Cactus

Europe’s leading corporate advisory and growth consultancy for agencies. Inspiring the now, next and future generation of agencies to thrive inside one of the world’s most competitive industries.

Managing Partner - Consultancy

Beyond Noise

Beyond Noise is a specialist strategy consultancy working exclusively with ambitious owners of established independent marketing agencies.  

Our mission is to enable agency owners to realise their potential and achieve their goals.

Now is the time to reinvent your marketing agency. We increase your chances of achieving your success by over 65%.

Agency Coach & Mentor

Coventry University

Guest Lecturer on Digital Marketing and Consumer Behaviour. Working with the module leader to deliver course content and develop students knowledge of marketing.

Guest Lecturer at the School of Marketing & Management

CreativeRace

Joining what was then Gratterpalm Limited, I was part of a team that acquired the agency in an MBO in 2002. Over the next 15 years I led the business as CEO, growing it into 21st UK largest agency (Neilsen)  and the largest outside London (Campaign).

- Grew revenue to £12.5M +
- Delivered EBITDA >15% YOY
- Grew GP by over 260% 
- 175+ people
- Won "Yorkshire's Best Company to Work For" (beating Morrisons Supermarkets)
- Deployed Lean Six Sigma
- Rebranded from Gratterpalm to CreativeRace
- Acquired leading eCRM digital agency Underwired Limited to become the agency's London office.
- Merged babyGrand Limited into CreativeRace (London) Limited
- Worked with clients including ASDA, Greggs, DFS, Pets at Home, Evans Cycles, Hobbycraft, B&Q, Halfords, Kenra, Sally Salon Services, Ritter Sport, Ladbrokes Coral and Symingtons Mugshot.  
- Won numerous industry awards
- Investors In People Gold accreditation
- Top 30 placing in The Sunday Times Best Companies list

I sold my 50% equity and exited the business in 2017.

CEO & Equity Partner

Momentum Worldwide

I started my agency career at PDP, a leading independent Sales Promotion agency. The business was subsequently acquired by McCann-Erickson to become the hub of their Momentum network.

Account Handler

I help agencies achieve their growth potential and stand out in a crowded and challenging industry. Over 25 years experience in the marketing agency sector gives me the expertise and insights to advise, coach, and mentor agency owners and leaders on how to optimise their business performance and create lasting value.

I'm the award-winning author of STANDOUT OR DIE, a practical and inspiring guide for agency owners that want to make their business more visible, desirable, and valuable in the digital age. Based on my own successful journey as the CEO and equity partner of a multi-million pound agency, I share my proven 7-step roadmap to agency success. My book has been praised by industry experts and won a Silver Medal at the Axiom Business Book Awards in Michigan, USA.

If Carlsberg did birthday presents…

…a post like this from your daughter has to be up there.

Gareth Healey

Agency Advisor | Exited Agency Owner | Award-Winning Author of STANDOUT or Die.

Digital Marketing Assistant (Focused on Technical SEO, Site Audits & Optimisation)

Happy birthday to the person who’s not just my dad, but also one of my greatest inspirations, and truly one of my best friends.

You can’t fake qualities like empathy, patience or drive, and growing up with your example taught me what those really look like.

Watching you lead with consistency and passion has shaped who I am more than you probably know. Your impact reaches far beyond our family, and if you’ve ever worked with my dad, you’ve felt it too.

Please join me in wishing him a very happy birthday today, he deserves all the love and recognition! Gareth Healey 

💛

No alternative text description for this image

Looking forward to a big day in London today and feeling grateful.

I’ve chosen not to comment publicly on the events surrounding Cactus Consultants - and I won’t be doing so - but I do want to take a moment to thank the clients and partners who’ve supported me since its demise.

Your loyalty and friendship over the past 3 months has been deeply appreciated. I won’t name names, but you know who you are. Thank you.

I’m also pleased to say that I’ve had more new business and partnership opportunities in the last 3 months than in the previous 12.

I think that tells its own story.

It’s amazing what opens up when certain doors close.

Most agencies think growth means more clients. Here’s why that’s wrong.

If your agency makes £1M at a 15% margin (after director drawings), your profit is £150k.
Increase that margin to just 16%, and profit rises by 6.7%. Push it to 20%, and profit jumps by 33% - the same as growing your revenue to £1.33M.

Which sounds easier: finding £330k in new business, pitching, and them delibvering it....or tightening your margins by five percentage points?

The obsession with “more” - more clients, more projects, more hires - can look like growth on paper. But behind the scenes it often means stretched teams, thinner control, and profit that refuses to move.

