You might not think of Teignbridge as a place of industry for digital marketing and SEO wizardry, but there is a huge demand for it as more businesses rely on their online storefront than ever before. Falcon Digital is a web design and digital marketing agency based in Newton Abbot that fills that gap, from designing bespoke websites for charities to creating social media campaigns for local businesses.
Director Charlie Penny is the mastermind behind Falcon Digital, who has been working in marketing for 10+ years. He shares his story of how he founded the agency, what services he’s been able to provide to South Devon’s businesses, and how he and his team has formed a family amidst shifting attitudes towards work.
What has your marketing journey been leading up to Falcon Digital?
I’ve had quite a long journey. I was going to join the army, but I had a sabbatical because my mum wasn’t very well, then my dad passed away, so that plan didn’t go ahead. I sold the companies Globi-Tech and iGoWeb, then did my MBA at the University of Exeter, working predominately in marketing with businesses such as Unilever, The Body Shop, then Circular Economy, which I fell in love with.
I entered the corporate world as the Head of Circular Economy Business Development there, then after some time, decided the corporate consultancy rat race wasn’t for me. I came back to South Devon, and before I knew it, I had more customers than I could shake a stick at who needed help with their web design as everyone was in lockdown.
Falcon Digital formed back into a boutique web consultancy, then we quickly grew to a team of seven staff and several hundred websites running across the UK. It wasn’t really planned, but it’s like fate brought us back to where I started.
How have you been able to help promote local businesses in Newton Abbot?
We help businesses build professional websites for a reasonable price as it’s all done in-house, then following that, we can help them get found on Google through SEO and paid ads online. Social media marketing is a whole kettle of fish, but we can help with a bit of consultancy with that as well.
It all comes down to working out who the customer is then working out what they need. That way, we keep the client happy, but we’re also targeting the right audience or segment that they’re hitting.
Everyone needs SEO when they’re selling online, to the point we can’t get staff trained quickly enough to compete with the demand. Unfortunately, there are a lot of agencies out there that use a middle-man, which means the consumer isn’t getting their full value. For example, you could be paying £500 a month for something worth £250. We’re not like that. If you pay us £500 a month, you get £500 a month.
It all comes down to working out who the customer is then working out what they need. That way, we keep the client happy, but we’re also targeting the right audience or segment that they’re hitting.
How have you expanded your services over the years?
We’re always continuously improving our SEO, digital marketing and web design, from learning new design methods to branching out into different departments. Our video guy Sam does a lot of video work for charities and businesses. Our biggest product branch in the last two years is our charity and community scheme, which is a £5000 bursary we’re awarding to any charity or CIC in the UK. We’re building about four charity websites and donating £20,000 of value a week. That’s £800,000 a year now since we took off two years ago.
We’re really proud of the work we’ve done, and I’m proud of my team for spending their extra time building those charity websites. I’m thankful for our commercial clients through the profits of the work we do for them that we’re re-investing it back into this charity scheme.
How do you find managing a whole marketing team?
Hard but rewarding. COVID’s changed people’s outlook, values and perceptions on life. Simple things such as moving office or putting in a return to work will result in a loss of team members. People’s attitudes to work have changed greatly too.
Although it’s great to follow that journey and learn what they want to do, it’s very difficult to find skilled technical people, so we’re very blessed with the team we’ve got. We call ourselves a Falcon Family because we’re all very well jelled. We give our staff members days off, including birthdays, mental health days, or time off for funerals or doctor’s appointments.
We find the better you treat your staff, the harder they work, and we’ve seen huge productivity rates compared to the traditional 9-5 jobs where you only get a set number of days off.
We find the better you treat your staff, the harder they work, and we’ve seen huge productivity rates compared to the traditional 9-5 jobs where you only get a set number of days off.
What have been the difficulties of running Falcon Digital?
Our challenges are more external than internal. What we deliver is an intangible product since it’s digital. When you go to Tesco’s, you don’t care about how much you pay for your shopping, whereas people don’t see that we put time and effort into creating a good product that will inevitably make them more money. We’re up against companies that think they can outsource their digital marketing to external countries for cheaper. They quickly learn that it’s not the same product or service, they come back to us, then we have to re-educate them on what we’re doing and hold their hand through the process.
Working in the current business climate is also difficult. The government is actively making it difficult for small businesses to grow and develop, which has a knock-on effect with every business that we work with. Even the big construction companies we work with have had their projects stopped.
What are your future aspirations for Falcon Digital?
We’re very excited to be launching three new products soon. Our short-term goals are to hit our targets for those products. In the long term, we want to keep breaking down everyone’s attitude to legacy web design. What we do with our charity scheme is break down those barriers. Premium web design is very affordable; you just have to choose the right agency.
What advice do you have for people wanting to start their own marketing agency?
Don’t sell your time too short (e.g. charging £15/hour for a technical job). Build a good growth mindset and don’t make decisions based on emotion, but also foster good mental health by staying off of social media, eating clean, exercising every morning and staying away from drugs and alcohol. When I started Falcon Digital three years ago, it wasn’t uncommon to spent 15-16 hour work days, 7 days a week. Having that growth mindset speaks volumes and will get you through some very stressful positions and experiences.
On top of all that, be as open with everyone as possible by networking, have fun, and don’t make work a chore. There are lots of ways to build a business, but whether you’re starting a marketing agency or something else, you need those fundamentals.
Having that growth mindset speaks volumes and will get you through some very stressful positions and experiences.