Currently just in ePub and PDF as Kindle format has some fuckery, but I will tinker with formats as I go. Also, the navigation on the ePub file is being a prick. But it’s ready.

Thank you.

I am going to go spew. Remember: this will change as the book rounds out.

EDIT:

Okay, I know I was supposed to only make my Chapter available on  Patreon, but now it’s done I kind of want to share it so that people  know that I can actually write, because I have had writers’ block everywhere else… and  people really love it and I feel greedy paywalling it.

Okay, I am nervous about this, because it is still going to change as I finish the book.

There is no artwork, and it is a work in progress, but I decided to make the first Chapter available to everyone.

But, if you’re interested. If you want more, do consider becoming a Patron for future Chapters.

Do share. 

*nervous puke*

My first live stream was SO bad! Now, I have Patrons and regular viewers and I hit the 1000 subscribers mark which is pretty fucking unreal.

Seriously though, if you’re afraid, look at my progress. I spent 8 months wanting to puke from fear. I still get really anxious when I go to stream, worried that I am going to fuck up.

But, it gets easier. Still have a long way to go, but if I can overcome fear, you can.

I’m flat out with work this week, but I am going to try and write a post for the anniversary. Yes, I am aware I owe you a book Chapter but everything is getting a bit stupid and I have to try and work through it. I am also feeling the weight of things this week – the constant conflict – as someone who is a bit of a shitstirrer but also someone who hates conflict (yes, those things can be true at once), and tries to be a positive force… being put on the ‘lists of the bad people’ is really hurtful, and in the case of this week – actually damn terrifying.

I will try to keep speaking for as long as I am able. I spent too long trying to get a voice and build up the courage to use it. No point backing down now.

This post should tide you over

https://teasmith.com.au/like-and-subscribe-a-shy-old-persons-first-week-on-youtube-and-what-i-learned/

If you’re scared of putting yourself out there… I did. With my hang tooth and no makeup and stutter and shyness. If I did it… you can too.

And maybe one day I might overcome my other fears, like doing standup comedy or sharing music recordings and stuff with you, but lets not go nuts. For now I just want to get better at THIS thing. Because THIS thing is at the core of seeing everything I love being destroyed.

Thank you for your precious life seconds, precious moneys and thank you.

Here’s my old Amstrad story. It was my first upload. The bit you don’t see if the bit where I picked a fight, then screamed at Paul, cried, stormed off and then came back. And that is why to this day he refuses to film me. haha. Turned out to be a good thing because then I had to do it myself with a webcam.

That’s Téa for ya.

Also, man I really wasn’t very well in that video. I’m alright now, thankfully. <3

I’ve been staring at a blinking cursor, on this neglected blog, for about 15 minutes. It’s not the first time it’s happened, and not the first time I have tried to write this story. In fact, it’s been brewing for about 9 months. It’s still brewing, really.

Each time I have tried to write about it, though, it’s the same blinking cursor.

Why am I breaking up with marketing?

Where do I even begin?

Ironically, it starts with that blinking cursor paralysis.

Because I never used to have that problem.

Back in the olden days (known as the 90s and 00s), I was a prolific and talented writer. I’d write a blog post daily, effortlessly. I was funny, candid, and shared stories and snippets and thought experiments when few were. Admittedly, I shared more than I should have (and I was groan-worthily precocious in my twenties). I would write about politics, motherhood, digital technologies, design, music, relationships, business. Basically, whatever I wanted to write about, because I was Téa, a person — not a product.

It’s hard to imagine it, but the internet was once a place where conversations were fun, rather than tedious. Where keeping stats on your blog was lame, and bragging about them to anyone made you a wanker. We built our audiences based on the strength of our ideas and our willingness to collaborate with others — not by our wallets (or access to them). It wasn’t “content”, and we weren’t a commodity. We just… were. We were (mostly) operating in good faith and hanging out with our imaginary friends.

The early days of the internet was the closest thing you could get to a true meritocracy. It was our haven to express ourselves, be who we wanted to be without the constraints of the physical world upon us, write and share our thoughts, and find a sense of belonging and community with like-minded people.

And no, that didn’t mean “people who always agreed”, like the tribes we have today. The flame wars were epic and brutal, but fun… mostly descending into accusations of having no life, suggesting the other person should get one, and then a debate over who had the least “life” (until someone pointed out they were arguing this point on the Mariah Carey fan forum, and rendered the conversation moot).

Then, Facebook happened.

The Like button happened.

Twitter happened.

