How to build a beautiful team and client list that enables your business to succeed with Marcus Hemsley, Founder of Fountain Partnership

In the second part of our chat with Marcus, he talks about the importance of finding the right clients and team members to enable your business to succeed, and why following the money won't always get you where you want to go. Sometimes walking away from a client or a prospective employee is the best decision for the ethos of your business - even if it means turning your back on the promise of 800 grand in revenue.

Marcus Hemsley is the Founder of the digital growth agency, Fountain Partnership, winner of Google's Global Award for Growing Businesses Online. Marcus is also a Founding Member of The Million Tree Pledge. Launched on Earth Day in April 2021, The Million Tree Pledge is a collaborative initiative that’s brought together more than 60 inspiring businesses who have made the bold commitment to plant 41 million trees in the coming years, as well as to each find another two other pledgers, ensuring the initiative grows exponentially. 

Transcript

Yiuwin Tsang: 0:00

I'm your host Yiuwin Tsang. This episode, I'm joined by Marcus Hemsley. Marcus is the founder of the digital growth agency Fountain Partnership, winner of Google's global award for growing businesses online. Marcus is also a founding member of the Million Tree Pledge. Launched on Earth Day in April, 2021, The Million Tree Pledge is a collaborative initiative that's brought together more than 60 inspiring businesses who have made the bold commitment to plant 41 million trees in the coming years, as well as to each find another two pledges. And in doing so ensuring the initiative grows exponentially. Let's go straight in then, So Marcus, when we see the term create a fairer society, what does that mean to you?

Marcus Hemsley: 0:41

Well, we're not doing well enough, are we? I mean, I don't think many people can look at our society right now and go, Yeah, looks pretty fair to me. Think we're done there. So I think there's so many areas where we can improve, and it's not to point the finger in a nasty way at previous generations, you know, they did the best they could. I mean, we're still, less than a hundred years away from the second World War. The world has changed in exponential and incredible ways, but, There are so many things that still are unequal, and I think we just need to be aware of those and, and look and improve them. So, yeah, I can, I can go into specifics, but we might go down different rabbit holes. So let's just end with that. I mean, have you met anyone whose ever said, Yeah. I think we live in a really fair society where, you know, everyone, starts fairly with almost equal opportunities...

Yiuwin Tsang: 1:31

Not one. And and again right across the kind of political spectrum, cause we're kind of like shuffling around in that kind of space as well. I think, I think anybody who were to say that doesn't have their head screwed on properly, because you know, the reality is, is that the inequality of this in society drives these divisions. You know, it, it really is the, the, the hammer that cracks on the fault lines of, of a fractured society. And when you're in a position of influence, if you're a founder of a business or if you're leader of club or whatever it might be, then again, there's that responsibility that falls on onto your shoulders to do what you can.

Marcus Hemsley: 2:07

Yes.

Yiuwin Tsang: 2:08

To try and create that fairer society. And a question I've got for you is obviously with all the different clients that you get to work with at Fountain and from your interactions with them, what's your views on why businesses, you know, have their role to play in, in creating that fairer society?

Marcus Hemsley: 2:23

I think that it goes back to the thing of power, right? We hold amounts of capital and we can do stuff with it and we can make various choices. And it can be whether we decide to pay people much more than a living wage. It can be like, you know, dealing with example, like the current cost of living crisis. And in fairness, most agencies are tackling this. I think Agency Collective recently had a piece, didn't they? On how to deal with cost of living. And I think it's, Because it isn't our staff's fault that, you know there's a global energy shortage. That's not their problem. And energy price has gone up, but they have to deal with those consequences. And from a board level, we can say, Do we need X amount in reserves? Can we afford to pay people a bit more? How can we make this easier for them? How can we use our buying power? So, you know, something we explored a couple of months ago, although it's, it seems less important now, although we'll see with the pandemic, so the government gonna phase out lateral flows to buy lateral flow would be sort of two pound 50, but we as a business could buy them wholesale and get loads in and just give them all out to everyone. So there's lots of things we can do, and it's just sitting there and going, Okay, how can we leverage our position to just make everyone's lives a bit more easier directly that we work with? And then in terms of the clients we take on, are they making the world better or worse? Yes or no? If they're making them worse, then we just say no to them. We, we turned down quite a lucrative contract the other week and it made sense, you know there's a little part of me that says, Gosh, that's some zeros that, that would've been nice in our bank account. But then you just can't take people on who you just don't think are ethical. I'm speaking to the number four at Google. I got to meet her once and she kind of said that she wishes that, Cause I could tell she was quite progressive, but she wished that she could stop various people advertising on Google, but they couldn't, Like the Google has to be, it's, you know, it is a listed company. If it's a legal business, they have to let them advertise. Whereas, you know, as an agency we can be picky and say, well we're not gonna market you. You know, we don't think this is right. We don't think this is contributing to a better society or to be honest people's wellbeing. So we have that ability and I think if enough agencies club together and start being a bit stricter with who we take on and then we can start raising the standard a bit. And we, we are responsible for some of the problems in the advertising world that are here. So we have our part to play.

