E005: Joshua Grant

Richard Hill [00:00:07]:
Welcome to episode 5 on Agency Intensive. I'm Richard Hill, your host. Now in this episode, I speak with Joshua Grant, director of digital at Absolute Design. With over 30 years in the game, Absolute Design are well known in their field of Magento and Shopify Dev. But it wasn't always like that. We chat building strong strategic partnerships more Josh and the team look for in potential partners, measuring and improving the productivity of your team, and why Josh and the team decide to focus efforts on running events and how they are securing the right attendees, and managing those difficult clients. Hint. Be preapproval with them.

Richard Hill [00:00:44]:
And so much more in this one. Now do me one favor. Hit the subscribe or follow button wherever you are listening to this podcast. You're always the first to know when a new episode is released. Now let's head over to this fantastic episode. Hi, Josh. How are

Joshua Grant [00:01:00]:
you doing? Good.

Richard Hill [00:01:01]:
Welcome to Agency Intensive, the podcast for agency owners and aspiring 7 figure agencies.

Joshua Grant [00:01:08]:
Well, thank you for having me.

Richard Hill [00:01:09]:
No problem at all. Well, I am looking forward to this. Josh is somebody that we work with quite closely at the at the agency at Ecom 1. So I thought let's get Josh on the podcast, agency intensive, and chat all things growth and building an agency.

Joshua Grant [00:01:24]:
So I

Richard Hill [00:01:25]:
think, best thing to do will be for you to introduce yourself to our listeners and how you got into the world of agencies.

Joshua Grant [00:01:32]:
I'll try and keep it short and sweet. I guess I've sort of grown up with ecom. I remember my brother back in the day sort of end of the dotcom boom. He had quite successful sort of start up agency, had some really big clients. And, I start yeah. I started doing a bit of development with him, help him out around the peripheral because I was quite a bit younger than him. And then I kinda sort of fell into marketing as part of that and, went into the hotel industry. Building building a lot of hotel sites and kind of a a little bit of ecom.

Joshua Grant [00:02:02]:
Did that for a few years. Did the usual traveling and, you know, finding your feet and

Richard Hill [00:02:08]:
Where did you travel? Where did you travel?

Joshua Grant [00:02:10]:
So I traveled I traveled lots over the years, but, so I've done the usual sort of, you know, New Zealand, Southeast Asia. Wow. You know, the backpacker routes.

Richard Hill [00:02:18]:
Yeah. Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:02:19]:
Yeah. My parents dragged me from pillar to post when when I was sort of young teenager. I lived in New Zealand and Australia with them Wow. And went to school went to school over there. But it was it's one of those things, I guess, that probably meant that my career path was kind of a little bit more bumpy, I guess. Wasn't kind of, like, as linear as some people. So ended up, yeah, going into going into marketing for quite a few years for hotels. Met with our wife.

Joshua Grant [00:02:44]:
We went off to New Zealand together. We met in a hotel, came back and and and got a job at an ecom business, looking after their site. So primarily direct to consumer. Did a sort of really good stint there, and actually met the agency that I now work for. Yeah. Yeah. So I did a stint there for about, I think, 6 years, and what's sort of ended up being the ecom manager, multiple sites, so grew there massively. Mhmm.

Joshua Grant [00:03:13]:
The company got acquired from sort of private equity, and it was COVID and everything going on. And a lot of people in the industry kind of had a bit of a change. And, the guys are absolute, I just reached out to them, in my day to day with them Yeah. And said, look. If anything ever comes up, do you do you think about me? And they were like, well, the funny you say that. Oh. So, yeah, I joined joined the guys. So I've been I've been there 3 years now.

Joshua Grant [00:03:36]:
Yeah. Part of the senior team, sort of pivotal in the operations and Yeah. Decision making in the business. So, basically, I've I've known them for about sort of 9, 10 years Mhmm. Which I think is really, you you know, a key in this industry to to sort of trust the people you work with. And I think I I knew what they could do, knew the team really well, and so, you know, agency life. I wanna I wanna have a go and see what it's like. I I have dabbles into agency life with sort of my my brother's business and things.

Joshua Grant [00:04:04]:
So I I kinda knew that the Mhmm. Sort of the the way this just the vibe, I guess. Everyone sort of talks about it, but the agency life's got quite a nice sort of feel to it. And, yeah, I think that was a big draw. So, yeah, I'm I'm I'm loving agency life, and I think we've got some great plans, going forward, sort of directing sort of Absouth into sort of a new a new era, I guess.

Richard Hill [00:04:28]:
Exciting. So I started working at another company as a client for Absolute. Yep. And then fast forward x amount of years, then working there as a director of the business Yep. And so we're headed up operations. And I know I'll that's obviously quite a broad title, but, obviously, we'll we'll get into the different things that you're you're heading up and and working on. And and, obviously, in the time that you've been there 3 years, you know, what would you say has been the sort of the main thing that has led to the success that Absolute is having now?

Joshua Grant [00:04:55]:
Yeah. So I think over the years, I think it's it's relevant now as well. The success of Absolute has been when it's sort of focused on its you know, what it's good at. And, a few years ago, it was, you know, becoming a part of Adobe, for example. Yeah. Was a massive thing. A lot of agencies went through that same journey. All of a sudden, you know, accelerated the amount of work going through the door.

Joshua Grant [00:05:17]:
Yeah. And I think one of the sort of big key successes that we is is in our roots is we're really good at complex back end development. Mhmm. And we we try not to be a full service agency. We try to, be good at kind of our lane, I guess.

Richard Hill [00:05:32]:
Yep.

Joshua Grant [00:05:33]:
And we've invested a lot of time and a lot of process and a lot of, you know, finding the right people for that. And off the back of that, I think that steered us into a good position for where we are now. A lot of agencies are kind of pulling back from Magento, you know, the they'll be commerce, And we're waiting quite a lot of support counts, so our support team is growing. Yeah. Support is becoming bigger and bigger part of business. It's about 40% of our turnover now. Support. Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:06:00]:
Yeah. Which is massive. I think we've gradually sort of transitioned some of those accounts into probably Shopify and other platforms that probably suit them a bit better. Yeah. And I think that's that was a key a sort of key decision. And I think another key decision that was made was to actually not back one horse. And, I think a lot of agencies have had to do that and have have obviously had to pivot. Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:06:21]:
And we we sort of invested in Shopify quite a few years ago. I had I had a good a decent team and, sort of recruited well. And that's put us in a good position to start, but we're we're building some big sites on Shopify now. Yeah. And, you know, some of the bigger agencies have acquired maybe other agencies to kinda help that pattern. But I think we're yeah. We were lucky that we'd seen that early. Mhmm.

Joshua Grant [00:06:44]:
So, yeah, we're we're kind of back at 2 holes at the moment, I guess.

Richard Hill [00:06:47]:
So as as in a platform. Yeah. Yeah. I think it's an absolute, like, vital and critical point, and we talk about it a lot. But I think for the people that are listening Yeah. And then maybe doing a bit of this and a bit of that and not quite sure and taking what they what they can take and, you know, and it's I think it's an absolute key decision in any agency to sort of make that right with this and this. Well, you know, it doesn't you don't have to be you're completely so narrow, like you say, you know, but you've gone narrow in that or narrower that you're ecom. Yep.

Richard Hill [00:07:19]:
And then within ecom, there are certain platforms. So, okay, we wanna be known for this, but it doesn't mean you can't be known for this and this platform as well. You know? And it's similar. You know, we think about our agency. Yeah. We're known for, you know, we're known for do working with Shopify, store, owners, marketers, but, you know, Shopify makes up, let's say, 34% of the market. You know, it's a big part of the market, but Adobe and Magento is obviously also big part of the market. Big colors is also a big part of the market.

