All about me

An important thing to know about me is how much I dislike writing about myself. I understand the importance of pages like this, but writing them leaves me feeling almost as awkward as I look posing for that picture on this page. I love talking about business, marketing, technology and in fact most things. Just not talking about myself. I am definitely not one of those hyper-charismatic agency people who just networked and found success and thinks everyone should do the same. I built, grew and sold an agency whilst mostly hiding behind spreadsheets and an IDE. 

That agency sale came about after a pivot into publisher support – capitalising on what we saw as growing complexity in an area that we already had some experience in. We’d had limited success in specialising in the past, but had experience to draw on for the publisher pivot. Within 12 months of committing to the change we’d become 100% specialised, were seeing record growth and had become the first company in the UK to be certified by Google as experts in the field.

I am un-ashamedly proud of what we achieved at the agency, but equally so of how we did it. The values we built the business around shone through and shaped how we worked. In a niche renowned for sharp-practice and cut corners we gained a reputation for integrity and diligence, traits that remain core to how I work today.

The reputation, recognition and commercial success we had with the agency led to numerous approaches from interested buyers. Coming out of the pandemic and a period of poor health, I decided to sell my interest in the company to a US start-up in 2021. I stepped away from the business later that year.

Today I use that experience to help other agency owners. I work with a small number of clients, either as a drop-in C-level or as a mentor for agency leaders. I love the opportunity to learn more about other agencies and offer a new perspective on the challenges they face. I bring experience, support, critical thinking, accountability and 25 years of lessons learned (through both successes and failures), wrapped up in a friendly, no-nonsense approach.

Outside of the agency world, I still have a fascination with the web and related technologies and a growing interest in generative AI (and do take on occasional non-agency consulting work in those areas). Away from the keyboard my loves are my family, cat, campervan, music and comedy, but mostly spend my time doing DIY and closing doors that my family have left open. 

I can be found online talking business on LinkedIn and talking rubbish on Twitter.