Yiuwin Tsang: 4:39

That's a really interesting take on it, and I'm glad that you kind of just added it in there that little, there's always that little voice somewhere that kind of just goes, it's quite a lot of money, you know, that'll pay payroll for a few more months and stuff like this. But it's, it's interesting, these conversations we've been having is whilst yes, money in the bank is, is always a nice thing to have, it's how much does that money cost you is a question we need to ask ourselves.

Marcus Hemsley: 5:00

Yes. And this is the thing, you know, Everything that you've said to me in this chat, there's this level of authenticity, which shines through like a beacon with you and, and I'm sure it does through with Fountain as well. And you can't put a price on that. Undermining that would cost you more than the money that you get from the deal. Right. If you, if you take it from those types of organisations. And I think, it's how much all that money costs is, is, is a question. And then the other part of just what, what you just said then was around the clients that you work with and getting them to raise their standards. That was the other bit which is quite exciting, I think. Yeah.

Yiuwin Tsang: 5:33

that as consumers are changing their behaviors, if we, as business people start changing behaviors where we have a hygiene list of, you know, types of businesses and, and perhaps even, you know, without being binary about it again, but it might be you know, activities that those businesses undertake, let's say because there may well be a business that isn't carbon negative or carbon neutral. It'd be very, very difficult for them to do so. But it's like what you said, it's that progressive outlook. It's that kind of desire to create good in the world or whatever it might be. Where if they don't do that, if they don't have those standards, then, then we don't work with them.

Marcus Hemsley: 6:09

It's the ripple effect as well. Sometimes when we turn people away, they've been quite shocked. And I don't want to be offensive to people. But I mean, I can give you one example, which actually is more borderline, but it's fascinating. It was a cosmetic surgery company and they were shocked. They're like, 'Oh, but we want to make women beautiful.' And I said, Well, yeah, but from our perspective, we think actually you're making women feel, you know, inadequate, that they're not good enough. And for us to write content for you, we're telling people that you're not good enough now that you don't have an inner beauty. It's like, it's fine. It is a difficult one cause then you can say, Well, why don't you not work people who do makeup or whatever. But for me, when it's extreme cosmetic surgery, and also the most important thing is like we let the women in the business decide this. Right? That didn't necessarily come from me. I didn't have a strong feeling either way, but I was like, hmmm that's not really our sort of nice bag of clients. It's not a dream climate for us. But no. Obvously, there's four of us as founders, and there's two men and two women. And the women are like, nope, no way. But then the client or the prospect got very, very offended. I'm sorry, you know, I was surprised. But it's useful for them to just take a moment and think that, you know, selling breast implants, is that really a good thing for the world? All the stuff we're talking about, about, you know, unequal society, about a climate emergency. It feels like just taking money that just is just a nasty distraction. And, you know, that's just how it is.

