Achieving growth as a PR agency is no easy task, but achieving growth that is sustained and also sustainable, is the ultimate goal for any PR founder.
As over 100 delegates, online and in-person, descended on PRmoment’s annual Agency Growth Forum, it’s clear to see that many are curious to see how PR land manages it's growth.
Here are some, but not all, of the speaker’s pearls of wisdom for PR agencies on the grow.
Independent and talented?
Olugbeminiyi Idowu, founder and MD at Talking Drum: “A significant challenge for many independent agencies today is managing talent in an environment where expectations — on both the talent side and the client side — are constantly evolving.
“On the talent side, people want clearer career paths, deeper subject-matter mastery and work that allows them to build real expertise rather than churn through endless generalist tasks. At the same time, clients are demanding sharper counsel, sector fluency, and partners who truly understand the nuances of their industry — not agencies trying to be everything to everyone.
“When teams have to cover too many sectors, narratives and brief types, the generalist model works against them — stretching people thin, diluting expertise and making it difficult to deliver the strategic depth clients now consider baseline. Ultimately, it affects quality, confidence and credibility.
“At Talking Drum, we have chosen to specialise in telling innovation stories — particularly across Africa’s technology, logistics, health and fintech ecosystems — and we’ve built a team that thinks deeply, not broadly. This focus strengthens our counsel, accelerates onboarding and gives us a sharper understanding of story patterns, media expectations and sector dynamics. It has been a real strategic advantage.
“Because the truth is this: talent thrives when the agency is clear about what it stands for and who it serves. Specialisation reduces friction, empowers people to grow into experts and creates the conditions for consistently excellent work. “
Structure, clarity and growth
Rachael Marshall, founder of Magic Digits: “Set clear KPIs for your business. Every head office function should have a set of clear transparent performance metrics which underpin how the business is running, those could be HR; new business; marketing; finance and client services.
“Every quarter you can see if the performance is consistent within that area of the business, which will create predictability, and predictability will create stability.
“Structure is about clarity without the bureaucracy. Structure should allow your business to flow, it shouldn’t slow things down. Structure starts with your vision, as the business needs to have a clear big picture of where its trying to get to. You need to ask; whats the mission? Whats the long-term goal? What do you want to be worth in the next five years, what do you want your business to feel like when its working at its best.
“If you don’t have a clear picture of where you’re trying to get to its obviously a lot harder to get there as a business.”
When in-house and agency combine
Clara Biu, head of consumer communications at Allwyn UK: “The industry at the moment is just fascinating. You’re seeing lots of pressure points all over and its having quite an interesting impact as it plays out, so obviously we are seeing big mergers which is leading a lot of redundancies and that’s on the agency market.
"For in-house there’s also a lot of changes to how businesses are set up, and we aren’t immune to economic pressures they’re just playing out in a different way depending on the size of your organisation and the industry you are working in. It’s naive to think that in-house isn’t feeling it too.
"What’s happening now is a lot of very talented agency people are available that perhaps may have never considered moving in-house before, and they are moving in-house. What that enables you to have is an agency mind within your in-house team, and I’m seeing that the skills within in-house teams [are] shifting.”
Getting culture ‘just right’
Jo Carr, co-founder and chief client officer at Hope & Glory: “Dont be a warm bath nor a cold shower, the best cultures have high support and high challenge. I’m sure we all are highly empathetic and the problem with that is you can create very protected cultures.
“But, it can be a warm bath and it means ambitious employees will get a bit restless and wonder what’s in it for them. Then you realise, and go cold shower and tell them what you really think. That isn’t great if that’s all they get.
“When I talk about support, I mean it’s about inclusion, giving feedback and benchmarking. At Hope & Glory we gave our management feedback training so they’re able to tell people in the moment how a particular thing happened, how it made them feel, what needs to happen, how to do it and how to make things work better."
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