S1 E3 Luke Cope & Agency Culture

Stephen Baker: Hello and welcome to the Digital PR Podcast. A podcast that will cover the big talking points of the digital PR industry. My name is Steve Baker and this is Louise Parker. Hello. We both work at digital marketing agency Propellernet and we’ve both been working in digital PR for a long time. Nearly a decade for you, Lou, right? Yep, that’s right. and over a decade for me now. In the last few years, we’ve seen the digital PR industry explode and with that has come a lot of interesting conversations about how the discipline works and where it’s going. From creativity to relevance to burnout, this podcast will cover the subjects that everyone is talking about with the help of some very special guests.

Louise Parker: In this episode, we’ll be talking to Luke Cope. He’s the co-founder of one of the newest digital PR agencies out there, Bottled Imagination. We wanted to talk to Luke because as he’s starting a new agency, we were really interested to hear how someone starting from scratch would approach company culture. These days, culture isn’t just about having a beer tap and a ping pong table in the office. Was it really ever, though? And we want to discuss with him how things have changed and what does make good agency culture. Welcome, Luke.

Luke Cope: Thanks very much for having me.

Stephen Baker: We’re going to start with the basics. Just tell us a little bit about yourself. What’s your background? Where have you come from? How have you got to this point and what are you up to at the moment?

Luke Cope: I’ve been in the digital marketing industry for about 11 years now. I’ve worked at probably three different agencies in that time. I’ve worked loads of different jobs before that. Literally every job you can think of. I’ve worked in the mail room. I’ve been a lawn technician, which is basically just a gardener. I’ve done basically every job as a kid and that sort of stuff. And then, yeah, I got into digital marketing not long after uni. I went self-employed pretty quick and I was just writing and I got some good writing gigs for Topman and Siemens and some other big companies. And then that got me a job in an agency. So I started off as an agency called Cuba in Sheffield and basically got to build up a content marketing offering from there. Did sort of everything from start to finish. So it was a good way of learning everything. So yeah, I’ve been around for a while. Most recently, I was content marketing director at Rise at Seven. And then, yeah, like five months ago now, I co-founded and set up Bold Imagination with two of the colleagues from Rise. And we publicly launched about seven weeks ago. And yes, it’s gone really well so far.

Louise Parker: Yeah, congratulations on the new agency launch. It seems to be going very well from everything you can see on like Twitter and things like that. But I mean, like I mentioned in the intro, that is actually one of the real reasons we wanted to speak to you because it’s not you don’t always get the opportunity to speak to someone at the beginning of their kind of agency life when they’ve started it themselves. So I imagine there was lots of decisions that you’ve been making in the last couple of months around how you want your agency to come across and what you want your culture to be. So, yeah, we would love to dig into that subject. I guess a quite good place to start is what does company culture mean to you and why do you think it is important?

Luke Cope: Yeah, it’s something that we we had quite a bit of time to plan out. And so along with our offering, it was like, what type of agency do we want to create, which is was quite nice to sit and think about before sort of launching and then thinking about that after we’ve launched. And it’s something I felt I’ve been part of in lots of other agents I’ve worked at. So I’ve organized Christmas dues. I’ve always liked to feel part of the company that I’m working at. And so in terms of what it means to me, it’s like a big part of working, of working life. I like being part of those kind of agencies and feeling sort of integral to it. I see it probably more as a set of values that are more guidelines. So the actual culture is probably going to be formed by our employees. So it’s not going to be formed by the values that we stick on the wall in the office or anything like that. We’re going to say this is the kind of place we want it to be. And then I imagine employees are going to kind of make that that kind of culture themselves and interpret it how they want to interpret it and I think that can like ebb and flow in different agencies and sometimes it can change slightly depending what type of people you have and what kind of groups come in to those to those to the companies as well so I’ll see it as something that like it’s probably going to be set by the employees but we’ll give a set of guidelines of what it is Like I said, it’s always been important to me and I think we spend like 75% of our days at work so we might as well create places that it’s enjoyable to work and work around like-minded people.

Louise Parker: Yeah, definitely.

Stephen Baker: Yeah. I mean, it’s so fascinating to hear you sort of talk about like how important it is to you, but how it’s going to be led by the employees. You also referenced, I just wanted to pick up on it because I think I share the same view, but like, you know, where you have like the values stuck on the wall. What do you think of that kind of thing? Like where you’ve got like, you know, pride or sort of that kind of thing. What do you make of it? Is it something you do? Yeah, are you going to have words?

Luke Cope: Yeah, what words are you going to have? Yeah, we’re going to get imprinted on pillows in the office. No, it’s like, I think it’s like, like I said, it’s more of a guideline. No one wakes up every day and thinks, like one of our values is use your imagination. They’re not going to skip to work and think I’m going to use my imagination today. It’s a set of guidelines and they’re going to insert how they see fit. I don’t think it’s something you can really hammer into people and say. It’s stuff that you can reinforce, but there’s no real need to as long as they know what kind of agency they’re at and the kind of the culture they’re at and like I said they’re not going to look at a sign in the kitchen and be inspired every day it’s going to be what they’re actually doing as opposed to almost what I was really keen on not doing is coming up with values for the sake of it and just having them there enough you know you can do sometimes at like a board level or SLT level you can you can almost do activities for the sake of it and never actually feel it was down it’s stuff you’ve done So I’m very keen for that not to be the case and not just be a set of words that we pulled together because we felt like we needed to sort of thing.

Louise Parker: Yeah, I think sometimes it can become like a weird test where like the words are just there for you to remember because someone at some point more senior than you might be like, what are our values? Repeat them for me. You’re like, oh crap, I can remember three of them, but what’s the fourth one? But yeah, you’re right. It’s good to use it as like that kind of something that everything kind of falls from and you can Sorry, what was the one that you said? It was imagination.

Luke Cope: Use your imagination.

Louise Parker: Yeah, that’s so applicable for so many different facets of agency life from your work to how you’re going to run fun things and stuff like that. It’s really nice. It’s a good one.

Stephen Baker: How much do you want to be known for the culture at Bottled Imagination? Obviously, the work is going to be super important, but some agencies, they really push like, this is a great place to work, the culture is amazing. We’re obviously going to talk more about that in a bit, but how much do you want to be known for it at Bottled Imagination?