Then, they monetised everything.

The marketers and recruiters and scammers and VCs and middle managers saw a quick buck and took over our spaces and took a giant shit on everything great about the internet.

If I wanted to survive, I had to say I was in marketing, and shut up, and shut down parts of who I am. I could no longer be multi-faceted and “Téa”. I couldn’t be a social scientist AND a designer AND a writer AND a musician, right? I couldn’t be funny AND credible, right?

To be more than one thing takes longer than 30 seconds to talk about, and why would anyone talk to you if there isn’t a buck in it for them with an elevator pitch? Crazy!

Middle managers, “lifestyle bloggers”, Social Justice Warriors and over-consumers (the bane of everybody else’s existence) took over the internet and appointed themselves as the morality police.

The fact is, I could no longer be a person with opinions if I wanted to succeed in business.

I was no longer Téa.

I was now a product.

And I have been a product since 2011.

And it shows in everything I have (and haven’t) written since.

Think about the time you left a relationship. The other person asks you “why?”, but you struggle to answer, because it is never one thing, but death by a thousand paper cuts.

My procrastination over this post – and that dreaded blinking cursor – feels like that, because I have observed the gradual erosion of my soul and intellect over ten years, it’s hard to explain it without sounding like a laundry list of whining.

The short answer?

I’m bloody miserable. And bored. And everyone else decided what I was, who I should be, how I should package it, and I let that determine my value. The fact is, the thing I signed up for has changed (and not for the better, despite all the buzz about innovation and creativity). It’s all about making 5 men richer, at everyone else’s expense. Marketing is not something that requires intelligence or critical or creative thinking — it now requires assembly.

The thing I once loved — through the underhanded exploitation of data, manipulation of people’s weaknesses and tech companies literal harvesting of our lives for profit — has turned something that used to be fun into something sociopathic, violent, and greedy, and I can’t compete in it anymore without being complicit.

I have to quit marketing because, in 2019, it’s time to pick a side. I choose my soul.

So, in 2019, it’s a weird place to be in, having so much to say and yet, finding myself crippled by the blinking cursor, unable to write a single word of truth without looking over my shoulder.

You only need to look at my blog archives to see the turning point in my writing. Look, in the last few years I have still tried to challenge things in my way, but, all I have been writing about was marketing and design. And I lost a decade of my life.

Because I, too, was writing for the money and the “product”, not for the sake of the idea. Or, more specifically, only writing about the safe things I can not offend someone with, or only offend those who aren’t my customers.

But, marketing has dulled my senses, and I have lost the ability to do my best work by letting insecurity, fear and self-consciousness dominate my thoughts.

Because now, everything is problematic to someone. And if it isn’t problematic, someone has a “well, actually”, or a comment about my face or whatever. The comments sections aren’t what they used to be. Now, negativity and offence and outrage in the comments is the price of admission… how is any of that worth it if it’s not even for work you’re proud of?

Year upon year, I have written less and less, about less and less. Still Téa, of course, but still, very much a broken and shallow version of what I could have been.

And that is, in part, the reason that cursor blinks at me.

That blinking cursor is why I need to get the hell out of marketing and into art, because I have lost a decade of comedy, book writing, podcasting and all the things that make me happy.

Seems I overcame the blinking cursor today.

That’s a start.

Right?

October is ADHD Awareness Month, and with all the talk (platitudes?) about Mental Health in the workplace lately, I feel the need to talk about something that’s bugging me.

There is far too much focus on what I call “neurotypical depression prevention” in corporate-land, with no real conversation about a) how most depression is caused by structural problems and b) how we are supporting different brains that aren’t going to get “better”.

Not just for ADHD, but for other differences such as Dyslexia, Autism, Bipolar Disorder, Schizophrenia, or personality disorders… and designing workplaces that accommodate and celebrate — rather than discriminate and performance-manage — those who are not neurotypical.

I’m pretty good at what I do. Excellent in fact. But, every single full-time job I have ever had has made me painfully, and crushingly depressed within 6 months.

Not because I am not a top performer. Not because I am not intelligent or competent. Not because I struggle with depression (I don’t, really, it is more a secondary/situational thing and usually my gut telling me I need to make a change), but it is because not a single job working for someone else has ever been able to fit in with the way my (very smart and capable but different) brain works.

Because I have ADHD (… and on the spectrum, but that’s more a side note for the purposes of this article. There are overlaps and complexities… but ignore that…).

Yep, that funny “Dory” thing. Oh, look a squirrel… or, that thing that to some, doesn’t even exist despite being one of the most widely (and confirmed as real) disorders in the DSM.