Richard Hill [00:07:48]:
Then you got the the newer brands or the you know, depending on where you listen to this podcast, the different platforms. So the lesser known maybe in Europe, you know, the the shop lines, the shop wears, the, you know, different platforms that are coming through. It doesn't mean you can't sort of be involved with a few of them, but you're saying, right, we are platform expert. We're we you know, you know Yep. Adobe, Magento, Shopify, and others others, I'm sure. But, obviously, sitting in front of a well, one marketing your business, been able to say, right, we do this and this and this. And you speak to that prospect or that prospect's looking at you you guys from afar, never spoken to you within the past. Well, these guys, they focus on this.

Richard Hill [00:08:27]:
They don't do SEO. They don't do email. They don't do this. That's great. You know? I think that's a key thing, but I think a lot of agencies struggle in the early days and understandably so in one in one respect because they need to pay the bills. You know? And they're like, oh, we've just won this. What is it? SEO. We don't really do SEO, but yeah.

Richard Hill [00:08:45]:
We do now sort of thing. But it's easy to say stick stick to one thing or, you know, one focus. But, well, how what would you say to those guys that are maybe tussling with trying to make that decision or make a hard stop and say, no. We're not gonna take that. We're just gonna take this. What would you say to those guys?

Joshua Grant [00:09:02]:
I think as an agency, we because because we've been around, like, 30 years, and we started off as a Yeah. A traditional branding sort of, design for print agency. And and and don't get me wrong, we still have our studio and we still have our roots. Yeah. We we did the typical path of going into sort of brochure sites and the WordPress thing. You know, ecom obviously blew up, and then we transitioned into going, hang on a minute. What what's the the best platform to back at that particular time? Yeah. And, you know, as an agency, we've been doing Magento for a long time.

Joshua Grant [00:09:26]:
And Yeah. And I I cut a lot of my, you know, teeth on on on that platform, Magento 1, Magento 2.

Richard Hill [00:09:31]:
Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:09:32]:
And I think it it is difficult. Like, we found it a battle where we tried to do too many things, and, actually, understanding the intrinsic, you know, nature of these platforms

Richard Hill [00:09:43]:
Really deep. Really lead

Joshua Grant [00:09:44]:
to sort of embed into it. I mean, the SaaS based stuff like Shopify is probably not not quite as bad, but, historically, with the, you know, the the beast that that here's Magento. A lot of people really struggle with that platform. Yeah. It's been hard to to sort of build, maintain I

Richard Hill [00:09:58]:
get a cold sweat every time I hear the word Magento. We get flashbacks from 5, 6 years ago when we when we were that agency, you know, maybe 7 years ago. Right? You know, a bit too spread. Now we're very laser focused, and the difference, you know, is night and day, really, comparing us to sort of 6, 7 years ago. But, yeah, Magento had a attack. We put it be polite as possible, but, you know, obviously, a lot of challenges, you know, sales were where it's, you know, version 1, version 2 deadlines, and then a lot of panic in the industry, should we say. And then things not really doing what they should do.

Joshua Grant [00:10:29]:
You know? And, the upgrades have been hard. Yeah. And then what you know, 12 months, a bit longer ago, yeah, the whole industry went through a horrible pain point with upgrades. And, you know, don't get me wrong trying to keep clients when, you know, you're saying to them, look, you've gotta spend a lot of money because they'll be in in their wisdom of. And, yeah, we understand why because they're trying to sort of feature Yep. The sort of base platform, I guess.

Richard Hill [00:10:49]:
But Yep.

Joshua Grant [00:10:50]:
It is yeah. It's it's not for everyone. And I think we we've built a team that have been with AgenT for a long time Yeah. To go through those battles and have those frank conversations with clients. And we do try and move people off if it's not the right fit for them. So Yeah. Now there are options for smaller companies. Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:11:06]:
We, you know, we say to them, look. You know, you've had a project cycle a long time. It's costing you a lot. Let's do an analysis on your platform here. Yeah. Let's have a look to see if there's something better for you. And and we we find that being proactive and, doing that for clients really sort of builds that retention. Yep.

Joshua Grant [00:11:22]:
And it it it it's difficult. You never get it perfect, but you, you know, you just try and do the best you can for your clients, I guess.

Richard Hill [00:11:29]:
So I think that, yeah, that's really gonna resonate with the listeners. You know? You sort of were saying, you know, we start out, and we maybe build websites for everybody. You know, that's maybe you know, go back however many years. And Yep. You know, as an agency, you're trying to get that first client, 5th client, 10 client. We broke a 100 k. Now we're doing half a mil. We're doing a we're trying to hit the mil a year, and we're trying to hit a mil reoccurring or and all these sort of, targets, plateaus that we hit, but really tidying up our you know, the avatar of the brand is obviously focusing on Magento, Adobe, and Shopify for as as an example.

Richard Hill [00:12:03]:
Obviously, that's what you what you guys have done. But how has that made sort of recruiting? Has it made things easier for you because you're very focused?

Joshua Grant [00:12:12]:
I I think it has there's pros and cons to that, I guess. Yeah. One of one of the big things that, we did from the outset was to make sure that all our developers are UK based. So the the recruiting pool is obviously a lot stricter in that sense.

Richard Hill [00:12:27]:
Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:12:28]:
I think COVID and, obviously, the way that the industry's moved and, you know, business in in general has meant that we've we've allowed people to be slightly further away from the office. But we we've we've kept our core, and I think it has been difficult when the platform was kind of the go to. Yeah. Everyone was fighting for the, you know, the the real good candidates.

Richard Hill [00:12:46]:
Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:12:47]:
I think it's become a little bit easier with the downturn in the economy with, you know, last 12 months, 2 years, we've recruited people that are probably running have been running their own, like, freelance small agencies kind of thing. Yeah. Realized the work's kinda getting a bit more tricky and wanted a bit more stability. Yeah. But they've got great skill sets. So Yeah. We find we found that as yeah. There's been a little bit

Richard Hill [00:13:06]:
Are you do you actively look for those sort of people maybe as well? Like, sort of the guys that are maybe working for themselves that, you you know, they maybe got one team member, 2 team members, but you think, oh, maybe they'll wanna consolidate that and have a bit more of a security as you put it.

Joshua Grant [00:13:19]:
Yeah. I I don't think we've actually targeted per se. Mhmm. I think they sort they're wrong. We're kind of always on the lookout for decent Magento developers as an example. Yeah. So they they naturally kind of migrate to us anyway. If we're in a pickle and, you know, someone's left, then, you know, recruiters sometimes because they they they know where the good guys are and, you know, we all have to use them.

Joshua Grant [00:13:41]:
But, yeah, I think Shopify, finding someone we we kind of got a bit of a uniform with our with our head shop adviser. He'd he'd been there in the industry for a long time, but he I think he's I think he's been with Econ for, like, 20 years. Like, he's been he's been around a long time. Yeah. So has won. He he's a he's a veteran. And I think he'd he he'd got fed up with kind of, the potential platforms in the agency that he used to work at and kind of pivoted anyway to Shopify. Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:14:07]:
But just having that, sort of knowledge really steers the rest of the team. Yeah.

Richard Hill [00:14:11]:
So you can

Joshua Grant [00:14:11]:
have someone come in that's maybe not as experienced. But because we've got that seniority and we've got our processes in place, you can as long as they fit culturally, you can soon, bring the rest, with it. So I think we're quite lucky in that sense. And we're quite lucky on the Magento side as well that we've got couple of key people that have been around a long time understand it so well that Yeah. As long as people come in, they're willing to sort of learn and grow, we can support that. So

Richard Hill [00:14:37]:
So it sounds like you're attracting, you know, the the talent. You know, obviously, I think that a lot of that will also come from the value of 30 years old, which is quite a a unicorn in in this game, you know, because there wasn't an Internet really 30 ish years ago. So I don't know what you were doing 30 years ago, but But I'm

Joshua Grant [00:14:52]:
sure I I remember, talking the team about it that they were, it was back in the days before, like, computers really existed. They're like graphic design. So they were actually, like, cutting things out and sticking it on

Richard Hill [00:15:02]:
the frame. Design type. Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:15:04]:
It was before, like, the photoshops and the illustrators of yeah. And there's we've got old, Macs in the office that are like, you know, the green screen style ones. Yeah. Yeah. So it's yeah. I mean, it is it's unique, I think, that they've managed to the the business has managed to survive a lot in a lot of stuff.