Luke Cope: Yeah, I think we’re very keen. When we were launching, the main concern is like, can we get work in and can we pay people if we hire people, that kind of thing. So we’re still at that kind of stage of let’s create something and then let’s think about that integrates with how, what kind of agency we want to be. But it’s been a big part of our conversations. And like Katie in particular has said multiple times, she wants to create a very good place to work. And then once you say that, you want to, then you’ve got to think about how to actually do that and how to implement it and at what stages certain perks come in and that kind of stuff. Yeah, I think I’m really wanting like a real culture, Not something that is blasted out on social as being awesome and I don’t know what it’s like to work at a lot of agencies But every agency looks awesome to work out if you just look at social media, so I want something that people just really enjoy Enjoy coming to work enjoy doing Good quality work and don’t wish away their days of the week. I think that’s the main thing I don’t want people not wanting to come to work on a Sunday night. That’s like my absolute worst nightmare of running a company So we’re going to basically do whatever we can to make it enjoyable place to work for people. I

Louise Parker: Obviously you’ve started your agency, I guess, can we say we’ve come out of Covid? Probably not officially, but we’re out of lockdowns and things like that. off the back of COVID and lockdowns, the kind of flexibility of where people can work, what people want from their role has changed a lot. There’s been quite a shift basically from 2020 to now. How has that kind of like impacted what you’re doing within your agency? So could you imagine basically if you were starting your agency in 2019, would it feel quite different to the agency that you’re starting now? What has changed in these last couple of years?

Luke Cope: Yeah, it’s, I think it, I think it’s inevitably changed things and made things a bit more difficult. I think I joined, uh, right at seven and then seven weeks later we went into a lockdown. So I was kind of in that, in, in that boat where I’d met people. Um, but then we basically grew an agency during the, during the lockdown, the first lockdown. Um, so I felt like at the time we robbed a lot of our celebrating of those wins and stuff like that. Cause we were just sat on our sofas. Um, we couldn’t really do anything together or anything. But I think at least everyone was in the same boat then. So we literally couldn’t go outside, we’re all in lockdown, we’re all working remote. And I think now it’s the hybrid switch is going to make things slightly more difficult to make it consistent between working from home and coming into the office. So it’s definitely changed things. I think it’s made it slightly more difficult. We’re currently working from our Manchester office like two, three days a week, which is a co-working space and we’re basically Those are the days everyone goes in and we meet, because we’re brand new, we’re getting brand new staff in. Those are the days that we certainly want to go. We’ll go out for lunch, we’ll go out for dinner. We get to know each other. And then we’ll get a better understanding of what kind of agency this is going to be versus what we thought it was going to be as well. And it’s a lot easier to do that in person, there’s no doubt. But we are being flexible with things as well, because things have changed and it seems that It seems a little bit archaic now to expect everyone to go five days a week to an office.

Stephen Baker: I mean, it’s something that me and Lou talk about quite a lot. It’s one of the biggest challenges. You mentioned there like consistency and making sure you’re sort of growing a culture despite people being like dotted all around the country. Because it feels like such a long time ago, we were all coming into the office like every day and sort of having that, like getting to know each other, sort of all of the kind of, I hate the word, I’m trying to think of another, banter. What’s another word for banter? I really need a better word. That’s a good one. I was going to ask about how easy or difficult it’s been to kind of attract staff because obviously when you’re an existing agency that has been around for a while, you kind of, you can get a sense quite easily online and through speaking to people who’ve already worked there like what the culture’s like. you’re brand new and obviously people know about you and your work and your co-founders work, but how have you sold the company to people or how easy have you found it to attract from brand new, if you don’t mind me asking?

Luke Cope: Yeah, I think it’s a similar challenge with the clients as well as the staff. We’ve got to tell a story about how we got there, what we wanted to be. So we’ve just tried to do that. And I think there’s I think a startup is like this that is very small right now is going to appeal to a certain type of person as well. The type of person that wants to create something over inheriting something. And that is like a massive appeal of joining a startup. And I’ve really enjoyed it in the past. So I think the chance for someone to come in and be part of creating that culture is like a big appeal in itself. They’re not joining a culture that they already know about. that they may or may not like or may not get on board with everything they’ve got a chance to basically help create it and that we’re very keen to try and get them as part of the process as well to create the culture so I think that’s a big appeal and that’s kind of a big selling point and I think also transparency so risk and things like that discussing it early on saying this is where we are at currently this is where we want to be we’re going to be slightly riskier to join than an established agency that’s been around 10 years, they’ve got 4 million quid in the bank. So I think being transparent about all those things and then therefore it’s not a shock when they’re joining a startup and they’re in a slightly different environment to an established agency, for example. So yeah, I think transparency and then getting them to be part of it and getting them to buy in early to it and actually end up creating that culture is quite a big appeal to a certain type of person.

Louise Parker: Yeah, definitely. Yeah, no, I definitely agree. I think it’s it gives you because even if I assume even if you’re coming in or maybe a slightly more junior position or because it is so fresh, you can feel like you’re shaping an agency that will hopefully be around for years and years and years. And that’s a really cool thing to be part of. And will give a sense of camaraderie that you can’t really get in an agency that’s really well established because a lot of places are often set in their ways, take a lot of time to make changes. So yeah, this is a kind of perk I’d never really considered.

Luke Cope: I think if you win a client and you’re an agency of 200 people and there’s a corner of three people that were celebrating that win, for example, it’s a lot different if your whole agency is celebrating that win, which is what’s going to happen for the next six months, a year at least. So it’s quite nice to be really, really involved in it.

Louise Parker: obviously we had a little bit of an early chitchat, but just to get all our cards on the table in terms of what you like in terms of agency culture, we have a bit of a quickfire round, that’s what I’m trying to get at, where we have listed out a number of perks and culture-based things that often agencies have or have had or are trending at the moment, and we would love to get your thoughts on them. Don’t feel like you need to give loads of explanation, you can just say, hate it, love it, and we can move on.

Stephen Baker: But if you want to elaborate, then… Oh, I’m going to do some digging at some of them. We had a lot of fun… I’m really trying not to trip up on this section. Just to clarify, this is not a quiz, it’s just to get your thoughts.

Louise Parker: Yes. So, let’s start off with, I mentioned it in the intro, office ping pong tables. Yay or nay?

Luke Cope: a stereotype, but why not? Like I said, I’ve worked in some places like call centres and Burger King and I think it’s nice that I’ve got a ping pong table. It shouldn’t be the only incentive, but why not?

Louise Parker: All the money is going on the ping pong table and that’s all.

Luke Cope: Yeah, basically. That’s what I’m saying.

Stephen Baker: I completely agree. We had one at Propellernet for a while and we actually had an office table tennis tournament and it was genuinely some of the best lunch times I’ve ever had. Like really, really good fun.

Luke Cope: There’s always a secret ping-pong table player as well. There’s always a table tennis player at the office that just doesn’t say anything and they’re amazing as soon as they get on it.

Stephen Baker: Because I was pretty good and there was this guy called Mark who no longer works with us but he was insanely good and I actually got too competitive so I think it almost like had a had a negative effect on the culture because again I could have been a grown-up but I was irritable because I lost so yeah.