Haha.

Haha amirite?

Yep, it can be funny sometimes, for sure. Watching me try to bake, or crack the shits because my desk has finally gotten so messy I can’t take it anymore and suddenly drop everything to clean it, is funny (Pro tip: if you have ADHD, get a weekly cleaner, even if you have to eat noodles. Worth every cent.), and we laugh a lot at the madness that occurs at the Grith house (we all have ADHD and other “quirks”. Never dull.).

But in the modern world, ADHD is both a gift and a curse. It is also experienced differently for everybody. In my case, it works well, but for some, it is debilitating.

Remember: ADHD is a disability, not a personality trait.

ADHD is always there, in the background, in big and little ways. It is a disability, like any other, that I am medicated for, and manage quite well (I am very lucky to have the ability to surround myself with people who complement/carry me and allow me to focus on my strengths).

ADHD manifests differently with different people, even within the different sub-types. Each person has their unique combination of impulsivity, distraction, emotional regulation problems, forgetfulness (e.g. with Inattentive types, in some it means “off with the fairies”, for others it is not. For me it is impulsivity, lack of patience, running at a million miles a minute and emotional intensity… and often getting crippled by overwhelm when those all happen at once.).

It is not just “shiny haha Dory she put her keys in the freezer”. It’s very annoying and frustrating that I can do amazing intellectual gymnastics, perform amazing feats with my work and yet fail at basic things. It shatters my confidence often… I mean how the hell can I lead anything when I forget to pay my car rego?

ADHD is why I can get up early and give myself loads of time but STILL be late.

ADHD is how I can forget to eat, forget to pee until I am busting (yes this is a thing), rely so heavily on calendars and timers, and why I can be sitting here, writing this article instead of writing a simple thing about what I do, because this is absolutely the MOST IMPORTANT THING RIGHT NOW.

ADHD is why I can easily focus for 8 hours straight on Wikipedia that started with an article about Q-Tips… or accidentally stay up till 3am reading a book I am immersed in… but then struggle to focus on what I am supposed to be doing (today it is a page on our website advertising web consulting services), and have very little control over what I can focus on.

(Thankfully I have turned that into a strength. I work with that rhythm, and when I am procrastinating, I keep a list of things I can go look up… something I have been intending to learn that isn’t Q-Tips on Wikipedia, or write a blog article or something.)

ADHD is why I can’t do a 9–5 job, and have no choice but to run my own show in order to protect my mental health.

Traditional employers (and honestly, some clients) absolutely do not allow for people to work to their own neurological rhythm, or create (or even contribute differently) in ways beyond their JDF, their hours or the awful, awful culture of mediocrity rising and tenure determining value. Hierarchy and a lack of flexibility is incredibly smothering for most people, but add in ADHD, and it is SO much worse — almost always performance managed, or seen as laziness or an “attitude problem”.

Maybe it’s not an attitude problem. Maybe the system is broken.

But, if you learn to work with ADHD, and accommodate it, there are great bits too.

ADHD is why I am excellent at a lot of different things — in a way that nobody (OMG… recruiters) ever believes till they see it in action.

ADHD is why I am able to see and cut through bullshit, call it out, tell the truth, formulate a plan forward. I have an extremely low threshold for boring and pointless tasks, which is why I am able to run leaner and faster projects, without stupid unnecessary meetings or PowerPoints or 50 page documents that nobody reads.

ADHD is why everything I do, I have to care passionately about (or delegate to someone else as we grow the business… because sometimes, boring stuff has to get done!). So, if you get to work with me, you can guarantee that I give a shit.

Because it won’t get done if I am bored with it. My brain will, against my better judgement, check out. Thankfully I work with fantastic people 

ADHD is why I am a polymath and look at things creatively, make connections others don’t, and think in a completely non-linear (but often profound) way.

It’s why I am funny and why I can sight read music, but only play a little bit of 8 instruments.

ADHD is why I fix messes, get excited about big ideas and the bigger picture, and handle chaos better than anyone else, because being (appearing?) calm with a noisy brain is normal for me, and there is nothing that I enjoy more than creating order out of chaos and making others happy (and it’s probably why people tend to come to us to fix their poison projects).

We need to support this, because you are missing out, and we are suffering unnecessarily.

For all the talk about mental health, ADHD is still mostly just a punchline, or a fast track to the corporate naughty corner… or… incredibly depressed and looking to leave.