Yiuwin Tsang: 7:27

That's a really good example. And just digging through a little bit, it's quite interesting your point that you made there about your opinion and then, and perhaps not, not having a strong opinion about it and asking the people who would have an, involving those people who would have, which I think says a lot about the culture. There's a phrase actually from, from Paul Bulpitt, actually from, from Wow Company, and he said it was only afterwards when I thought, Do you know what, That's actually a really sensible thing to say. And he said, 'Look, my opinion on this isn't strong enough for it to count. And I thought, Oh, that's, that's actually quite a good phrase, a really good turn of phrase i.e. there are other people's opinions which would be more important than mine. And that's quite a nice segue into the cultural part of Fountain and some of this kind of discussions that you've had. Cuz on your website you say that you hire not just for skills, for attitude. And, and I love that and I think that really does say a lot about the inclusivity aspect for Fountain. But skills can be really, really dependent on privilege, you know, being born and right end of the town and all these sorts of things. Whereas attitudes, obviously a lot more kind of global. So with this in mind, what kind of like recruitment policies and, and how do you take people on in line with the, the culture that you have at Fountain? What's, your strategy there?

Marcus Hemsley: 8:39

Yeah, I mean the strategy to actually hire people is pretty straightforward. I do wanna try and do it through networks. So if we already have employees, we kind of say, Look, you know, anyone who'd love to work alongside, you know, and that's really good cause it's, they've worked in the past and all the rest of it. Our networks always try and run networking. Say, do you know one who's fantastic in SEO or pay per click or conversion rate optimisation? And very rarely people say, Yes, they, they might come back, You should chat to this person. They're really good. And of course we use recruiters as well, which is fine and the recruiters we use, we work with for such a long time, they, they know what is a Fountain fit and who the sort of right personality types are and the backgrounds can be diverse and it makes sense cuz guess what? Consumers are diverse. You know, our clients diverse, it's fine, but it's it's a personality type. And we sound quite funny, but our co-founder Rebecca, who deals a lot with the culture. She's been the, the main person that spearheaded it. She has what she calls her sweetheart test. And what she means by that is that even though we've got teams that will hire and everything now, she'll still have a, just a quick coffee at the end of those and, and if she walks out of that and goes, You know what, yeah, I'd call them a sweetheart. They're a nice per, you know what I mean? Like someone who you just, you know, you get, you get the warm and fuzzies when you think about them. Like, yeah, they're just genuinely kind, sweetheart then they're in. If they're a bit of a dickhead, then, no. And we had an extreme of that, which is quite funny. I mean, going back to again, numbers, there's a guy years ago hiring for a business development position and I can't remember his exact name. I'll make it up. His name's like, like Giles Smith. But it is like this shows all person he was, he like created this sort of like PDF about himself and he had in brackets in the middle, Giles 'the Big Cheese' Smith, it wasn't that cheesy it that bad, but it was kind like, like I'm the like, you know, he was very Wolf of Wall Street if that's so, you know what I mean by that?

Yiuwin Tsang: 10:20

Yeah.