Louise Parker: Counterpoint is that I know of an agency and they had to get rid of the ping-pong table because someone complained that the noise was driving them absolutely up the wall which I’m like I guess if you’re not playing ping-pong the sound of a ping-pong ball bouncing and also probably hitting you in the head now and again might get a bit annoying but it’s contentious. Second one, alcohol-based fun. I think this is something that’s been talked about more and more recently.

Luke Cope: It’s not a more serious one, but about whether that is a… I’m okay with it, but it needs to be inclusive for everyone and it can’t be your sole way of organising events. Good answer.

Stephen Baker: Yeah, totally agree.

Louise Parker: Totally agree. Company holidays. Full disclosure, Propellner and I are going on a skiing trip next year, so… As in all going away together?

Luke Cope: Yes. Company holiday. Myself, James and Katie went away before we launched and I know them pretty well and that was fine. If it was with a load of people I’m not comfortable with, then I’d probably struggle, but I’m not the barometer on social awkwardness. Why not?

Stephen Baker: Make of that what you will. I’m intrigued. I want to dig away there.

Luke Cope: Why are you not the barometer? I’d feel bad if someone was sharing a room with me. I’d be like, this isn’t going to be that much fun for you kind of thing. Just level with them early on. This is not going to be fun. Yeah, I’m going to find the next awkward person to me and be like, let’s team up and then we don’t have to take part in everything sort of thing. No, I think they’re pretty cool. I think that’s quite a cool incentive. Depends where you go. Like a ski trip sounds amazing. So I think to be able to pay for stuff to go and do something like that in a few years would be pretty cool.

Louise Parker: Yeah, I think you don’t have to go, which I think is the key with these things. Imagine it’s like you’re forced on the slopes. But yeah, if it’s not your thing, then you don’t have to. But yeah, I’m like, free holiday, I’m there.

Stephen Baker: Yeah, why not?

Louise Parker: Charity days. So not taking holiday days, but allowing your employees to take days off to do charity work.

Luke Cope: Oh, cool. Yeah, I like that.

Stephen Baker: I’m not going to say I’m anti-charity. That’s why I think Lou was trying to trip you up there by getting a soundbite. It’s like, Luke co-founder of Bottle of Imagination is anti-charity.

Luke Cope: Two months in and I’ve ruined everything.

Louise Parker: Office dogs?

Luke Cope: Absolute necessity for my well-being. I think they should probably be paid a salary. So I say hello to people’s dogs before I say hello to them usually if they bring their dog in.

Louise Parker: That’s great.

Stephen Baker: See, I love dogs. I do genuinely love dogs. I’m kind of with you on it. But we have had some experiences where, you know, like a dog sort of like weed on the carpet when like clients were in and there was like some bark, you know, just just some stuff that and it ended up getting banned for a while, didn’t it? Like or stopped for a while. And now because it’s remote, it just doesn’t really happen. But I love it. I think they aid well-being and create a lovely feel and kind of, yeah, culture. But it can be risky.

Luke Cope: it’s when someone brings their dog in it, it sort of gives me nothing back. That’s when I’m against it, you know what I mean?

Louise Parker: Yeah, because that’s upsetting.

Luke Cope: Yeah, I know. Yeah, it just hurts my feelings the rest of the day. So as long as they’re friendly, then yeah.

Louise Parker: Pro. We kind of touched on this earlier, but mandatory office days. So you have to go in on X day.

Luke Cope: I think if you’ve joined a company and that’s been discussed before you’ve joined or early on, then yeah, you’re joining that type of company that’s saying that they want you in on the next day. So I think if you do that, you shouldn’t be shocked that you have to do it. But for me, I think a hybrid is like totally fine. I think it just needs to be discussed early on on an individual basis, I think, and make it fair company wide.

Louise Parker: Yeah, yeah, because I think at the time of recording, Twitter, I think, have just announced or Elon has just announced that all Twitter employees have to suddenly go back to the office. And it’s just been really, yeah, I don’t know if it’s actually going to happen.

Luke Cope: But there’s people in there’s people in Ireland that live nowhere near Dublin or wherever their headquarters is that are now supposed to move in a week or something.

Louise Parker: Yeah, so obviously that’s like completely unreasonable.

Stephen Baker: I miss that, that is ridiculously unreasonable if you’ve got a job remote and it’s like, no, sorry, you do need to move now. Yeah. Shocking that.

Louise Parker: And I think I don’t think that is going to instill a good culture when you’re being forced to do something that, yeah, you haven’t signed up for. So the whole point, if you’re like, hey, this is going to make everything better, you’re like, well, people are just starting off on the wrong foot there by forcing them in. Employee of the week schemes. It feels quite old school, but I think there’s like different versions of them in agencies. But that kind of like end of the week, end of the month, oh, so and so, you have been the best at this or you’ve got the most links or yada yada, that kind of thing.

Luke Cope: The only time I’ve seen it done is Employee of the Month Awards and that was usually given to someone who they were worried about leaving that month. That’s the only time I’ve actually seen it implemented. It was actually pretty successful at retaining them for another month sort of thing. So I’ve never really seen it done that well and I think it’s quite also quite, you just mentioned Lynx there as well, it’s quite hard It’s almost like digital PRs could be the strikers as well and they can get the glory, but actually someone in technical SEO may have done something amazing that month and it’s less tangible. So it’s quite hard to make bear across different teams, I think. Yeah. Yeah. So I’ve never really seen it done spectacularly well.

Louise Parker: So not probably on the list for old imagination then?

Luke Cope: Not at the minute. And also it’d just be between like four of us at the moment.

Stephen Baker: Imagine if you didn’t win ever.

Luke Cope: I know. I vote for myself most weeks, but I’ll probably be outvoted.

Louise Parker: Bonuses?

Luke Cope: I think coming back to fairness. It’s hard, it’s a hard one to get right. So I think in some scenarios, and this is probably similar to commission type stuff, but you can go on a pitch, for example, with someone from new business, they might not say anything, but they might get commissioned for that win, for example. So it comes down to fairness. So it needs to be consistent, even with Christmas bonuses or anything like that, across teams and across the whole company, else you’re going to annoy a lot of people, I imagine.

Louise Parker: Propellernet is the first place that I got a bonus from, like other places that I was… You got a bonus? Steve, please. We all got bonuses and I was really impressed because obviously I started quite junior and the bonuses are the same for everyone. So it’s not a percentage of your salary, it’s not a different amount dependent on your performance or your level or anything, it’s just like equal across everyone which I think is nice.

Luke Cope: I’ve had them before as well and you know it’s nice but I’ve also felt a bit guilty about getting them if someone else hasn’t got them as well.

Louise Parker: Away days. So getting your team together, going to a manor house or going to anywhere, Alton Towers.