A lot of us don’t care how you treat us, because we can just create our own gigs… but what about those in your organisation who can’t do that?

Do you think they’re going to be mentally healthy? Do you think they’re going to be engaged? Do you think they’re going to be contributing? Do you think you might have an untapped superstar that you are ignoring? Trust me, I work with them. They’re amazing when you give them a chance.

ADHD remains one of the most heavily stigmatised, and yet most studied (and well established) disorders in the DSM… yet some people STILL insist that it isn’t real and we are just speed heads.

To those people, pfft.

The best and brightest people I know (and look up to) have what I have, and I am completely kicking arse right now. Everyone should be supported to do that.

I care about this. I want to build a business that celebrates people’s differences, and nurtures their talents, and works with their rhythms. Because I know the current way of doing things is broken. Everyone is angry and afraid and fed up… and now that we can go off and make our own Q-Tip Consulting businesses… you don’t need to be worried about how many FTE you can fire this year… because the good people will be leaving you in droves if you don’t start supporting all kinds of diversity.

If you want more information, start with Jess of “How to ADHD”. She’s amazing.

This article originally appeared on LinkedIn in October 2018.

Honestly, that’s not the case. I simply don’t care about awards, because I don’t believe they actually mean anything. I most certainly would never nominate myself or pay to enter them, and even if I did, most of what we do is behind the scenes anyway: audits, fixes, project rescue, consulting, integrations etc — all the unsexy, necessary (and low-profile) stuff.

In other words, we are the people who tend to clean up agencies’ messes.

There’s not exactly an award in the digital marketing industry for “dropped everything to create an emergency landing page and moved a client’s domain to a new server in half a day, because their agency went out of business and everything went dead, and now they are ignoring calls or emails and there is no backup of the $50,000 website they just put live and there’s a media campaign this week”.

or

“Saved the client $1000 a month in ad spend through optimisation”

or

“saved the client $100k in marketing spend without losing a single head count”.

Doesn’t work that way. The thankless work tends to go unrewarded.

It’s very difficult to believe in the credibility of Awards when you’re in our position.

Obviously I won’t name the awards or the agencies, because that isn’t right and I have integrity, but I also want to tell you that awards tell you nothing about the quality of the agency or their work. In fact, I have often found the opposite to be true.

In the last year, I have audited (and fixed) quite a few “award winning” digital agencies’ work for clients who suspected they weren’t getting what they were promised (or paid for), and asked me to take a look.

What I see continues to shock and amaze (and infuriate) me.

Yes, even at the high end. At the lower (under $5k) end of the market you expect compromises. But, bigger clients beware: paying more does not mean you’re getting more. As someone who has always priced fairly and worked with integrity, I find it upsetting to know that we deliver so much more, and work so much harder, for so much less!

There are a lot of digital agencies that are claiming “award winning” status, all while leaving behind a trail of overpriced, terribly designed, broken and slow sites, not even optimised or mobile-friendly, with terrible-or-no strategy, with clients on SEO & PPC monthly fees and not actually doing anything… and an increasing number are charging clients top dollar, only to delegate work to juniors and interns (or off-shore).

• One had charged $20k for what was obviously a $1000 off-shored job. My report got the client their money back.

• One charged hundreds of thousands of dollars for a Drupal multisite that is still broken and doesn’t have even basic blog functionality after 2 years of development.

• One was charging $2k a month for Adwords Management (not spend) and they hadn’t even logged in for 3 months.

• One was charging $5k a month for SEO, without even the most basic of technical tweaks or site updates being done in 2 years (and the client writes their own content!).

• One quoted a simple request as 3 days of development — it was no more than an hour’s work.

• One had stripped out and white-labelled an Open Source CMS, and was selling development of core features back to the client at a premium.

• One had advised a solution for a client knowing full well that the client would need a rebuild in 6 months, even though the client had specified their plans in the beginning.

• One resold a $55 Envato template for $25k, and had configured the back-end so poorly it took us an entire day just to figure out how to make a simple change.

• One had developed the site with all content fields on lockdown, so that the client could not add in any additional text without paying for development work.

• One has been charging a $40k a month management fee. That’s plus production, plus ad spend. And no, the work isn’t good.

All of the above have come from “award winning” agencies in the last 12 months. And no, it is not just the small ones. The big ones are just as bad.

It is really disappointing, and quite disillusioning, to see our industry through my eyes. It’s hard not to be “negative” when this is what you see, day in, day out.

