How Strong is Your Agency?
Hear from a range of speakers on how to understand harness the power of your agency without tripping over avoidable obstacles on the way.
Speaker – James Ashford – Founder of GoProposal by Sage: Spin out, scale and sell a SAAS business
James co-founded and scaled his SAAS business and in 2021, sold to a PLC. Within months of its inception, GoProposal was already a profitable business. Its strong foundations and rapid ARR growth attracted the interest of multiple acquirers. Listen to James’ inspiring story as he explains how together with Paul Barnes, he built a successful SAAS business out of an already successful service and how you can do the same too.
Speaker – Sarah McKenna
Sarah will explain the 4 Proven Steps to Stability and Profit, and how they can be harnessed by agency owners to build strong, robust and successful businesses.
Sarah McKenna is a leader of global agencies, a non-executive director, and an investor. With a focus on transformation, digital products, and innovation, Sarah specializes in turning agencies around or growing them for unparalleled success.
During the global financial crisis, she significantly expanded the Asia Pacific region for FutureBrand, transforming a loss-making Singapore site into a network of six offices generating $80 million in revenues. Leading AJ&Smart Germany, amid the Covid-19 pandemic, she professionalized the firm and achieved its highest commercial success to date.
Based in south Manchester, Sarah currently leads Wayv Hello, partnering with global brands like Peter Attia, Curative, Fed By Blue, L’oreal, Cisco, Gucci, and Audi, to solve their most complex product and innovation challenges and also trains teams on collaboration and innovation practices.
She holds technical qualifications from Wharton, Oxford, and MIT, a BA, an MA, and is a proud mother of three.
Speaker – Marianne Page: CONSISTENT – Trust and Loyalty are built on the foundations of consistency.
Marianne grew up in a business that is trusted by billions, spending close to 3 decades as a senior manager with McDonald’s. The lessons she learned and the experience she gained, have helped her to crack the code for consistency and develop a formula that enables every successful small business owner to deliver the consistent operational excellence that will win the trust and loyalty of both their team and their customers.
Speaker – Paul Barnes – We Are MAP
Financial Confidence for Digital Agencies: Whether you have an appetite for scale or being small and mighty, with a mature business you have options and the freedom to choose. It’s about having faith that what you are doing works. It’s about financial confidence. When you have financial confidence, knowing what decisions to make and actions to take becomes easy. The information stares you in the face and waves a big flag saying “this is what you need to focus on”. You can then progress with confidence and without second guessing yourself as to whether you are working on the right things.
Speaker – Steve Kuncewicz – Glaisyers
Wherever you are in your growth journey, you will at some point need to call your lawyer. We hope it won’t be a painful experience, but make sure of that this session is going to cover legal issues which you’ll need to keep an eye on to ensure that you’re managing risk and enabling growth, including what to look out for in client contracts, how to put the best possible structure in place to fulfil your ambitions and retain your people and what regulatory issues may have an impact on the projects you deliver and your business model more generally.
Speaker – Michael Henderson – RiskBox
Taking control / How to make commercial insurance work for your agency?
Insurance can be a powerful tool, but how can you use it effectively?
The digital landscape continues to evolve rapidly, so agencies face an array of potential risks and obstacles that can threaten their business viability. By understanding the nuances of commercial insurance and its application within their specific operational contexts, agency owners can learn how best to arrange their insurance programme, and crucially, how to harness the very policies they purchase.
Join us as we delve into practical strategies and insights to empower agencies in protecting their ventures and thriving in today’s fluid business environment.
Host – Nicky Unsworth
Nicky works in an advisory capacity with agencies. She was previously CEO of the BJL Group, an independent creative agency with Manchester and London offices.
During her years at the helm she led the evolution, growth and development of the Manchester office, opened a London office and saw the agency through a period of significant change. As a hands-on owner/CEO she worked to acquire and retain an impressive portfolio of clients.
Her journey at BJL saw her being part of an MBO team acquiring BJL from the original founders in 2004, before becoming CEO. In 2019 she led a trade sale to Dentsu stepping down in 2021 once she had completed the successful integration of BJL into the wider Dentsu organisation.
She is a Fellow of the IPA having spent 11 years as a Council member and also held the role of Honorary Secretary; she chaired NABS – the industry charity – in the north for many years; was a member of the Internationalisation and Marketing board for the Manchester Growth Company, and a founding member (and subsequently Chair) of Tribe Global (the international independent agency network), and still supports the industry whenever she can.
She now works with agencies to support growth and leadership development.
Charities
We’re pleased to say that all proceeds raised from this events ticket sales will be going to Charity, specifically Francis House and The Alzheimer’s Society