Luke Cope: Yeah, I think I’ve worked at university after finishing uni, so my experience of away days is slightly more mundane than that and it wasn’t as much fun at all. Yeah, I think I’m for it. Why not? We did quite a lot of that stuff at Riser 7 and it was always quite fun. I don’t think you have to make it mandatory though.

Louise Parker: having to put your own money into a birthday fund for your colleagues.

Luke Cope: OK, depends if I like them or not. And now, now it’s my staff I’m going to have to do it. So I haven’t really got a choice. I was joking on the first point. But yeah, yeah, I’m going to have to do it now. I run a company. Yeah.

Stephen Baker: I wanted to add to this one because when Lou put this down and we looked at it, I then just added a little bit just saying birthday doughnuts. And I don’t know who invented this, who came up with it, why they thought it was a good idea. But you know, like back when we were all working in the office all the time and it was your birthday, you were kind of expected to bring in doughnuts or cakes for everyone. It’s like, but it’s my birthday, buy me things. Like why are you buying them for everyone else? Like why doesn’t just maybe everyone have a whip round and get you some doughnuts that you can then choose to share if you want to?

Luke Cope: I agree. I try and keep it on the down low as much as possible and if anyone, so when they get together and sing happy birthday and that kind of stuff and it’s my birthday, I try and make that as not enjoyable as possible for everyone else as well. So I will give nothing back until they stop and then… The birthday Grinch, if you will.

Stephen Baker: I like it.

Luke Cope: I’ve got to enjoy it as well, haven’t I?

Stephen Baker: Yeah, get something out of it.

Louise Parker: What are your feelings towards unlimited holiday? Again, another big kind of thing that’s happened in the last couple of years.

Luke Cope: Yeah, I think some take too little, some people take too much. It requires a staff not to misuse it and I don’t know if I have the right kind of answer for it, but I don’t think we’ll be implementing it. I don’t know if you do it with Propellernet at all. We do.

Stephen Baker: Yeah, we do. But to be honest, it started not as a sort of dreamed of as a perk for staff necessarily, like, oh, this is going to be able to attract staff. And it was mainly because of COVID, because obviously no one could go anywhere. So everyone was like, kind of gathering up their holiday allowance. And it was like, well, actually, we need to find a way of making this work. And then we started it, trialed it for a year. exactly as you said, Luke, as long as staff don’t abuse, it actually works quite well. Because for me, it’s like where you can take, I think we said you can take the odd day. If you just like want to do something for yourself that day, and you’re not like counting the holiday days, it can work quite nicely. But ultimately, it’s almost exactly the same. It doesn’t change that much. No one’s going to take that. I’m just taking nine weeks off. Cheers. Bye. You know, that’s not going to happen.

Louise Parker: Yeah, we also, like quarterly, are checking that people are taking them. And some people are absolutely fine with taking holidays, no issues. And then, like you said, there are some people who just, for whatever reason, just aren’t taking them. And maybe not having a number makes that harder for them. So I sometimes think, I was like, just aim for like 28 days. Because that’s a really healthy amount of holiday days. And I just think like, if you need a number, that’s a good one to aim for. And then if you need to take more, great.

Luke Cope: And I think we’ll probably just do that. We’ll give generous holiday. And I think that’ll be the case.

Stephen Baker: If you love what you do, you’re always on holiday. That’s a phrase that I’m going to try and instill at the agency and the team. I’ve just thought of that.

Luke Cope: I’m going to put that in the kitchen.

Louise Parker: This is going to be similar to Chow today, surely, but mental health support in terms of an employer offering it. What are your thoughts?

Luke Cope: hope goes against mental health support is what you’re trying to get. Yeah it’s becoming a necessity isn’t it like it’s I really want an environment where that’s accepted and understood at the very least and we want to create an environment where that’s an option for sure like I just think it’s it’s just a necessity now and it’s unfortunate that it is but yeah we definitely want to create an environment where that’s an offering sort of thing.

Louise Parker: Work from anywhere in the world policy?

Luke Cope: Again, I’ve worked in the mail room where they had no windows when I was younger, so that sort of thing to me is just unreal that we can actually do that in this industry. I think we’re going to try and do it. I think we need to figure out the legalities behind it, but to have at least a brief period over the year where like two weeks out of the year you can go work from wherever you want, that’s something we’re probably going to try and offer, I think. Yeah.

Louise Parker: Nice. Nice. Free snacks. And if you’re pro free snacks, then what free snacks?

Luke Cope: I will just eat anything that’s there. So it needs to be like, I’m sort of annoying when I see like fruit and stuff, but then that means I just eat the fruit instead of whatever else is put there. So as long as there’s a nice mixture of healthy stuff, we had like free cereal at my previous agency. So I was having like three bowls of cereal a day. So it’s like, yeah, I mean, I’m for it. Just please put some healthy stuff there. So I’ll just eat whatever’s there.

Louise Parker: In the Propellernet kitchen, I don’t know if you’ve noticed, Steve, but there’s recently been an introduction of crunchy nut, and I swear that’s to try and entice people to come to the office more.

Stephen Baker: So is that actually, sorry to clarify, this is an important clarification, Luke, apologies, but is that for staff? I thought that was someone’s private crunchy nut, so I’ve not been taking advantage. I’ve been taking advantage. Was there an announcement about this? I don’t know. You’ve been eating someone’s crunchy nut. Cut this out, cut this whole podcast. We’re going to have to, yeah, definitely cut this bit out.

Luke Cope: I’d stay in this podcast room if I was you.

Louise Parker: And a last one, which seems a strange perk, but you do see it now and again, is your own laptop.

Luke Cope: I mean, this is a perk on our website as well, which I only realised before I was about to take the mickey out of it. But you kind of need one, don’t you, to be able to do the job. It is actually on the site. But yeah, I mean, you just need one. It’s not really a perk. It’s just part of it.

Louise Parker: Sorry, that wasn’t a pointed point. I did not realise that.

Luke Cope: No, I didn’t know. I don’t really know how to use a Mac, which is quite an embarrassing thing to say. I look old when I’m using a Mac, basically. I look uncomfortable. So I was the only one at an agency about 100 people with a Windows. So I was immediately segregated. So you’ve got to be careful with that.

Stephen Baker: Well, thank you for indulging us with that quick fire round. It is really enlightening. And actually, there’s a lot of kind of stuff that you would consider as essential, some that’s a little bit more old school. The follow up question to that is, in general, do you think like what employees kind of want from agency culture has shifted? And if so, kind of how? Like how do you think it’s changed?