Awards don’t really mean anything other than “we put extra special effort into a key client that had our best work”. It is not an indicator of all their work. Trust me, in my experience, most of the grunt work is handed to juniors and/or off-shored and the average client is subsidising the “award winning” work.

When choosing an agency, make sure that “award-winning” is not your only criteria, and that you don’t just rely on the work that they choose to show you. Push them. Ask who is going to be doing the work. The good ones will be honest with you if they are using a freelancer or off-shore (there is nothing inherently wrong with it as long as it is open and well-managed).

And, ask yourself this question: Are you are a key client (like a major brand or high profile startup)? If not, and you have an inkling that you’re overpaying, you should definitely ask questions. Agencies that are doing the right thing will be straight with you (or open to someone else looking at the project).

Awards are nice. Some of them are credible. I am sure that in many instances they are well-deserved. But, they are not really a marker for anything other than “we nominate for awards”, “we pay to nominate”, or “we put all our best effort into a client that is good for our PR”.

Never assume that Awards = good.

They look shiny, but make sure you dig deeper. Ultimately, what matters is whether you trust them, whether you feel you are getting value for money, and how YOU are treated. Are they open with you about who does the work? Do they take time to explain the effort and cost? Do you have a nagging feeling that something isn’t right?

Trust that.

Of course, if you are a cheapskate or difficult client, this doesn’t apply to you. Your agency is probably not charging you enough (I can tell that too… but that’s for another time…).

Note: like other agencies, audits are not part of a sales strategy for Kintsugi. Yes, we run an agency, because that stuff pays our bills, but this is not why I do these audits. I’m looking to make consulting our focus, and I want to emphasise that if your current agency is doing the right thing (yes, I can tell), I will always advise you to stay put, call a meeting and arm you with info you need to try and resolve it.

Originally published at kintsugi.com.au on January 1, 2019.

You’d be wrong.

I like the logo, the colours are good. The palette is accessible. The website is okay, the UX is very meh. The copy is alright in some places and I hate it in others. I don’t like the blog design. I like our business cards. I am not sure of the tagline.

But here it is. I have had to move on because it works.

We design websites. What?

It is a whole different ball-game trying to implement your own branding and website.

Recently, I spent some time on our own branding. It’s changed a few times. But, I reached a point where I had to just get it done and let it go or it was never going to be done.

So, I speak with personal experience when I say this.

No matter how much you might know about marketing, or branding, or web or whatever, your own emotional investment, as a founder, MD or anyone else with an emotional stake in the business, is a potential problem.

And, you might be unwittingly undermining your own efforts because you aren’t letting people do what you hired them to do. Trust me, I have had to part ways with a few clients over this, so I understand things from both sides.

Success or failure has many moving parts, but clients usually don’t ask this one question:

“Am I really the best person to lead this?”.

A large percentage of projects fail because of the emotional state of the people involved. Even when it is wrapped up in logic and requirements and contracts and checklists… it is never about that. From a Small Business owner who micromanages everything and insists on DIY and editing everything into their own words rather than their customers’, to the owner who puts the IT Guy in charge(that is its own post… oh Lord), to having a project manager or product manager who doesn’t have the authority, skillset, experience or confidence to run the project properly…. projects succeed and fail on anything but logical stuff.

Do you really have your emotions in check?

It is imperative that you are aware of your own bias, and especially be aware of your own role when things aren’t going well. Because, like that guy who has a lot of “crazy” exes, a client who has been “burned” by all their agencies is a red flag for me. Yes, there are some bad agencies, mostly mediocre ones, but if they’re all bad, sorry, but the problem is probably closer to home.

As a business owner, you have to admit that you are never going to be objective about your own brand or your strategy — no matter how knowledgeable you are. That is okay. Nobody makes decisions based on logic anyway, but if you are engaging consultants to advise you, you should be aware that this might cause problems for you. That’s why you should always hire someone else. I am hiring someone else I trust to build on our brand because I have realised I am the wrong person to do it.

As a business owner I know that I have three big trigger points: my reputation, client perception and money. I absolutely make more emotional, less rational decisions when any of those are at risk. I will openly admit that I have frequently stood in the way of the “bigger picture” because I was too scared to risk my reputation (by sacking a bad client), a client’s perception (giving away far too much and not setting boundaries), and about paying my bills (discounting too heavily to get the sale) — frequently to my long term detriment.

This won’t change, because caring about these things is what makes us good. But, it doesn’t mean I don’t have blind spots. We have to be aware of it and factor it in.

Maybe put someone else in charge.