Richard Hill [00:15:20]:
Yeah. Sort of gone through those, how do we call it, those transitions from, yeah, from yeah. There's there's, oh, there's this thing called dial up. And now we're on the Internet. Now we've got a website that looks like a Excel sheet, and now we've got a graphic on the Internet. Wow. And now, obviously, 20 years later. So, obviously, having the benefit of 30 years experience or or been established, you know, we've had a few different agencies on, you know, that, you know, maybe doing x y zediting from a standing start in 2 or 3 years.

Richard Hill [00:15:48]:
But, obviously, if you've been established for quite some time, you know, there there's a benefit of that, you know, reputation, network, you know, built you know, you're known. You know, it's probably work you did 20 years ago from a guy that's recommended you 50 times, you know, since and got on to do all different things. But just staying with the staff and the and the team piece, so, obviously, you're well known in the industry, you know, well done well known as a specialist in, you know, the these these areas. So you're attracting the staff potentially and attracting the team. Is there anything specific you do, absolute to retain your team and to sort of look after the team and build the culture within the business?

Joshua Grant [00:16:24]:
I think that's the culture is the key one. I think that's the reason why we've kept, a lot of staff. We sort of have Ross who who is our director of design, he's been I think he's been with us for 14, 15 years. And I think, you know, giving people that autonomy and trusting them to do their jobs

Richard Hill [00:16:38]:
Yep.

Joshua Grant [00:16:40]:
As think around me, it has its downsides sometimes and sometimes bites you, but I think people respect that. Yeah. And just having that culture and and trying to keep that sort of team, camaraderie. Yeah. Don't get wrong. A lot of agencies are really struggled with that with the sort of new world of working.

Richard Hill [00:16:55]:
Mhmm.

Joshua Grant [00:16:55]:
And we do the usual things, you know, try and get the team out, and try and be really flexible. We invite people's out. You know? They've got to work, but they've also got to have a a sort of social life, and they've got to Yeah. Have a life outside of work. So we try and keep a good balance with that as well and understand that people have, you know, got to go to appointments. They've got to look after their kids, whatever it might be. And I think if you make it nice like that, it's hard for people to go, oh, I really really don't like it here.

Richard Hill [00:17:23]:
Yeah. You can't if you can't be much more flexible than you are, it's like, well, so, well, that's a great place to work, isn't it? Like, the fact that I could do what I want within re and, obviously, that's the extreme. Yeah. But the work's gotta get done. Yeah. I mean, I was talking to somebody, earlier, actually, and so they hang up. A friend of theirs has gone to a new position, and they have to be in the office 5 days a week. And, you know, it's like a trust thing.

Richard Hill [00:17:46]:
It's like, oh, that sounds quite a tricky place to work, to be fair.

Joshua Grant [00:17:50]:
Yeah. Really is. And I think we transitioned really early to being basically fully remote. Yeah. Since I've I've been there, I've kind of, you know, with the team of of we we try and get everyone in once a month to the office to to build a bit of glue, and we you have a lot of, you know, regular calls between the team and stuff like that. But we I think people have enjoyed not having that horrible commute, and I think you risk losing talent if you've not got some flexibility. I think agencies that allow a bit of a hybrid approach, I think that's a good a good place to be as well.

Richard Hill [00:18:21]:
Yeah. Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:18:22]:
But I think just a hard stop is, you know, don't get wrong. Even last week, I had one of the teams saying, I've got a friend. His agency that he's working at have basically just changed the rules, and they've all got come back to the office. And now he's looking for someone else. You know? It's Yeah. You will lose talent, I think Yeah. At the moment if you can't be a little bit flexible.

Richard Hill [00:18:42]:
Yeah. Completely. Completely. It's an interesting one. There's this sort of so you'll know what so you have a location you can go to, but but Yeah. Have to be remote first. Yes. And then you have certain days you have to be or you're meant to be in or

Joshua Grant [00:18:56]:
how Yeah. So so we're really lucky in as much as we've got, proper bricks and mortar office.

Richard Hill [00:19:01]:
Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:19:01]:
Company owns it, has owned it for a long time, outright. And, you know, it's a massive space and track back a few years, it was a high, you know, high buzzing Yeah. All the rest of it. And and they were on people there there are people in the office all the time, but we don't enforce everyone that is practically able to come into the office Yeah. More than once a month. We have got some developers that are living on the south, yeah, south coast, for example. We don't expect them to travel in. Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:19:29]:
There's not really much point, in doing so. But we do try to get to meet all the team, get them all together, etcetera.

Richard Hill [00:19:35]:
You do that, well, quarterly sort of social type

Joshua Grant [00:19:38]:
thing or Yeah. So we'll we'll generally do the it's quite quite a thing in this industry, I guess, but we'll go out for a meal Yeah. Some sort of activity. Yeah. I think people really like that. Yeah. Yeah. Everyone jumps on it.

Richard Hill [00:19:49]:
Awesome. And the best, day out you think you've had or after or or event you've done

Joshua Grant [00:19:52]:
for the team? We we did, we've done ax throwing, which was quite

Richard Hill [00:19:56]:
Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:19:57]:
Because we did go out for a few drinks before, which was probably not super sensible. Intense.

Richard Hill [00:20:02]:
Yeah. That's, yeah. If I switch it the other way around

Joshua Grant [00:20:04]:
Nothing, Josh. But but that was good. And, I think we we organized a loved one. We're doing, like, a mini golf type thing. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, we're just trying to do something a bit lighthearted and fun. And, you know, don't get me wrong.

Joshua Grant [00:20:15]:
Me, myself included, I've got, young family and actually just getting out socially, whether it's for work or not, is just a nice

Richard Hill [00:20:23]:
Yeah. Enough room. Yeah. Yeah. Sort of memories of us doing acts pro, and actually, it was quite quite amusing to say the least. You know? I'm like, watching the bounce outs. I feel that was a

Joshua Grant [00:20:36]:
there's slight danger to it. Kind of adds to the camaraderie, I think.

Richard Hill [00:20:39]:
But I do remember they don't say alcohol at the one I went to. Well, they did because I think it's something Yeah. Because I think it is like a legal thing, isn't it? Yes. I've, like, 5 beers, and then let's do. It's not gonna last pretty long. So, obviously, 30 years in business, long, long time, you know, probably, you know, just probably one of the oldest, you know, companies in the industry. You know, so, you know, fantastic. But driving new business, obviously, you've got the benefit of that sort of historical, you know, 30 years pedigree, a lot of recommendations, I assume.

Richard Hill [00:21:14]:
But But I know you do a lot with sort of your partner network and something that you you spend a lot of your day to day. Yep. You know? When you're well, I thought I guess a 2 pronged question. How in part how important is your partner network and your partners to your business? And how do you then go about sort of selecting and sort of deciding which partners to work with?

Joshua Grant [00:21:37]:
I think it's a it's a it's a great question because it's a battle that we all have, I guess. I think I look at, you know, some some of our partners are probably clients in as much as they just give us work. We as they, you know, they're long standing. They they really appreciate as a team, and there's some personal outside of work relationships that we've built because of, you know, the long long relationships that that they've had. And I think we it's it's a tricky one. We've had, partners that I've sort of known in the industry before I even came to Absolute that I've kind of kept in touch with Yeah. And got yeah. You get on really well and peep yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:22:08]:
Exactly. It's like people in fact, David David is one of the director of directors always says people buy people, and it's true. Yeah.