Luke Cope: Yeah, quite possibly has changed, I think. When I was a recent graduate and stuff when I was younger, all I heard about agencies and how it was different was that it’s more full-on. You work harder, longer hours and all that sort of stuff. There’s more of a hustle culture. And that is the association with agencies over the years, I think. And now it’s probably switching to people want a better work-life balance and they want the perks and security that you get in-house, but at an agency. So we can see in that mirror the list of benefits that agencies are offering from like four day weeks to unlimited holidays and that kind of stuff. And it’s become almost like a bit of a perk war, but it’s been driven by the people. They want certain things now that they didn’t get in the past. And I don’t think it’s a lot to ask to have a good work-life balance at an agency. It shouldn’t be out of the question. So yeah, I think rightfully probably it’s shifting. What people want is shifting, definitely.

Louise Parker: Do you think maybe people are going from, you kind of touched on it, but from kind of physical things that they might have wanted or experiences that they might have wanted, for example, like being taken to Thought Park every month, to actually, like you said, the more work-life balancing, so more like an agency is set up to facilitate a better kind of working experience rather than maybe the ping pong tables and the free cereal and things like that?

Luke Cope: I think that’s it. I think if you think what the average person is going through now, they’re probably going through some sort of mental health problems or something and maybe even financial problems or their family might be and stuff like that. So when it comes down to it, people want to be paid a fair wage. They want decent balance in their life so they can, you know, they can feel normal and it’s not all about work. And when you’re, if you try and replace that with, we’re going to Thorpe Park today, people are going to be like, I don’t really want to do that. I just want to finish at 5.30 and see my family and that kind of thing.

Stephen Baker: I totally agree. I think it’s really interesting to hear you say that because I totally agree. I reckon if I was asked what would you strip away from the culture at Propellernet, I’d sort of take away everything before I took away work-life balance because I think that’s one thing we do really, really well. I hear so many horror stories. I had a mate years ago who got a new job at an agency in London. I certainly won’t name them, but he went in at like, I think like half eight on his first day and the contracted hours were like nine. He basically got told, oh no, we will turn up at kind of half seven. And he left within a few weeks. And I think you’re right, Luke, because he’s people doing that, people taking charge that say, no, I’m just not going to stand for it. Like, yeah, occasionally I have to work through a lunch or a little bit later because stuff needs doing and stuff comes up last minute, but it should be the exception rather than the rule. Like we all have lives and actually we’re going to talk about burnout in a bit, but it’s just, it’s like the fastest way to burn out if you’re constantly working. So yeah, I totally agree. Yeah, exactly.

Louise Parker: A lot of those examples that we ran through, some of them do involve having budget available to pay for them. And some of them are very much worth that budget. But as a new agency, what’s the importance in terms of having the money available to do certain things that are going to aid your company culture? And what can you do for free or nearly free, you know, that might be helpful for other people who might be thinking of starting their own agency?

Luke Cope: Yeah, I think you probably need some. So like, I like the thought of having like little rituals. So whether that’s like a curry club or a book club, something you do each month as an agency to get people together, a gaming night, whatever that might be. And sometimes they require a little bit of budget. And it’s, it’s also not going out for a meal now isn’t cheap at all, like which we’re finding out. So it’s, it’s that kind of stuff where it used to be actually, you could probably pay like not loads and loads of money to have to go for a meal with like five, six members of staff is actually quite expensive now. So I guess if you’re the type of agency that has stuff like ping pong tables and pool tables and I know gaming area and stuff like that. You can probably host quite a lot of stuff within the office and it’d still be fun. And that won’t require as much budget. But yeah, I like the little things that I’ve done at past agencies where we’d have pizza and pool night once a month and that was where everyone got together. We ordered some drinks in, they got dominoes and that was good. Everyone looked forward to that. So I think there’s stuff you can do without breaking the bank and you gotta try and find that fine line between okay let’s go on a nice walk with because no one’s going to want to do that with me like so I feel like we need some sort of budget usually to try and like force the fun a little bit.

Stephen Baker: So where do you get your ideas from for how to sort of shape or kind of improve the culture for you and your staff? I know you’re a small team now, but it’s going to be growing. And is it sort of a bit of trial and error? Is it a bit of learning from, you know, cultures that you’ve worked at previously? Like, where do you get your thoughts from for that?

Luke Cope: I think, yeah, we’ve all worked at a few different places now. So we’re going to bring in some of what you enjoy from those places inevitably. We’re so So new it’s still being defined kind of thing. We’ve got one member of staff. We’re hiring another two, which we should get in soon, hopefully So it’s going to be more obvious about what what it feels like to work here in a couple of months I think for especially for our staff and but I think I’m keen like I said, I’m keen to get them involved I want feedback from them on what they want to be doing and even to the point where you know where we can actually get them involved in organizing the company fund or be part of that if they’re actually like really bought into the agency and they want to want to do that kind of thing and So I’m really keen to get them to feedback on it in terms of what we actually end up doing. We’re trying to introduce things that we’re not even reinforcing yet. So we’ve gone out for a meal and we’re going to do that once a month. That kind of thing, I can see us saying we’re going to do it and then you don’t always do it. So we’ve got to try and reinforce it ourselves as well and make sure we actually do it. And that’s the thing that’s in. like a weekly end of week unbottled where we talk through everything that’s happened that week and say this, you know, this is the clients we’re speaking to, this is the cool work we’ve done, this is what X has done and they’ve done amazing, that kind of thing. Those little things, like we’re just trying, we’re gradually trying to introduce them. So I’m keen to do more and more of that and then eventually get the staff to feedback and suggest things as well.

Louise Parker: That’s really nice talking about the transparency of what work has been happening this week and what people have done and what people have learned. You know, you’re using that as an example of how you’re starting out your culture, which is a really good example of how it isn’t all about trips and it isn’t all about things and spending money necessarily. But it’s creating an environment that feels really open. And I imagine there’s a lot of congratulations as well. So people feel really appreciated and they know what’s going on. And that’s something I think like where our team has grown like in the last couple of years. And we went from, especially when you’re in an office, obviously very easy to keep people abreast with that kind of stuff. It’s been something where we’ve had to make a conscious effort to make sure people are aware of what’s going on outside of their own clients and stuff like that. And it’s something that you can easily kind of forget about, how that can really help with the culture and how people kind of feel within a team.

Luke Cope: Yeah, you don’t feel isolated than if you’re just coming in and doing your job and going home and not really knowing what’s going on. We did our first kind of like financial update the other week and that was like the first we’ve only got like one employee so it’s literally a sound sat around a laptop saying we’re doing well kind of thing. We’re trying to figure out how transparent we want to be and what information people need and stuff and like I said we’ll probably learn more over the next few months on that.

Louise Parker: Are there any like particular companies and it might be outside of SEO and digital PR but are there any companies that you look to and think have created great culture and kind of aspire to be like?