Margin-focused growth flips that logic. It rewards clarity over chaos. It means knowing which clients drain time and which deliver value. It means pricing confidently, scoping properly, and building systems that scale without stress.

Revenue might impress your agency friends but margin builds your freedom.

STANDSTILL agencies chase top-line vanity.
STANDOUT agencies build bottom-line sanity.

Feeling stuck in the agency trenches right now? You’re not alone.

But just remember you are doing something incredible.

Running an agency isn’t just a job.
It’s a high-stakes balancing act that never switches off.

You’re the strategist, the firefighter, the cheerleader, the therapist, and sometimes… the cleaner clearing up the mess.

You sacrifice weekends to do your finances.
You miss dinners to keep clients happy.
You invest in people who don’t always invest in you.
You plan ahead while fixing problems from yesterday.
You battle with cashflow while carrying everyone else’s payroll.
You dream of working on the business, but spend your week deep in the weeds.

And you do it all while trying to look like you’ve got it together.

It’s no wonder some days feel like you’re running in treacle.

And yet… you’re still here. Monday morning. Still showing up. Still building.

That is what makes you a STANDOUT agency leader. Not how perfect your process is or how slick your brand looks - but the resilience to keep going when it’s bloody hard.

So if this becomes one of those weeks that feels heavier than usual, I want to say this:

You’re doing better than you think.
You’re achieving more than you give yourself credit for.
Most of the people you know could not do what you do.

And even if no one appreciates you this week...this post is a standing ovation.

Because you’re not just running a business.

You’re creating opportunity.
You’re leading with courage.
You’re shaping something that wouldn’t exist without you.

I hope you have a brilliant week. You deserve it.

You’ve grown your agency… but are you really in control of it?

That’s the question behind the Agency Mastery Programme - and the reason why Alfie and I are launching a new and improved version in 2026.

Fractional CFO Helping Agency Founders Scale Profitably | Pricing Optimisation | Commercial Finance Strategy | Team Commerciality Training

Should our agency focus on brand or lead generation?

It’s a question I get asked a lot. The answer: both matter - but not equally, and not at the same time.

Brand builds trust. Lead generation builds traction.
Most small agencies need the latter before they can afford the former.

Les Binet and Peter Field’s The Long and the Short of It recommends a 60/40 split in favour of brand. Great research - but it assumes you already have awareness, budget, and reach.

Most sub-£2M agencies don’t. They’re still fighting for recognition, credibility, and clients.

So if youre a small agency, start where it counts.
Prove your positioning through performance.
Generate conversations. Win deals. Build cash flow.

Once you have momentum, invest in brand to make that growth sustainable.

The progression looks like this:

Foundation: 70% lead gen / 30% brand
Growth: 50/50
Leadership: 60% brand / 40% lead

Lead generation gets you noticed.
Brand ensures you’re remembered.

STANDOUT agencies build proof before profile.
STANDSTILL agencies chase perception before performance.

Most agency owners don’t need more ideas - they need more clarity.

If your agency’s stuck, you probably already know what to do…
You just can’t seem to do it all.

That’s exactly why Alfie Wenegieme FCCA and I built the Agency Mastery Programme (AMP).

Cohort 1 will soon be coming to an end, so we're delighted to announce the details of Cohort 2 starting early next year.

AMP is a practical, 16-month journey that helps you move from firefighting to leading.

✅ 8 in-person full day workshops (London)
✅ 8 online accountability sessions
✅ Real frameworks, not fluffy theory
✅ A small cohort of ambitious agency founders who get it

If you want to make 2026 the year your agency finally runs like a business - not just a collection of projects - this is for you.

Places are strictly limited to just 14. If you’re an agency owner who’s serious about scaling and want to secure one of them, check out the event post here for all the details and dates:

https://lnkd.in/e9YZrbxQ

View event: Agency Mastery Programme 2026

A lot of agency owners are feeling it's quite tough at the moment. 

If you want an inspiring story as a reminder of just what can be achieved with focus, determination and hard work, look no further than this today from my friend Helen Foord.

Helen has gone from being on the brink of closing her business, to achieving a 250% revenue increase and a double digit team in just 3 years....oh and a daughter too! 

Amazing stuff. 

Helen was a committed member of our previous  agency mastery programme, travelling from the north of Scotland to London for every session.

if you want to be part of our next cohort in 2026 click the link in the comments.

Legal sector wordsmith and directories wizard. Submissions that shine, website copy that clicks, and reports that deliver real, measurable impact. CEO of ELE and one half of Helen Squared along with Helen Burness.