Marcus Hemsley: 10:20

And but what made him so competitive? Like me and Rob were sitting there and he was pressing the sort of the money buttons in our head and he was like, listen, I will leave my big agency right now and I'll bring 800 grand a year of revenue right now if you go sign it, Bush Bash Boss, come on. 800 grand. Do you want it? Come on. What's return on investment for my 50 k salary? You love this. Come on lads. And we're just like, Eight hundred grand would be really useful, but my goodness, we can't let you anywhere near our business. So, you know, like, and of course that sort of person would be doing that with us in a year's time. So there is again, like short term, great. 800 grand. But so, no, and I mean that's obviously, that's an extreme. I think very few people would hire someone like that. But you know, there's always those people in the middle that wear a bit of a mask, but a mask of sort of, I don't really know like you, you don't feel you can be honest with me and show trust. And trust begets trust. So there's, there's just this lack of me really understanding who you are and what you're about and whether your moral compass is in the right way. And it might not be in the right way because you've had a tough life. And I'm like, Yeah, but. It's a tricky one because the ripple effect of a, and we've all been in workplaces prior to setting up business. Lots of us where one toxic person can come in and, you know, negativity can really spread and it's so, so difficult. And life and business is, is challenging enough before you get people who don't have emotional sovereignty. I think that's the other word we use. So there's a sweetheart test, but if you don't, if that's not, if that's too fluffy for you, it's where they have emotional sovereignty. It's whether when things go wrong, They throw a toddler tantrum, like my seven year old son still does getting upset or they just go, Okay, yes, I'm feeling negative emotions right now, but that's on me. Right. I am not going to then throw all this at someone else. I'm gonna go, You know what? I'm feeling rubbish right now. You know, I might go for a walk and I'll, I'll check out for a bit. Cause my state of mind's not clear. I'm in a low mood. I'm probably not gonna say anything productive. I might say something insulting. So I'm gonna, you know, sub myself off, you know, like go off for an early bath, you know, if you like sport, but like, yeah, it's like, yeah, stop yourself off. You're in a bad game and just take, take a bit time. And people that have that, that self regulation and introspection to see that. And the other thing as well is just the ability to not then build stuff up in their heads. So I think that's one of the things we talk about a lot at Fountain and it just like not working ourselves up and like if you've had a bad interaction with someone, then you know, waiting till you're sure in a good place to then try and resolve it rather than gossiping and telling everyone else and making this a really big emotional story. So when you next see the person, rah, it all comes up, you know? Cause we all feel our thinking, not the external world, you know, like from a scientific perspective, you know, like, you can't make me feel bad. Yiuwin, you can't, there's no, you can't send stress or anger germs through the Zoom. It infects my brain. You can say something and I can have an emotional reaction. Then it's up to me if I embellish it and really go, Oh, I can't believe you said that about me. And tell, Tell the story 10 times. Get in fight or flight and then say, I don't like you, and I could just say, Something came up for me. Then I probably misunderstood it. He seems like a nice guy. Let's just let it go. Which is what grownups should be doing

Yiuwin Tsang: 13:27

It so is, and you're right. Funnily enough, you mentioned, you mentioned Google, and that's like a whole other chat in itself, like the, the intricacies of that. But we did a talk at Google HQ in Central del Square and we were in the town hall building thing and we had this entrepreneur on there and and he said his biggest lesson was that sometimes it's better to have a hole than an asshole when it comes to hiring people. It's like, that actually does make sense. Everything that you just said makes it, makes total, makes total sense. And again, coming back to that, that cultural part and creating a kind of a fair society and having these kind of values as well, It's almost that common ground, you know? And, and if that's what you do and that's the common ground that you have, then as you say, it gives you that kind of foundation for this, you know, cohesive kind of team culture within, within the organisation. And I also love that this the sweetheart. I really like that. That's a really lovely one. Maybe a little bit too fluffy for my my, I'm trying to think what our equivalent. Yeah. Emotion, professional, whatever. I do love it. I do love it. I'm trying to work out what our equivalent is at Disruptive. We have the other end of it, which basically no dickheads, and that's just what the other end of that spectrum where you got, as you say, you've got that alarm bell kind of ringing where you think, Yeah, this isn't gonna go down well,

Marcus Hemsley: 14:39

No, I think, you know what, like that Wolf Wall Street guy, I know there's, there's a mode of business. I think deep down he was probably a sweetheart. He said a lot of nasty conditioning about, you know, if you want to make you, you wanna cut it in business, you gotta be cut throat. It's dog eat dog. And it's like once this in the 1980s, you know, greedy really wasn't good. Like, it really wasn't. Cause I know what happened in 2008. So it's, it goes to show.

Yiuwin Tsang: 15:04

It does. But I think, I think that comes as well from having a real clarity on what your identity is and what Fountain's identity is and knowing what you know, what the culture is, what the values are. And that's when you can make that kind of distinction. That's when you can make that kind of decision and think well this guy's not gonna fit. Yeah, Yeah. You know, his, his kind of, his, his methodology isn't gonna fit in with ours because we, we've got real clarity on what it is that makes, you said Fountain fit. That's what clicked in my head. You know what, a Fountain person is and you've been able to articulate that to your recruiters. And I think that's, that must be one of the key building blocks.

Marcus Hemsley: 15:37

Trial and error with recruiters. I won't lie. It's lots of back and forth and No, no, this one. So, it takes time. Like all of these things. Thanks so much Marcus Hemsley from the Fountain Partnership and the Million Tree Pledge, such an incredible session.