Luke Cope: I don’t know if it’s going to make me sound bad. And I’m like this with the actual work. So I’m like this with the work that’s going on in particular in our industry, but I don’t really look at what other people are doing. So there’s a couple of reasons why I don’t. The work side is slightly different to the culture side, but I don’t know what it’s like to work at those places. So I could say I want to build a culture like Gymshark, for example, I actually have no idea what it’s like to work there. we all know social media is the highlight reel. So I don’t, I wouldn’t want to be basing our culture off something that looks good and actually might not be, for example. And then I’m also a big fan of like creating something instead of inheriting something. So we’re inevitably gonna bring through stuff that we worked at past agencies and stuff like that, that’s just gonna happen. So we kind of are doing that. But I don’t do loads of like, oh, I wish we were like them, or I’m looking into why they’re doing that, that’s cool, because it just might not be. Like, I just don’t know, without working there myself. So yeah, we’re going to try our best to create something. And like I said, I’m similar on the work side where I don’t, if all I look at is Propellernet campaigns, then all I’m thinking about is Propellernet campaigns when I’m doing idea gen and stuff like that. So we’re trying to do our own thing and we’re inevitably going to bring through stuff, like I said. But yeah, I’m not really very good at that, looking at other people.

Stephen Baker: That’s so refreshing to hear because I think we do have quite like a or the digital marketing or digital PR culture is quite like inward facing in lots of ways. We do kind of look at a lot of other people. There’s lots of lovely stuff, like lots of great sharing of tips and like here’s, you know, and fails as well and things like that. But just to hear someone say, actually, I wanna create it for myself. I’m gonna take bits that I’ve learned. I’m not gonna, cause you’re absolutely right. We, it’s so easy to make that judgment and go, I wanna, cause I’ve always thought I’d wanna work at, or see what it’s like to work at Paddy Power. Cause they always look like they’re having a right

Luke Cope: laugh.

Stephen Baker: Essentially, that’s because they’re creating videos to make people laugh. I don’t know. It might be awful to work at. You’re right. You’re not going to know until you work there. Why not create something that you’re proud of, that you want to do? That’s great.

Luke Cope: Exactly. I also think I’ve set up a business before in 2017. I compared myself to death to everyone. I think it’s the comparison thing that doesn’t do as much good in real life either on Instagram and stuff like that. Yeah this time around I’m trying not to be like I wish we were doing that or that looks cool and just be like we’re just going to do our own thing and hope it works.

Stephen Baker: Yeah so what in your opinion motivates people to do better work? Like we really like the look of what you’re doing and the industry does at Bottled Imagination and like how you’ve shaped it and the work’s going to be super important but how do you actually kind of get your staff, how do you motivate them to do better work?

Luke Cope: Yeah, I think that’s a really good question. I think it’s just come from working with basically 100 over 100 individuals as well. I think that’s, that’s it, you’ve got groups of individuals that are motivated by different, different things. And if you treat them all the same, then it’s not going to work. And I think it’s, it’s trying to understand those different types of people, what their motive, what they are motivated by. So my motivations, I know, and I was probably confused at this when I was like 27 ish, maybe like, I know now that they are financial and I want to leave a legacy of work behind and I won’t sacrifice either of those so I won’t build a legacy of work for no money and I won’t get paid a load of money for not doing good work so I’m aware of that now but it’s trying to find out on an individual basis with the staff like what are they actually motivated by and I think like we said with one of our values is use your imagination And that can be can be translated to a lots of different types of people as well. So that might be using your imagination, try and find new data sources or to come up with campaign ideas that have not been done before. I think consistently across the company, we do want people to feel creative and they want to feel free and express in their creativity and stuff. So people to be motivated by that and to do to be doing good work. But I think it’s on an individual basis. We did this profiles and stuff that previous agencies and people are just wildly different. And they’re going to be motivated by different types of things. So I think it’s just trying to understand that and then trying to group these people into different types of people and then trying to understand what they’re actually motivated by.

Stephen Baker: Yeah, that makes perfect sense, because a catch-all, like for, okay, we’re either going to offer, I don’t know, unlimited holiday or bonuses, because some people are going to be really motivated by that, but others are going to want exactly what you’ve just described. Like, I want to feel free creatively and not restrained, or I want to, I need constant praise, or some people really need like direct feedback in the moment, others struggle with that. So I think you’re absolutely right.

Louise Parker: You’re talking about how you motivate people and how you can motivate people at work and do better work. How do you address failure? So that could be failure, things that might not be going to plan within your agency or it might be things that you feel that you have failed at because it’s quite hard to maintain a good positive agency culture while also saying, look, this could have been better or let’s improve on this.

Luke Cope: Failure is quite a big one for me, which makes me sound like a bit of a loser, to be honest. But like, it’s one of those things that you look at the time is awful, but you look back on and I’ve had like two big, big failures before. So like I set up a company in 2017, I wanted it to be amazing. And it didn’t take off like it got close. I’ve had pitches with Google and Sega and stuff, but I really wanted to do well and it didn’t at all. I had to go back and work in another agency. But looking back on those sort of things now, they’re the most important important elements of my life now. So instead of viewing it like a failure, I view it like I made all of those mistakes and now I set up another agency and I’m not making those mistakes again. So I think you’ve just got to look at it like that within yourself and also with the staff and If we’re encouraging creativity in different types of thoughts and different types of campaigns, there’s probably going to be some failure within that. And you can’t encourage that and then hammer people for failing, for example. Providing constructive feedback is really difficult as well, and you’ve got to try and do that so you get the best out of them the next time around as well. So yeah, I think, like I said, I’ve had a couple of big failures and I think about it a lot. something we’re not we don’t want to be in a an agency that fails and stuff like that but um i think there’s going to be failure we we as founders are going to make mistakes and we’re going to make small failures hopefully not big ones and it’s just about uh how you react to them i think as well i’ve been in scenarios before where i’ve lost big clients and How we reacted to that, for example, means now if we ever lost a big client again, I’d react accordingly because I’ve been through that experience. And I think if a member of staff goes through that experience, it’s about guiding them through that. So next time they are prepared for how they’re going to feel and also have a look back about how we might be able to prevent it. Sometimes you can do amazing stuff and you can still fail as well. So I worked really hard on my first business and I still failed. because I was sat at a laptop for 12, 14 hours a day and I felt guilty being away from the laptop, whereas now I know I probably need a lunch break and I probably need to do this and to do that to keep me sort of sane and well and therefore I’m going to perform better in my business anyway, so I think Yeah, learning from it is just a big thing, and I’m going to try and encourage that. They’re not always easy conversations, and some people are harder on themselves than others as well, so it’s trying to understand on an individual basis, again, about how to best deal with that.