This photo was taken almost exactly three years ago — and I barely recognise that version of myself.

I’m standing on the steps of my favourite local Speyside hotel with Helen Burness after a team strategy meeting. I was newly pregnant, having gone through a long and difficult IVF journey and I was already burnt out... trying to work out how to do it all.

At the time, ELE was a full-service legal marketing agency. We were juggling social media, websites and branding, general content production (which I loved — especially website and report writing), and a lot of directory submissions, which had been part of my world for 20 years.

I had just partnered with Helen to form Helen Squared®, which was going brilliantly — lots of interest, fantastic clients — but underneath, I was struggling. I was 44, pregnant, exhausted, and worried about how to keep everything afloat.

Six months later, after an emergency, premature birth, it all came to a head when I found myself returning from maternity leave after just three weeks to keep on top of client demands. 

That September, I joined an agency development programme as a way of figuring out what to do next. I was seriously considering shutting ELE down and going solo as a freelance copywriter, and I gave myself one session to make a decision. Leaving my not-quite four-month-old baby, Teddy, at home I travelled to London.

In the first session, Gareth Healey looked me dead in the eye and told me I couldn’t do it all. He was clear - I needed to focus on the one or two things I did best. Never one to entirely follow instruction, I chose three and went all in.

That decision, along with Gareth’s guidance, brilliant financial insight and tools from Alfie Wenegieme FCCA, and support from the other agency owners in the group, completely transformed ELE. And me.

Within two years we’d grown revenue by 250%, with a core employed team in double figures, a global network of freelancers, and a client list I could only have dreamed of: from one- and two-partner legal boutiques through to Magic Circle and AmLaw 50 firms.

Today, ELE is a team of specialists in this field that impresses and inspires me every day. We’ve built the ultimate niche agency with a totally clear focus on the three things I love most in legal marketing: directories, website content and report writing.

And the best part? My daughter Teddy is thriving too. She's scribbled in all my notebooks, appeared on dozens of client calls and loves coming up to my office after nursery (which she calls “going to work”). Together we’ve built a rhythm that lets me be both CEO and Mummy.

Also, I no longer have pink hair but I'm not entirely sure that's a good thing... Oh and Helen Squared continues to lead the game in helping ambitious law firms and legal technology businesses build strong marketing foundations.

#throwbackthursday #mentalhealth

Is my advice cognitive or directional?

Someone asked me that yesterday- and it stopped me for a second.

Most consultants love to tell you what to do.

That’s directional advice:  “here’s the plan, follow these steps, do this next.”
Useful, but often superficial.

The real change happens earlier - when you start thinking differently.

That’s cognitive advice:  challenging assumptions, reframing problems, asking the uncomfortable questions that force clarity.

That’s where I sit.

I help agency founders think better before they act.

Because when you see your business more clearly, you make sharper decisions, set better priorities, and move faster with confidence, not confusion.

I’m not here to bark orders.

I’m here to make sure you know exactly why you’re doing what you’re doing.

Think first. Then act decisively. That’s how agencies move from standstill to STANDOUT.

Agency owners keep saying it’s tough right now. Clients are quieter. Deals take longer. Wins don’t feel secure.

But here’s the truth most won’t admit: the market isn’t the problem - their differentiation is.

If your agency sounds like everyone else, clients will treat you like everyone else. Loyalty fades when value feels interchangeable.

This isn’t about shouting louder. It’s about becoming unmistakable.

STANDSTILL agencies wait for better times.
STANDOUT agencies become the better option.

Are all these people posting about LinkedIn SSI scores on some sort of incentive to do so?

taplio

Gareth Healey's Linkedin Analytics

Gareth Healey

Performance ScoreGareth Healey's LinkedIn Performance

Gareth Healey's Best Posts (last 30 days)

Ready to grow your LinkedIn presence?

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.css-6ytdur{background-image:linear-gradient(284deg, rgba(39, 43, 72, 1) 0%, rgba(33, 47, 183, 1) 100%);color:transparent;-webkit-background-clip:text;background-clip:text;}Gareth Healey's Linkedin Analytics

Gareth Healey

Performance Score.css-goub6s{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:500;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);display:block;margin-top:var(--chakra-space-1);}Gareth Healey's LinkedIn Performance

Gareth Healey's Best Posts .css-1emoo84{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:400;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);}(last 30 days)

Ready to grow your LinkedIn presence?

Gareth Healey's Linkedin Analytics

Performance ScoreGareth Healey's LinkedIn Performance

Gareth Healey's Best Posts (last 30 days)