I see a lot of businesses making terrible decisions (and ruining projects) simply because the wrong person is running it, or they’re too emotionally invested in it.

They don’t like the copy because it is written for their audience. They prefer hot pink. Their cousin doesn’t like it. They are self conscious, or afraid of alienating anyone (remember: by pleasing everyone, you please no one). They want to vomit industry jargon all over the place. They want SEO but don’t want to do the necessary changes that help SEO, because they’re married to their buzzword headline. The list goes on.

I struggled with this too. I am still not happy with anything on here. Thankfully, Paul and Yas kick my arse, so we have something up that I can live with, but we all know that it’ll never be right in my eyes. And I am not making an agency’s life hell because of my emotional bullshit.

If you are with a good agency, that does good work for other people, but you feel like they aren’t giving you what you want, are you the problem?

Is your agency trying to give you what you need, but you are too close to be objective?

I have tinkered with my (now our) brand for years and years. I get it. I overcomplicate everything, not just because I have been born with a lawyer-overthinky-brain and have 25 years of Internetting that I want to share, but because I am in MY head. Not the head of those who have no idea who I am. I overcomplicate my own copy, because like every other business owner, I am emotionally attached to it all and want to show everything upfront.

Have you ever gone on a date with someone who vomits their entire childhood and emotional baggage all over you?

Boner-killer, ain’t it.

I have learned that I don’t need to unload everything. With some reflection about how I tend to overcomplicate things, I managed to get over myself, and ended up with the simplest, and yet effective opener imaginable. And to be okay with “done” rather than “perfect” so that over time we can do “better”.

If you’re a client, wherever possible, you need to back off and let the pros handle it. If you DIY it will NEVER be as good as someone objective. If you find yourself micromanaging your agency, step back and ask yourself why. It just so happens that I can help you with this stuff, even if you have an agency. I can go through your current setup or project and tell you if it’s you, them or somewhere in-between. I can help find a way forward in a way that has everyone happy.

But, the first step is admitting that you might not actually know best, that the experts do, and you need to step back.

Originally published at kintsugi.com.au on November 27, 2018.

This is an archived post from before 2019 and may reflect outdated information or opinions. It’s included here for historical context, and future embarrassment, no doubt.

Yes, me. Queen big mouth. heh.

Not because I’m afraid of speaking. Anyone who knows me knows that isn’t true.

It’s because I am supposed to put my story up there, for the scrutiny of strangers, and do it in no more …

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LinkedIn told me that I have been running my digital agency, Kintsugi for a year now, so I thought I might take the opportunity to share some lessons I have learned making the leap from freelancer to “full Agency”.

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“Téa Smith has carved out a career building websites and copywriting under the business name Kintsugi. But she’s never bothered building one for herself.

The Perth woman insists that most people search for her by name. And she’s right there on LinkedIn, she points out.

“People have recommended me and so a new client …

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I don’t generally like to comment on or analyse viral videos, because it often leaves people with the impression that “viral” (I mean truly viral) is something you manufacture, rather than something that is, for most part, fairy dust.

There are, of course, ways to increase your odds, and it is usually a perfect storm of unscripted, relatable pain and ‘ri…

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Why?

Reflect for a second, because it might not be their fault.

You, the client, might have created this.

I am the first to talk about dodgy Agencies who have mastered the art of style over substance. A lot, in fact. In a sales pitch, they’ll love bomb you, buy you dinner and promise you the earth. They’ll say the…

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But I want to talk about a problem in our industry, which is juniors starting digital agencies and exploiting the (apparent) ignorance of some clients. People with no experience opening content management agencies, and bamboozling people with buzzwords and non-strategic “content” over actual strategy.

I am not talking about freelanc…

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Many thousands of years ago, all I wanted to be was a writer. As a baby undergrad in Political Science & Communications, I had aspirations of great journalism, moving political speeches, opinion pieces and documentaries as my legacy. From the day I read Animal Farm when I was 12 years old, I have always been fascinated with the power of rhetoric, persua…

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The word that everyone talks about, and thinks they have, but very few are actually able to put into practice.

Empathy, not to be confused with sympathy, is being able to sit in someone else’s shoes, and feel the way they feel about a certain situation. Empathy is feeling without judgement. Sympathy, on the other hand, is to understand someon…

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The digital marketing industry is not like it once was. In 2010, it was straightforward: you built a website, you invested in some SEO, you posted to Facebook and it all ticked along. You could play it safe and act like a robot and the leads would come in.

It isn’t like that anymore.

You, the b…

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