Stephen Baker: You referenced there the 12 to 14 hour days when you were setting up your previous business. And this is quite a blunt question, because obviously you’re just starting out with a new agency. And I know from friends and from a little bit of experience as well, when you’re trying to build a company from scratch, you really do have to put the hours in, but you’re obviously trying it differently this time. The question really is, how are you managing or how will you manage work-life balance for both you and your team? Because you need time away, but you also need to invest quite a lot of time to get things up and running. Is that a real challenge at the moment?

Luke Cope: Yes, I think there’s a minimum amount of work you have to put in to make something like this work. There’s that, but then there’s different types of work. There’s effective work or there’s being sat worried about stuff and procrastinating and stuff like that. For me personally, I’m trying to do the most effective work possible. And if I do really effective work in seven hours, that is way better than non-effective work for 12, 14 hours, which is something I know now. From a staff point of view, they don’t work after 5.30, it’s just not gonna happen. So if it is happening, and occasionally agencies, you know, being in flux of work, it can happen sometimes. If it’s consistently happening and there’s something wrong with our processes, so we need to look at that and we’ll address that as soon as possible. So, comms is an absolute killer of people. So, Slack, WhatsApp, that can just be a complete drain on people. It means that people are switched on all the time, so there’ll be no Slack after 5.30. WhatsApp between ourselves as founders is probably gonna happen, and we like talking about stuff and that, but if that becomes a problem, then we’re all gonna be transparent about it, too. So, I think, in order to do that, you need trust. So, you can’t be passing on your anxieties to your team so if you feel worried about something or you want to know what’s going on there should be processes in place where you get that information if you’re not getting it and then it comes out in a I’m worried about this direct Slack message to an exec or in the Slack channel you’re passing on your anxieties you’re passing on panic to the staff you’re going to cause overworking because they feel like they’re going to have to try and amend that whereas you should just be getting the information you need so you don’t have to do that Myself, it’s something I’ve struggled with over the years. I’ve been burnt out before. Now I make sure I actually have lunch breaks. I do exercise and stuff like that. I try and finish at 5.30 and then later on I’m back to do some stuff I do. So it’s something that we need to set a precedent off quite early. else we’re not setting a good example as well. So even if it’s amongst ourselves then it’s kind of fair enough at the minute but it’s not long term we’re going to set a precedent of we’re doing this and therefore other people are going to expect to do that because that’s how you can sort of just pass down bad habits as well.

Louise Parker: It’s interesting you mentioned about WhatsApp because you reminded me, I think it was a couple of months ago now, but there was a study maybe, and it was around particularly PR professionals and there was a couple of anonymized case studies and they were talking about burnout and not having great working environments and things like that. And one that did come up a lot was talking about getting messages to your personal phone about work stuff. And that is not something that had really crossed my mind until again, like COVID, because, I mean, like, in a way, I loved talking about work all the time, because there was nothing else to talk about at that point. So I was like, thank God I have this to be thinking about rather than the end of the world. But, you know, now you’ve gone back to normal life. That isn’t, I don’t think, healthy unless, like you said, you’re kind of your founders and you’re doing it, you know, because you’re all accepting of that. But for more like employees and stuff, I personally just don’t think there should, like, on your own personal phone, I just don’t think that’s right. And I think it’s going to make for a very stressful environment if you can’t get away from it.

Luke Cope: It can be perceived as like, oh, don’t reply then, but it’s not on that, it’s on the person messaging. And especially if that person’s more senior messaging someone more junior about work, then you’re putting the onus on that person to then think about work at that time, whatever the time is. And so yeah, it’s something you can’t really do and expect to to not affect people.

Stephen Baker: Yeah it’s setting the tone as you say Luke like you’re the you know you’re the founder you’re you’re like running the company with your co-founders so you’ve got to set the tone as it sounds like you’re doing brilliantly I mean um we try and do it with like holiday for example and I used to be terrible for like checking stuff on holiday not like to the point where I was actually working on holiday but you just get addicted to like whatsapp and slack and email and like oh just stay in touch but actually we’re kind of telling people like if they come on slack when they’re on holiday like go away Enjoy your holiday. We have it under control in the nicest possible way. We will contact you if there’s anything super, super urgent that you haven’t told us. But otherwise, it’s your time. Don’t come back to us. I should say for absolute transparency, Lou does WhatsApp me once a week with new TikTok ideas. She needs my feedback, that kind of thing. So it gets a bit jarring. This sounds toxic. This is what this podcast is going to expose, mine and Lou’s toxic working relationship.

Louise Parker: I’m going to move on to something slightly a bit more serious. I think a few months ago you might have tweeted about how unfortunately you experienced burnout. If you’re comfortable talking about it, I think it would be really interesting because what does the term burnout mean to you? It can mean a lot of different things to different people. And what did you learn from that experience?

Luke Cope: Yeah, I’m more than happy to talk about that sort of stuff. I’m keen for it not to be a buzz term. I felt tired and stressed before it were, like everyone has and stuff. This was something a bit different. Like I said, I’ve had problems switching off before. I’ve been at reasonably paced agencies and that before and sometimes I actually want it to be going quicker and I end up just working out of hours doing random stuff anyway. So I wouldn’t say like, I hate people who say they’re workaholic, but I’m not. I just, I like being plugged into something. And I think at the time I was an agency that was growing crazy. There was basically an endless supply of work. So I was just like, cool, plug myself into it. I can just do everything here. That’s great for me. Keeps me, my mind occupied and stuff like that. But there’s like a shelf life on being able to work like that. you just can’t sustain that for very long. And it’s not like I’ve been taking it easy over the last 10 years anyway. I have been, like I said, I’ve tried to set up companies. I’ve always worked out of hours or freelancers and stuff like that. But this time I started isolating myself. So I started not replying to friends, not seeing friends. I forgot my mom and dad’s birthday until quite late on their day, which I’ve never done before. So basically I was all consumed by work. And then you can get to a point where The glass feels really full and if something happens in your personal life, then that can just tip it over. And it’s not like you wake up one morning and you’re like, I’m burnt out. Sometimes that can happen from what I’ve read. But for me, I just, I went like six months without any emotions at all. So I didn’t feel anything. I didn’t really clock onto it that quickly either. So I was watching the Euros final with England and I’m a football fan. That’s usually something that’d be high emotion for me and I wasn’t enjoying it. And then I thought back to when I last enjoyed watching football or last enjoyed doing something I enjoyed and I couldn’t really remember. And then I just thought I’ve not had actually any emotions for ages. So it crept up a little bit. Like I said, there can be a combination of stuff, but because I prioritise work more than anything, It was easy to overflow and anything in personal life that can kind of tip me over the edge there. So I just, yeah, I needed a bit of time off. I luckily had a few weeks off and even that’s really probably not enough when you’re in that sort of scenario. It’s, it’s probably happened and it’s probably run its course and you probably need a bit of sustained time off to try and reevaluate how you’re working and stuff like that. But I did, I came back and I had an agreement with myself and with other people that this is how I’m going to work now. And I want to, I’m going to adhere to it. I want other people to adhere to it. And I kind of stood by it. So I had lunch breaks. I went to the gym every lunch. I was swimming, I was meditating. I was basically doing everything I can to try and keep myself healthy. And then I followed up on it. So I called out any out of hours contacts and stuff. I remember sending an email on a Sunday night and just said, we agreed not to do this. And this is not how you get the best out of me. If you want to get the best out of me, this is how we do it. So I just protected myself, basically. So I think learning from it is you’ve got to protect yourself from that. There’s going to be a shower of life on working like that. And it’s probably not even the first time I’ve burnt out. It’s probably stuff in the past that I’ve done. So it’s just a case of protecting yourself and being aware of when that’s happening, or even worse scenario for me now, when that would be happening to a staff member. And if I was you know contributing to that even worse so I think it’s something I’m keen to keen to try and make people aware of and make sure that people aren’t aren’t doing that because I was largely doing it to myself as well because that’s the sort of what the kind of person I am I think so um yeah it’s something I learned quite a bit from and yeah luckily I feel like really invigorated now and I’m you know running the company and I definitely don’t feel like I’m you know, burning out or anything like that. So I think I’ve got to a place where I’m trying to protect that a lot better than what I was, for sure.