Richard Hill [00:22:14]:
If

Joshua Grant [00:22:15]:
you if you build, sort of a a a network and you already get on and to kinda that's why we wanna come into the office so that you you enjoy the, you know, the time you spend with partners and colleagues and, getting to do some really fun fun things together. And I think off the back of that, we've had some great client wins Yeah. In both directions. Like, we trust some of our partners explicitly so that you were like, look, these are the guys I we know they're gonna do the right thing for you. And that, you know, we we don't wanna risk a big account giving us the wrong person. So one of the key things that we always look for in a in a partner is they've got to add value. No doubt about it. Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:22:52]:
And I think a lot of partnerships from other agencies have probably sold partnership sort of referrals and things for the wrong reasons. But we are always like, right. Do they add value to our client, and are the team the right fit? Yeah. Are they pushy? Are they gonna gel with kind of the clients that we've got, etcetera? Because there are partners out there, that I think are probably a bit their sales teams are a bit aggressive and all the rest of it. You know? And we we just avoid that. Yeah. And the partners is more recently with our, like, payment partner. Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:23:25]:
In fact, they kindly sponsored the event. And we just sort of gel with our team. Get on really well with them. Could drop them a line anytime, and they'll help out. Yeah. And I think that has been really tricky to find in the part part of space, especially. You know, if if there's a tech problem or there's something I need to just escalate because I need to get it done, I I know that I can trust them. Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:23:46]:
And off the back of that, we've, you know, we've we've done some great work together. But finding the right ones is really hard. There's so many, isn't there?

Richard Hill [00:23:54]:
I mean, you go I mean, I think, you know, which is which is good. You know, you go to, you know, the the the ecommerce space particularly, you know, is is seems to be really good at the moment in terms of events. There's a lot of key people driving it. Well, a lot of people driving events and, you know, you could probably go to an event every other day, I think, now in in the UK for sure. You know, and it's something I know we're both sort of investing in a lot, you know, and to drive our businesses. And I know a lot of other people that we know in the in the sort of our circles, I guess, and similar circles are doing similar. So it's obviously choosing the events to meet the people. But then when you meet the people, the the potential partners, I think what you said there, you know, some of them are obviously quite sales y, which I think is a complete turn off, personally.

Richard Hill [00:24:36]:
It's like you know, there's a chat we spoke to called Ari, you know, which is, you know, a great guy, but he he he is a big, opponent of the win without pitching sort of methodology. Yep. That's very much how we run our business. We don't sort of sell, but, of course, we sell. You know, we have to sell as we don't we're not here. But it's, you know, leading with value, be great people, help them if we can help people, you know, and then it's like, well, actually, these guys might be quite nice to deal with maybe. You know? And it's, right, buy my shit. Buy my shit.

Richard Hill [00:25:05]:
It's like, hang on a minute. Woah. Woah. Woah. And you see it. You know, I understand some people are you know, they might be targeted and, you know, driven commercially because of bonuses and things like that, but it's complete turn off, isn't it? I think so many newer agency owners sort of get that wrong or, you know, they may be not doing it for a while, but it's not because they're not probably able to do it the other way. Just, maybe a little bit more, how can we put it, a little bit more desperate maybe to Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:25:33]:
I think there's that there's that element that, some partners have incentivized referrals quite aggressively as well. And I don't think that brings out necessarily the right, sort of mentality Yeah. For some people to sell. And it's one of the reasons why we've kind of lost out in the Adobe Commerce space probably is we haven't aggressively sold Adobe Commerce to the product as as much as we probably could of them.

Richard Hill [00:25:57]:
Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:25:58]:
But we've kind of weighed up our client needs probably a bit too Yeah. Well, not too much, but I think we just we just care. And I think we've been up against some really big agencies in the last couple of years, and we won accounts because they've liked us as a team. They've liked that we're not too big.

Richard Hill [00:26:14]:
Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:26:14]:
They can still talk to the senior team Yeah. On a day to day basis if they need to. And they like us and kind of who we are as as as individuals. Yeah. And I think that's a big one. I think some of the big agencies, they almost become a little bit too corporate and a bit too Escaped. Detached. Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:26:30]:
Yeah. And and, you know, some of some of even big brands kind of are like, we're not sure that's gonna work day to day Yeah. Because they wanna be able to just you know, if they need to pick up the phone and talk to you, they wanna be able to just get through to someone soon if they need to. Mhmm. They were wrong. It doesn't happen that often, but they know they got that option.

Richard Hill [00:26:48]:
I think that, yeah, that sort of size of agency. Obviously, we're on a age agency intensive about scaling. Yeah. You know? And we'd we'd, you know, we'd we'd talked in in the past few episodes, you know, the different plateaus. But, you know, head count and size of agency, you know, we're a very similar agency size, 20, 25, depending on, you know, 25. I think we're at 25 with our sort of, handful of contractors that are full time as well. And I think you're similar Yeah. Similar head headcount and and and team size.

Richard Hill [00:27:19]:
And it's like you say, certain certain companies are looking for a certain sort of almost like nothing a 100 person agency. Almost has got a preconceived feel that, yes, it's gonna maybe lose that personal touch. It doesn't always, obviously. But having a certain size where, you know, you've got you haven't just got one really good developer. You know, you've got half a dozen. You've got 3 or 4 ridiculous tech guys that can do x y zed. You got an insane 4, 5, 6 customer service, the tickets that are coming and fro. You got a really, experienced senior leadership team.

Richard Hill [00:28:00]:
You know, there's something to be said, I think, for that sort of whether that's 20 30 sort of headcount. You know? And I think, you know, we we I think we win or we're we're very similar sized businesses, don't we? And for that reason where, you know, we win, you know, some very big, I would say, clients that we know that they're gonna go off and have a look at some of these bigger agencies, but I think they like our team. You know? And they they actually think, actually, yeah, those guys, they really know what they're doing, and they they actually really give a damn and they really care. And all the different departments are very well connected rather than maybe siloed over here, and these guys don't speak to these guys. And we're trying to keep that sort of size. I think it's a sort of a a decision that a lot of agency owners have to decide, you know, what right. We've got to 10. Right.

Richard Hill [00:28:47]:
We're gonna get to 20. Then we're gonna get to 30. Then we're gonna get to 50. Woah. Woah. Yeah. As an agency owner, what would you say to those guys that are, you know, looking at sort of the the headcount and where to where to keep it? What would you say?

Joshua Grant [00:29:01]:
I think I think that's an interesting one because I think some people want to grow it to a certain size because they want to do a particular thing. So it might be an agency owner that wants to grow it big enough that they can then silo themselves off to go and do Yeah. Whatever they want, you know, grow grow the business and and do nothing else. I actually really enjoy being involved with clients. And, you know, some of the senior some of the really big, projects that we've got, I'm actually I'm involved with. And I like to be involved in, like, the strategy meetings and all that side of it because I really enjoy adding value or hopefully adding value to clients. And I I do I'm probably sort of a 5050 introvert extra, but I actually do enjoy spending time

Richard Hill [00:29:38]:
Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:29:39]:
Talking about the subjects that I'm knowledgeable. Yeah. And I sort of get a lot of value out of them seeing those conversations then progressing to something, you know, great for the for the for the customers. And I think if you get too big, you don't probably have the same capacity to do that because you gotta be probably more distracted Yeah. Trying to manage a much bigger agency. But HR becomes a massive thing, does it, when you've got a headcount like that? HR is a massive thing anyway, because there's always something going on. And I think, you know, that that's a a a decision you've gotta make about the lifestyle. I think you probably want

Richard Hill [00:30:11]:
Yeah. As the as the owner or Yeah. Shareholder, etcetera. Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:30:15]:
So

Richard Hill [00:30:16]:
Yeah. Are you, do you wanna take a bit of a sit sit sit sit back, or do you wanna keep going? You know? And that's yeah. Lots of so jumping back to events for a second then. Obviously, I know we've recently, you know, a few weeks ago, did a did an event, and we've got another event coming up. So I think the agency owners that are listing now thinking about maybe launching or doing their own events or working with partners, you know, what makes up a successful event for you?

