges and opportunities for our clients, and in turn the agency community, but as the chat about AI continues to rumble in the daily news cycle, it’s feels like the rig...

In recent episodes, we’ve talked a lot about change and uncertainty, the persistent undercurrents unsettling our new business efforts and impacting our client relationships. So, it seems a perfect time to speak to someone who has an unrivalled perspective of the agency and client dynamic – Tina Fegent . From becoming one of the first marketing buyers in the UK over 25 years ago, Tina has set up an...

When I saw the title of Matt Watkinson’s new book, Mastering Uncertainty , earlier this year I jumped at the chance to interview him on the podcast. Matt runs LA based agency Methodical . His first book, The 10 Principles Behind Great Customer Experiences had already been recommended on here by Nick Phipps back in episode 22 and having subsequently enjoyed his next book, The Grid , I was eager to...

The recent acquisition of new business agency Future Factory by their leading competitor Ingenuity has been headline news in the new biz community. For me it was the perfect opportunity for a long overdue catch up with co-founder Alex Sibille . In this episode we discuss the expanded new business and marketing services offered by this combined new business powerhouse, Alex reflects on how new busi...

Any regular listeners to this podcast will know that I love agencies. I have a deep fascination for the dynamics of what are often small businesses, almost always servicing larger organisations and adapting to the continually shifting sands of markets, consumer behaviour, the economy, competitors – and of course, technology. In this episode I discuss the challenges of maintaining relevance with th...

How do you feel about the year ahead? Confident? Concerned? Uncertain? Wherever you are on this spectrum, one thing we must be, is ready .  I particularly like the work that Steve Parks does at Convivio because he focuses heavily on the macro issues facing clients and prospects and encourages agency leaders to use this insight to plan, adapt and respond as necessary. We discussed this approac...

Whichever way we cut it, 2022 has been A LOT. The last few years have seen so much change; for individuals, businesses and our industry. Many of us are still adapting. Whether we are recalibrating, reinventing, surviving or thriving, we’re doing it all against a backdrop of relentless economic and political turmoil and uncertainty. So for our final episode of the year I wanted to focus on how we c...

It’s been a little while since we had a client perspective on this podcast, and given the current economic wobbles, now feels like an excellent time to remedy this. So I’m delighted to share this conversation with  Gareth Turner . Having enjoyed a stellar marketing career with brands such as Johns Smith’s, Bulmers and Lurpak, Gareth was most recently Head of Marketing at Weetabix and earlier this...

It’s been a while since we talked about new business talent on this podcast. But after a bumpy couple of years, it seems like the right time to shine a spotlight on the superstars in our industry who willingly show up every day to seek out new clients for their agencies. I wrote about the  challenges for new business practitioners  for Mental Health Awareness Week, highlighting the impor...

The theme for this series has always been to explore how we can use a marginal gains thinking to improve agency new business and marketing performance. That said, I’m conscious that in some episodes, when we do a deep dive into a particular element of new business and marketing mix, our reference to marginal gains may seem a little abstract. So with September upon us and in keeping with that ‘back...

There is no doubt these are troubling times. As the economic storm clouds gather, we are all bracing ourselves for some pain in the months ahead as marketing spends come under pressure. But what concerns me most is the timing. For most of this year, I’ve witnessed agencies juggling an influx of projects, finally unlocked after the stranglehold of the pandemic, with the twin challenges of resourcin...

Over recent episodes we’ve been taking a deep dive into some very specific elements of agency marketing and prospecting.  We revisited agency positioning with Roland Gurney at Treacle, really got to grips with thought leadership with Mark Wellings at Grist and in the last episode on relationships , Trenton Moss talked about the prospect communities he created and how they translated int...

After a tough couple of years, I’ve been spotting some really positive signs in agencies over the past six months; clients seem to be spending, delayed projects are being given the green light and new business pipelines are flourishing. But there is no escaping the wider economic picture and we should rightly be bracing ourselves for impact on future marketing spend. And whilst there is much we ca...

Whether your agency has a fast track growth plan or a more modest desire to maintain the status quo, there are innumerable challenges that can derail even the best laid plans. Client insecurity or overexposure, floundering new business pipelines or skills shortages not to mention the wider economic backdrop, can all create pinch-points for agency leaders. At each of these moments critical decision...

Within the ecosystem of agency new business, marketing, client development and the wider sphere of agency growth, there are certain topics which we will undoubtedly revist again and again. So, not for the first time, and certainly not the last, I wanted to talk about agency positioning. And not for the first time, and I hope not the last, I wanted to talk to Roland Gurney . Roland joined us on the...

Thought leadership – in its various forms, is a topic we have covered in a number of episodes over the years. Done well, it can be a game-changer for agency marketing, sparking and re-igniting meaningful prospect and client conversations. However, there are a number common hurdles I tend to encounter when speaking with agency founders which means that great content either never gets made, or worse...

I have a constant fascination with the power of agency marketing. I’m sure it’s my age – having cut my new business teeth in a pre-digital era, but my enthusiasm for the growing array of channels available for anyone to share their message with an audience shows no sign of abating.   So forgive me for revisiting the subject of profile building once again. Last year I dedicated three epis...

So here we are in 2022. I’m not really one for resolutions, but there is something about a new year that makes me want to clear the decks, remove distractions and create a renewed sense of focus. A new notebook and a tidy Dropbox tend to help but I find data the most useful tool. Whether that’s marketing data, new business pipeline analysis or attributing the source of new client wins, good data r...

There has been much written on the subject of agency new business, but I’m not sure there has been a book which has resonated so deeply with agency founders and new business practitioners alike, as the Win Without Pitching Manifesto by Blair Enns. So as we come to the end of another extraordinary year and the final episode of 2021, I wanted to chat with Blair about his reflections on the Manifesto...

In my work with agencies I witness a great deal of discomfort about the new business process. Of course there are brilliant, natural new business professionals out there who thrive on networking and relationship building, but for many, the possibility of rejection looms large and the process of prospecting or, shudder, ‘selling’, feels wholly unnatural. This realisation was the basis for starting...

We’ve talked a lot about leadership on this podcast, and rightly so. Sustainable new business performance starts with a growth mindset and that has to come from the very top of an agency. No matter how many people I speak with on the topic of agency leadership, every conversation brings a fresh perspective. And none more so than this conversation with Steve Parks of Convivio . Earlier this year St...