Stephen Baker: How did, because you, thank you for talking about it, and you know, you obviously sort of tweeted about it, it’s great to sort of, you know, raise awareness of different experiences of it, because it is really, really important, I think quite prevalent, but like, how did, again, if you don’t mind me asking, how did people respond when you started talking about it? Were they like quite receptive to what you needed? Were they sort of, dismissive? I mean it’s obviously quite a broad question because I’m assuming you talk to quite a few people about it but like I think people react quite differently to that.

Luke Cope: Yeah I think there’s some people you know you can have a conversation with this sort of stuff about and there’s some people that are not quite there yet or it’s not happened to or they haven’t been involved in that kind of thing so I what I won’t do is go to go to someone who I know is like that and try and have a conversation about my mental health will burn out because you’re not going to get the correct response basically and that’s there and that’s trying to understand where where they are as well and largely people are really supportive about that sort of stuff I think it’s not it’s not the sort of stuff that I’m like I feel really comfortable about tweeting this sort of stuff but occasionally there’s some stuff where I’m like I’m now a founder of an agency, I’ve been through these kind of things, other people are probably going through similar things, if I can help them through that. And I had quite a few people reach out to me after one of those posts and said they’re going through something similar. And I actually found that quite nice. I had quite a lot of messages and I had quite a lot of good conversations. So overall, people are are good people and it’s kind and they’re quite supportive and that was pretty much the the gist of it.

Louise Parker: Yeah I think so many people probably it’s hard to recognize those things in yourself which obviously you were able to but it sounds like you said you might have had it past kind of burnout issues before. So maybe it’s just like kind of this time you’re like, oh no, this is bad. But yeah, for someone like you, who is very well respected in the industry to be able to talk about it, like I think it does really help people to kind of look to themselves and think like, oh, actually, that does sound an awful lot like what I’m going through. I think it’s very, very helpful. And it’s, yeah, so I think it’s really great that you shared it with people.

Stephen Baker: I think we’ve come to our final question, haven’t we?

Louise Parker: What do you want to see more of in the digital PR industry and what do you want to see less of?

Luke Cope: That is quite a good question, isn’t it? It’s a good question for someone who’s just set up an agency as well. I want to see more of what I haven’t seen yet, which sounds like a weird answer. So I want to see things and think, oh, that’s clever, I haven’t thought of that, or I wish I’d have thought of that. I want to see that all the time. I think that’s what’s exciting about our industry is doing things that you haven’t quite seen yet. I think it’s become very reactive. And because of the press sort of regime has become very active, we’ve responded to that. But we’re kind of adhering to another industry there where you could lay out a clear strategy, for example, and then sit back and wait for something else to happen. And it kind of like it can sometimes not always match up. I think what else you’ve got there is We’re all effective at building links, let’s say in digital PR specifically. There’s loads of good agencies, but you can all build links. So then it becomes a race for the same stories if everyone’s doing the same things. And I just don’t want us to give up on creative campaigns or anything. Yeah, I know, just because of the perceived level of risk, I still want us to be doing cool stuff and pushing the boundaries and stuff and breaking into other industries even. I want to see less link KPIs. I think it’s a race to the bottom and we can all build links using the same techniques. Therefore, it kind of comes down to cost and therefore cost per link. And therefore, we’re back in 2012 when people are buying links kind of thing. So I think for me, I understand why there’s KPIs around links, but I’m aware of how the pitching process is probably working at the moment. And it’s probably for certain types of clients, it’s probably coming down to the amount of links they can build for the amount of cost. And I think there’s a lot more that we do. And there’s a lot more that comes out of what we do beyond that. I’m not sure of the answer of how to get there. We quite like not 100% of our revenue coming in tied to a link API. So I think that’s where we’re going to try and get to and get to a lower percentage on that sort of stuff. And then finally, probably I’d like to see more accurate reporting and better understanding of our role and what it can play in the overall picture. And that works on both. So I wanna see like not reporting too little. So not saying we’ve got X amount of links when actually there’s loads of cool stuff that happened that we might not have looked into and not reporting kind of overinflation of the impact of what we’ve done as well. So just accurate reporting on what we’re doing and giving the work we do the best kind of like response in terms of the report of what I actually did. So yeah, there’s quite a few things there I think that I want and don’t want.

Louise Parker: Yeah, thank you so much for joining us. Is there anything that you would like to plug? Are you hiring? Are you looking for more clients?

Luke Cope: We are hiring, yeah. We’re hiring, I think, just the PR exec now, but I’m not sure. So I’m going to say PR manager and PR exec, like basically everyone else in the industry. So we are hiring on the PR front. We are obviously brand, more or less brand new, any couple of months old publicly and stuff like that. So I mean if anyone just wants to have a conversation about basically anything, running an agency, anything like that then that would also be great too because I’m really enjoying those conversations so far.

Louise Parker: Amazing. Yeah we will include where relevant your Twitter handle so people can message you. I’m sure they’ll be able to find you.

Luke Cope: I want more followers as well, that’s the main thing.

Louise Parker: I can try and make that happen. Great. Well, yeah, thank you very much for joining us. And we’ll hopefully speak to you soon. Thanks, Luke.

Luke Cope: And thank you for listening. Thanks very much for having me. Cheers. Thank you.