Joshua Grant [00:30:44]:
I think a successful event for me is is sort of building that community. Yeah. I think the reason why we sort of partnered with you guys to do one in this particular area, and it no doubt it'll expand, is because I don't think you necessarily understand the skills and the amazing sort of agencies that are on your doorstep. And I think building a network with those people gives you sometimes an outlet to go, hang on a minute. I bought this client. They come and come to me. And, actually, they they need this really niche thing. We've got no idea how to do it.

Joshua Grant [00:31:10]:
But, actually, I do know the guys over here.

Richard Hill [00:31:12]:
Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:31:12]:
And I think I think that's really nice because you're adding value back. And, also, I think, you know, most of the people in our industry, if you have got a really sort of tricky decision to make or you're not quite sure strategically on something, a lot of these people, you could reach out to them and go, can't can we go for coffee and have a little bit of a chat?

Richard Hill [00:31:28]:
Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:31:28]:
And, actually, you can benefit from that. And I think that that lunch event we did, there's some really frank and honest conversations Yeah. With some really, you know, great minds that have been in agency world for a long time. Yeah. And I think you'd be silly not to want to try and absorb that knowledge. Yeah. And you and you can absorb it from so many different channels. But I think, actually, being sat around the table and actually being able to converse with all of these people, you you're almost accelerating your learning, I think.

Richard Hill [00:31:55]:
Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:31:56]:
And I I've been to quite a few. And, you know, some of them have been run by some really big names in the industry, and I've always got great value from it. And I've always made a few connections, had a few chats, bumped into them again. And, you know, we've done some work together. And I think, you know, that's that's the nice part that you guys have a bit of a spin off. But, the primary thing is kinda just getting to know everyone that's around you, and learning from them, really.

Richard Hill [00:32:19]:
Yeah. I think it's quite it's a great industry we are in where I think some industries, they're they're sort of very isolated, and they want to speak to, you know, speak to competitors or but, obviously, it's a huge our industry huge, you know, you you specialize in what you specialize in, we specialize in. But there's a lot of crossover in terms of, ultimately, we're working with people that found things online. You know? And then that that then you can bring in another sort of half a dozen, you know, tech partners, another half a dozen skills that neither of us have in our businesses that then next thing you know, there's, like, maybe 15 people that are core to the success of scaling that ecom store. So if you're listening now and you're, you know, you're building websites for solicitors or whatever it may be, you know, then knowing that industry and having partners in that industry, I think, is so key. You know? So go into events, firstly, in that industry, but then, obviously, looking at creating your own events or working with partners like we do to to run whether that's, you know, getting 6 people in our own, it can be. You know, obviously, scaling that saying that we've got something coming up with a couple of 100 people sort of after the summer, here in the UK. But it it doesn't start there.

Richard Hill [00:33:29]:
You know, you start with, you know, whether that's, you know, half a dozen dozen people sit around a boardroom like this, you know, and whether you rent rent somewhere or rent a a nice space for a lunch or a dinner. But for the guys that are listening, I'm thinking, do you know I really would like to start running events or, you know, a a private dining experience? Sounds so much nicer.

Joshua Grant [00:33:50]:
Yep.

Richard Hill [00:33:51]:
Any advice you would give to them about getting people to come to events? Like, what we refer to is bums on seats. Yeah. We we see that as the just maybe a bit of an overshare for, I get told off for oversharing on these podcasts, but the number one thing in our business is bums on seats. Yep. That's what we call it. If we can get people to events, whether there are events or other events we go to and help get people to events, we will be successful. Everything else is taken care of is the way I sort of see it. Because if we can get 10 or a 100 people in front of our team and in front of, you know, the the people that work here and just talking about what we do and what they do, and we're very confident in the ability of the team to just provide a good image of the brand, you know, and those that might want to work with us might do.

Richard Hill [00:34:39]:
And those that don't really like us might not. That's fine as well. But getting people in front of, you know, that event, you know, any advice you would give to getting people to events?

Joshua Grant [00:34:49]:
Yeah. So there's a few things that I've sort of discovered over the last probably couple of years is so we're trying to do some bigger events Yeah. Grow our network more broadly and then doing the much more targeted events to then see kinda where those conversations go. Yeah. And I think actively reaching out to people that you would like to to attend those events Yeah. Would be the real key one. Yeah. So, you know, some of the broader events that we run-in, we'll open it to sort of everyone, but we'll share it.

Joshua Grant [00:35:17]:
And a lot of our network is kind of, you know, in that industry. So some people will naturally migrate to it, which is great.

Richard Hill [00:35:22]:
Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:35:23]:
And then actually reaching out and going, you know, look. I really appreciate being there because you know they're gonna add value or they're gonna get some value from it Yeah. Is really good. And I think the the agency intensive model, again, it's it's reaching out to maybe agencies that you've kind of been aware of, and just saying, if how we did it with this last one, I'd be like most people that we contact directly were like, it's great idea. Yeah. I I really wanna come, and we'll come to the next one if I can't come to this one. And I think just just doing that and being a little bit targeted with it, it naturally then comes. And Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:35:53]:
People go, oh, would you mind if I bring so and so? Or Yeah. And then it kind of that natural ever flow of people sharing it.

Richard Hill [00:36:00]:
Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:36:01]:
You've got to kind of do a bit of all of it to to to get the right bumps on seats, I think.

Richard Hill [00:36:07]:
Yeah. I think that's brilliant advice. You know, ultimately inviting people Yeah. And off your Yeah. Side. Making a phone call or going, hey. We're running an event. I would love you to go, oh, oh, buy, but they've asked me.

Richard Hill [00:36:18]:
So I feel, you know, that that goes from, like you say, it could be 5 or 6, 7, 8 people, and then they, you know, then the the social media from those events are. You know, that I think if you if you maybe get 10 people in a room, there'll be another 50 that's seen that on social. God, what's that about? What is that? You know? So for those that are listening now, our, agency intensive lunches that we do, you know, go to the website, agencyintensive.com. There'll be an area on there around events. You know, you'll be able to fill in, you know, interest in our events. So we might see some of our listeners at some of the agencies agency intensive lunches and bigger events that we're planning sort of for the later in the year and next year. So event's obviously key. You know? I know, obviously, you are out.

Richard Hill [00:37:03]:
You know, I see you're out of a lot of different events, and then so here here, you know, completely agree. You know, we talk about events a lot on the podcast and on the other podcast. Nothing better than ultimately meeting meeting people and and and sort of having a good conversations. But just going back to the sort of, team piece, you know, I'm intrigued to know around your your sort of at this certain headcount 2025, you know, similar to us and this you know, there's then this, sort of idea that we're trying to build profitability, for example, with this headcount. You know, we're we're in a similar space. You know, we we believe we can add about 25%, you know, this year with the same headcount. That's a huge amount, you know, in terms of profitability, you know, improving the profitability. Do you have certain things in the business that how you measure productivity, like time tracking, time? How do you sort of measure productivity within your agency?

Joshua Grant [00:38:02]:
So it's obviously different across teams because they they work in different ways. And and as a as a agency, we've always well, for a long time, been an hours based business. Yep. Our developers and our designers are all theaters. So they all post their time. And we we use a a a well known platform in the industry. We use synergist. Yep.

