Challenge

I was a freelance copywriter and I wanted to build a successful marketing agency.Having gained experience in the Tech PR sector, I knew this to be a profitable and high growth area and one in which I was interested and able to convey complex technical messaging to a business audience in lucid and easily understood form. 

 

Strategic Objective

To be in the PR Week Top 20 agencies, the agency had to bill £1M plus per annum, but I needed to achieve a higher than industry standard profit on this to justify the risk of investment and specialisation.

 

Approach 

I decided to specialise in the Enterprise Software market, as I had contacts and experience in this sector. Using my portfolio as a starting point, I built a list of target clients, all of which were enterprise software vendors and most of which were VC funded and around one year from IPO. These vendors had an existing US client base, but were looking for EMEA “conquest” clients to establish themselves as global businesses. Most had an average order value of around $250K. 

 

I put together a package of services to a value of approximately $250K, comprising a number of branded information products specifically tailored to this market and offered further resources, such as use of a City of London base, in addition to PR, Direct Marketing and Exhibition/Conference services tailored to the market. I also made contact with vendors of complementary products, such as hardware, database and networking, and professional services necessary to provide a total solution to the customer. I then qualified my prospect list and travelled to the USA to pitch my shortlist with a specific offer to accept part of my fees as equity in their business.

 

Business Results

In fact, none of the businesses I approached took up the offer of equity participation. Nor did I win any contracts directly from the US. However, over a period of two years, my agency did pitch for ten contracts and was successful in being hired by the UK offices of three high growth US software vendors I had approached. Within three years, these businesses held successful Public Offerings with a combined value of $180 Million. A combination of annual contracts and project work saw agency billings exceed £1 Million with a healthy profit and my agency joined the PR Week league table of Top Tech agencies.