Joshua Grant [00:38:24]:
So they post the time and we we run reports, obviously, monthly. I'll run probably one every week just to kinda see how the the time posting going and and and obviously take into account people's leave and sickness, all the rest of it. But we kind of have a bit of a minimum requirement of what we want our support developers to be posting, what we want our project developers to be posting, and what we want our designers to be posted.

Richard Hill [00:38:45]:
And that's an amount of billable Yep. Hours because there's billable work.

Joshua Grant [00:38:48]:
Well, we have billable and non chargeable. So Yeah. We'll we'll even if they're working on internal stuff, they'll be posting their time because we need to know Yeah. They'll do stuff for us in time.

Richard Hill [00:38:56]:
Classes on billable, not billable.

Joshua Grant [00:38:58]:
Yeah. Yeah. So that so that comes on the reports. And and you don't get wrong. If we decided as a business to make a strategic decision to build a new website for ourselves Yeah. We're gonna see a lot more on billable. Yeah. Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:39:09]:
But we do monitor that. And if we see kind of, sort of slip in the amount posted or whatever, we'll obviously dig into those and have a sit.

Richard Hill [00:39:17]:
So do individuals have a targeted billable amount of hours they've got to do per week, month, and

Joshua Grant [00:39:22]:
Yeah. So Yep. So as as a as a guide and hoping that I would share and I'm sure I'm not because it's very similar with a lot of agencies, our support developers, we like them to post around about a 100 hours a month Yeah. Each. Yeah. Project developers, some of them will be posting 150, 160. Mhmm. Because they they by nature of the work, they're just working on

Richard Hill [00:39:41]:
Just head down.

Joshua Grant [00:39:42]:
Head down, go for it. Support is you're picking bits up and down.

Richard Hill [00:39:45]:
Yeah. You know? Yeah. Keep taking between.

Joshua Grant [00:39:47]:
Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. And people got you know, they've got to have a life as well at work, so we don't push them too hard. We're not expecting them to build, like, 8 hours a day every day. It's just unrealistic as a Yeah. So we we're quite sort of, sensible with that. And then I think the other teams of the business like sales team, we've got metrics around sort of new business and things like that.

Joshua Grant [00:40:06]:
And because we're small enough that we work so closely with our sales and marketing guy, and I do a bit myself and some of the other directors too as well, we've got a good sort of monitor on the volume of stuff going through. I think one of the one of the the big sort of things that we have to, really pull back on is actually how much, sort of events, outreach, all the rest of it. We we almost are too productive for kinda doing that that kind of stuff. And sometimes you take a step back and go, we need to sort of look at, you know, focusing on, I bet, a bit more direct sales or it might, you know, whatever it might look like, because we don't track our time in the same way. And I think that's something that I've been looking to probably improve this year because we use Monday and things like that to track sort of marketing activities and marketing plans and the rest of it. We don't necessarily put silos of sort of time or effort against some of those areas.

Richard Hill [00:40:57]:
Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:40:58]:
So that's that's definitely yeah. We're all striving to kinda make ourselves more efficient, and I think that's something we're definitely looking at. And, actually, that, agency lunch event that we we did, there was a lot shared exactly around this topic. Yeah. And I've already kinda started looking into kind of some recommendations. And so it's not just that you go into those agency intensive lunches to to learn about one particular thing. It might be like the pain points of the business. It might be actually the successes of using particular tools and platforms.

Joshua Grant [00:41:26]:
Yeah. Actually, people are quite happy to share those.

Richard Hill [00:41:29]:
Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:41:30]:
We're like, actually, this has been, like, pivotal in making our business 50% more productive, whatever it might be.

Richard Hill [00:41:35]:
Yeah. And

Joshua Grant [00:41:35]:
they're happy to check because they want yeah. They want some validation that this is great. Yeah. And all their peers are going, hang on a minute. How do you manage to do that?

Richard Hill [00:41:43]:
Some little custom tweak with the time tracking.

Joshua Grant [00:41:46]:
Yeah.

Richard Hill [00:41:47]:
Yeah. The I think yeah. Time tracking seem you know, is is the same in our business, but, obviously, sales and marketing is a little bit trickier to you know, you're not you're not tracking billable work. You're tracking time on a you know, whether that's in this event, this social media piece, this LinkedIn piece, this podcast now is a 3 hour trip to

Joshua Grant [00:42:06]:
Yep.

Richard Hill [00:42:06]:
Lincoln, you know, and then track that back to a return as, obviously, trip is nigh on impossible. It might be, you know, stepping back in a year, you go, oh, that podcast was the best thing I ever did. Maybe. Like That agency intensive was so busy. But, yeah, obviously, it's easier with developers and customer service and design and all the different, you know, whether, you know, agencies are listening and delivering social media or SEO, obviously, that's sales and marketing. But then I think you do have to, obviously, whether that's quarterly, sit and look at that sales and marketing activity. You know, where do the leads come from? Okay. You know, in in-depth, some of those lead times can be quite long, can't they? It's not like they're buying a couple of grand thing.

Richard Hill [00:42:48]:
They might be buying a 100 grand rebuild or whatever. So it might be a 12 month process from initial meeting them initially meeting them, you know, and then have an initial sit down just to have a little debrief and plan and cost exercise. And then for another 3 months, another it can be a year, can't it? So it's a little bit more challenging on the on the sales and marketing. But, ultimately, I think after, you know, you've maybe done events for 12 months, you get a real good feel for it, don't you? And then you can go, blimey. Actually, this is really good, but we know we can't go and do an event next week and expect, you know, 50 k back or whatever the numbers are the following week, you know, which I think with events can be a bit of a tricky one. Because some of them, if you're going to them, can be quite expensive, like the events that you pay to go to. Yep. You know? And we've sort of recalibrated our budgets to do more of our own stuff where we have more control and the costs are less.

Richard Hill [00:43:37]:
We can work with partners to spread those costs. Whereas when you go to the big events and you're paying to be one of dozens of, whether that's, you know, agencies or whatever, they're very expensive, aren't they? So They

Joshua Grant [00:43:49]:
really are. I think we're we're in the same boat with that that we we we've done the big expos and all of the things. And because I've got a a marketing background, we you know, we always wanted to try the next thing because, you know, that's how marketing works. You you keep trying things, but eventually something will stick with it. Yeah. And then we've done exactly the same. We've we've kind of put our budget into doing some more events, sort of investing back into maybe a bit more of our local area

Richard Hill [00:44:11]:
Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:44:12]:
Rather than kinda, you know, going to the the the big London events and hoping that people are gonna happen upon your stand and you happen you know, might have to have a conversation. I think I think we've already seen, sort of good returns on that. And I think the the I suppose the other side of the business that I don't wanna forget about is, like, the client facing team or the account managers, the project managers. We we try to, give everyone quite and a a bit of an even share of different types of clients, and we'll probably put, like, a a bit of a an effort scale against each of them. So everyone's got, like, you know, 2 or 3 big accounts and Yeah. You know, sort of these small ones.

Richard Hill [00:44:45]:
Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:44:45]:
Because we we need to be fair that, you know, they're manageable, and and we push really heavily.

Richard Hill [00:44:50]:
So it's a marriage of the risk internally as if some a team member was to whatever may happen to that person, leave or Yep. You know, something else more,

Joshua Grant [00:44:59]:
you know, permanent, yeah, spreading that risk. So so we do evaluate that regularly.

Richard Hill [00:45:04]:
Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:45:05]:
And we we we we do that support, and we all stay in project. So we'll kind of have a once a month, we'll have a bit of a helicopter view of kind of what's going on through the business Yeah. The size of the accounts, amount of hours are in them, and and potentially how the you know, not demanding, but how, the com the comms level on that account can be. Because, you know, some some some clients want sort of a a really sort of intense comms level, I guess, of the nature of what they're doing. Yeah. So we do we we do kind of evaluate all these things, but we're always looking for the next sort of thing as to how to project the sort of the the current work, the sort of groundswell of, clients coming back wanting more, you know, improving their their offering and the pipeline. And it and it's it's difficult for all of us. Right? We're we're always kind to try and make that as as good as we can.

Joshua Grant [00:45:55]:
And we and we do use CRMs. I think we, you know, we're using Monday at the moment to see kinda how that works with

Richard Hill [00:46:02]:
For the other CRMs and

Joshua Grant [00:46:03]:
Yeah. Just seeing yeah. Yeah. Because we Yeah. We we it can do a lot of things, but, we do put all our leads in there and Yeah. And try and get a picture of, you know, what what my mind. But it but it yeah.

Richard Hill [00:46:16]:
So you can forecast. You've got your you've got a feel for timelines and Yeah. And things will drop and forecast workflow, recruitment potentially you might need. Yeah. So any any specific tools that your agency couldn't run without? You know? I think, obviously, the agencies have all different disciplines. Obviously, you're more dev and design and that, you know, that side. Yeah. There's different different tools that I think your your side of the industry use more than our side on the marketing, but you've mentioned Monday.

Richard Hill [00:46:44]:
What will be another 2 tools your business could run on without?

Joshua Grant [00:46:47]:
So so definitely Monday because we we we've really got, sort of the benefit of that. Synergis, which is obviously the one where we do all of our financials, all of our, time tracking Yeah. Of our invoicing, etcetera. I think that's that's key with, the the sort of business model that we've got because we're, you know, billable hours. It it has to be tight. Processes around it are very strict.

Richard Hill [00:47:09]:
Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:47:09]:
We wanna make sure we capture as many sort of hours as possible. We don't want to fall through the net because that's our profit. Right?

Richard Hill [00:47:15]:
Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:47:16]:
And then probably so we do have a ticketing system. And historically, we've had, sort of a it's an open source one that we've kind of then evolved. It's a platform called Mantis. It's quite simple, but it works really efficiently for our support team. Our support team use that, and it's sort of the go to. And and, actually, we're struggling, and we've we've looked where so in projects, we're we're we're trying to kind of build out Jira to see if that kind of improves it. Yeah. And we've been a bit more you know, by the nature of the development, going for projects, tends to be a bit more complex.

Joshua Grant [00:47:44]:
Yeah. We don't think we're sort of, convinced on that yet. And, I always forget the name, but the one that JetBrains do, we're looking at that because there was there was a key feature in that that we needed that they didn't have. And I think in the last 6 months, that's been rolled out. So we're constantly looking at what platform could kind of improve our efficiencies. And and some of the agencies that were at that, last lunch event, they've they've had the same pain points. They've been building their own custom ones.

Richard Hill [00:48:11]:
Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:48:12]:
1, because it can save a lot of money because some of the platforms are quite expensive. Yeah. Especially the ones that have got licensing models around headcount, etcetera. Yeah. So the and also they wanted them all to be collected. And that's one of the things that we probably struggled with is we haven't necessarily got them all collected as well as we could. And I think we we definitely wanna improve that because you're kind of doing more work by updating multiple platforms. And I think, you know, we're we're we're far from the finished product.

Richard Hill [00:48:38]:
Yeah. It's an evolving thing, isn't it, an agency where you you, though, you try the various different, you know, say, you know, CRM, for example. You know, we probably had, like, 7 in our agency. I'm very happy with where we are now, but it doesn't do everything. You know? And I think that's the thing. Not one platform maybe will do everything that you wanted to do, so then it becomes some sort of custom piece connecting, you know, whether it's an API from here or a local studio thing, you know, pulling everything from and I think, you know, we've landed on a, I think, a pretty solid stack attack tech stack, but still, we are connecting things, you know, and our own tech guys are connecting this to this to build this. And, you know, it's, but it is an evolving thing. But, ultimately, yeah, you've gotta be able to track the work that you're doing, you know, the time.

Richard Hill [00:49:26]:
If you're tracking time, that's a you know, we could debate time over projects, that sort of thing, but I think, you know, we have time very much so. But some hours are worth a lot more than others, so we have, you know, team members on different hourly rates based on experience and and and what department they're in. But we have an agency rate. You know, that is our agency rate, and we have probably 5 or 6 or 7 of the team that are a lot more than that per hour. To tracking that time, tracking those tasks. But then, as you say, there's things like the pipeline, tracking where the pipeline is so you can forecast that. Obviously, there's the whole sort of cash of the inside of the the account side of the business, tying all that in. It's an interesting, set of dashboards, you know, which is very much where we are.

Richard Hill [00:50:07]:
So a a series of dashboards that represent each department and an overriding dashboard for all departments sort of added together. I've just as you know, I added nearly a month off, and those dashboards were my sort of touch point

Joshua Grant [00:50:18]:
Yep.

Richard Hill [00:50:19]:
With the business. You know, it's a bit of a test for the business and and for me, really, to be able to disconnect for nearly a month. But I have on my phone the dashboards of of the business. You know? So I think it's it's an area when you're looking as a agency owner, what tools? Just thinking a little bit bigger bigger picture. What do you want? You know, the nitty gritty day to day. Yeah. We need to have to get this project done, but what's the bigger picture with that dashboard? What are you gonna be able to do with it? Will it connect to this, this, and this? But, yeah, I feel like we could go on for another hour

Joshua Grant [00:50:51]:
or so.

Richard Hill [00:50:51]:
Should. But I think I'll ask couple of I'll ask couple of questions. Obviously, 30 years in business is a long, long time. You know, even 10 years in this game is a hell of a long time. You know, in that time, the time you've been with the agency, I would imagine it doesn't always go the right way. No. You know? Whether that's, you know, invested in this event that was shocking, you know, out of it. Not our event, obviously.

Richard Hill [00:51:18]:
But, you know, what would be one of the biggest sort of challenges, mistakes that you've seen in your time at Absolut? What did you learn from it?

Joshua Grant [00:51:25]:
I think it's it's probably quite a common one. And, what I can definitely I've been involved in it a few times. It's it's probably not transitioning some of the team out of the business soon enough. Yeah. Yeah. So I think, you know, you've you've taken someone on the on papers Yeah. Exactly what you need.

Richard Hill [00:51:42]:
Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:51:42]:
You tried you've given the birth of that and probably the benefit of that add a bit more. And I think, being quicker at kind of bringing that to a close Yeah. Is less disruptive for the wider business as well. And you don't get me wrong. It's it's it's difficult because, you know, you wanna give people, ample time and opportunity to kind of, you know, show their worth.

Richard Hill [00:52:01]:
And Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:52:02]:
With with with complex development, sometimes that's quite difficult to kind of get to straight away. Mhmm.

Richard Hill [00:52:08]:
I think Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:52:09]:
Yeah. And and I think we've all, you know, the all the directs involved, we're all in that same position that, you know, we've all collectively gotten. Let's, you know, see how it goes. And, actually, we should have all gone. Now in a minute, we need to, you know, bring it to place. It's the right thing for the business, but and it's also the right thing for the individual because you you you obviously try not to make it personal, but you always feel about people's, you know, livelihood and, you know, what they're gonna do, etcetera. Yeah. But, actually, if they're not in the right role with you Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:52:35]:
They're wasting their time as well. Yeah. So it it it's better it it's the right thing for to everyone involved, really.

Richard Hill [00:52:41]:
Yeah. The the people bit is always a tricky bit. You know, I think that's where it's quite a common thread in in agencies of the sort of size we're we're we're talking about. You know, the people bit. You hire somebody, they'll crack an interview. Yep. You know, nice guy, nice lady. You know? Brilliant.

Richard Hill [00:52:55]:
They've come on board. Actually, there's a few little few little warning signs on day 5. It's like, hang on a minute. Remote working's day 5. You know? It's like, this shouldn't be that that was a bit of an awkward thing that was said, and that the way we responded to that. And so it's having those awkward, challenging conversations, early doors, I think is what you're saying, to make some quiet I think I think decisions quick.

Joshua Grant [00:53:19]:
I think it's made it harder because they're all at work. And Yeah. Because if they're in the you're in the office with them the whole time pre, you know, pre COVID world, you would probably pick up the queues a lot quicker. And I think we've had it with, you know, people that you're not necessarily quite sure what they're doing. And I'm not saying saying that they definitely have been doing other things, but there's that sort of element of doubt. And I think maybe, you know, you struggle to support people as well as if they're in the office. Yeah. Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:53:43]:
So I think it's probably just made it a little bit harder to

Richard Hill [00:53:46]:
Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:53:46]:
To know when to sort of to move really on it. No. I think that's a great point. So

Richard Hill [00:53:54]:
hiring, firing, very tricky, or the firing piece can be. What about firing clients? You know, you've got, you've done all these, you know, these amazing events, and you've you've you've you've you've took on what you thought was gonna be your next biggest client. And then you're getting some you're getting some, sort of warning signs that, actually, these guys maybe could be a bloody nightmare.

Joshua Grant [00:54:18]:
Yep. I mean, it happens, is it? And I think we we've been in a position where, yeah, we we've had it happen. Like, it happens, you know, to everyone. Yeah. And, we always protect the team for Yeah. For first and foremost. And if we've got a client that is, you know, being hostile or rude to the team or whatever it might be, it's just a zero tolerance. Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:54:39]:
So Yeah. We'll we'll jump on that instantly. Yeah. And the senior team will will get involved and, you know, basically make it quite clear that this behavior is stopping right now. Yeah. Thankfully, it's like one sort of blooming that is that sort of scale of it.

Richard Hill [00:54:54]:
Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:54:54]:
The one that we get more of is where, clients are just, maybe they're just not understanding necessarily of kind of the nature of the site they've got. It might be a new team that come in. Yeah. Trying to educate and bring those newer team members on, yeah, on board is one of the skills I think of it Yeah. Especially with Magento, because a lot of people yeah. It's a bit marmot, isn't it? A lot of people just hate it. And that's one of our biggest day to day battles. And, you know, don't get me wrong.

Joshua Grant [00:55:21]:
We'll we'll sometimes onboard a support client, and they just won't listen to our process. And we're quite, we're not we're not rigid as much as we will be as flexible as we can, but we have a process that

Richard Hill [00:55:33]:
we There's a way you need to submit a ticket and Yeah. There's a Yeah. Timeline that's expected and it's Saturday morning at 11 o'clock. You might not get a response by 5 past, you know, or I the Exactly.

Joshua Grant [00:55:44]:
And it and it and it the process is there to protect us, but it's also there to protect them. Because if if you like, we've we've had it quite recently actually where a client is wanting wanting us to sort of circumvent the process and for us to do things on their live server, you know, turn things off without any context, all this kind of stuff. And we very much have to push back and go, look. We're happy to do it. Yeah. We're intact. We need to, yeah, we need to ask some questions, take a step back. And and I think sometimes it's where teams just haven't got the the breadth of knowledge to understand the impact Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:56:15]:
Those decisions they're making. And and and it can be tricky. It can be really hard. And I think that's one of the the parts of the job that I should probably enjoy the most is actually going through that journey with a client that, yeah, not necessarily being difficult, but they know they only know what they know. And they think, you know, maybe we're delaying them, you know, for for a reason, and we're and we're not.

Richard Hill [00:56:34]:
But that's an opportunity to build the relationship, isn't it? Whereas it you could see it as a bit of a, oh, they're not doing what we have. They're like, well, hang on. Let's spend a bit more time with them. You know? So that's where I could sort of whether that's, you know, the salesperson, you know, that's got the deal in or the customer service, the education, the onboarding, you know, that initial month or 2. I had a similar conversation with a SaaS only yes only yesterday, actually, sort of talking about onboarding people. Right? Because, obviously, they you get the bit of work over a line, but it's, you know, no doubt it's a great bit of work for both sides, but things can soon go wrong in that 1st month or so just by just a simple misunderstanding list. Usually nothing, but it's just not been dealt with, discussed. I put this ticket in and did it well, no.

Richard Hill [00:57:17]:
It's not we don't put tickets there. We put them there. You know, that's a simple thing, but that could be a thing that then there was no response where you wasn't the system that we showed you. You were right. You logged into the old one or whatever. Yeah. Just a simple sort of, nice, tight onboarding, understanding, you know, the the front end. Well, it's been a pleasure, Josh, having you on.

Richard Hill [00:57:36]:
Thanks for having me. 12 months from now, what's on the what's on the horizon on the road map for absolute design?

Joshua Grant [00:57:47]:
So I think it's obviously the the wild west of platforms at the moment, and I think, you know, we're we're pivoting more and more on, Shopify, backing that as a platform. Yeah. Got some big accounts coming on to that. And, I think off the back of that and building our partnership with Shopify, that's gonna get bigger. Yeah. Our events are, upping their ante this next 12 months. So we've got an event, a regular event going on in Nottingham, as part of the EcoCloud Club. Yep.

Joshua Grant [00:58:14]:
People will have seen, I'm sure. And we we try to just build a bit more of a community, just to get a bit more add a bit more back, but also get a bit more back from the community around us.

Richard Hill [00:58:22]:
Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:58:23]:
I think, you know, we're just looking to constantly improve our processes and, you know, invest back into kind of the business and the people that are in it, really.

Richard Hill [00:58:31]:
Fantastic. Well, it's been a pleasure. I'd like to end every episode with a book recommendation, Josh. Do you have a book that you recommend to us?

Joshua Grant [00:58:38]:
And this has been recommended by quite a few people in the industry quite recently. I think he brought I think the book's been about around 2 or 3 years, but I've already just got around I bought it ages ago. I've already just got around to to to reading it. And it's the, Human Powered by Trenton Moss. And I found it really interesting because he's from from a ladies background. And now he, does a lot more coaching in in that sort of, you know, the business. He's got a thing. He's set up a business doing it.

Joshua Grant [00:59:06]:
But there's a lot of pain points and sort of learnings and, ways to look at things that are quite useful in that book. I think I don't always get a chance to kinda say step back and go around it. I know we're doing an alright job at most things, but, actually, I was thought about this particular thing that we're doing and the way we approach it. Mhmm. And I think a book is a quite a nice place to kind of add a bit of perspective, and and that I really, really appreciate you reading it, but I haven't quite got to the end of it. It's one of those that are like it was a classic. I try and read a few pages every day, around sort of family life, etcetera Yeah. And and watching rubbish on telly, which I need to sort of hone down.

Joshua Grant [00:59:41]:
Yeah.

Richard Hill [00:59:42]:
Watch that. I'll read this. Yeah.

Joshua Grant [00:59:44]:
Yes. But, yeah, it's good recommendation. And I I know that, quite a few of the sort of bigger agency owners and things of of Reddit as well and and and sort of get Fantastic.

Richard Hill [00:59:54]:
Well, we'll link that up in the show notes. Thank you so much for coming on the show. For those that wanna find out more about you, more about Absolute Design, what's the best way to do that?

Joshua Grant [01:00:01]:
So, you can go to our website, absolutehyphen design.credituk, or fill up, you know, wanna get in touch on LinkedIn, please do. Fantastic. Well, thanks for coming on the show. Thank you. Cheers. Cheers.

Richard Hill [01:00:15]:
If you enjoyed this episode, hit the subscribe or follow button wherever you are listening to this podcast. You're always the first to know when a new episode is released. Have a fantastic day, and I'll see you on the next one.