Brath Year 4 - Here's how it went

Our agency has, with heads held high, made it through what has been the toughest business year in the company’s history. Here’s the full story of Brath’s fourth year.

The business year 2015-2016 began with the loss of our largest client, which accounted for nearly 6.5 million of our revenue. Despite fantastic success with their search engine optimization, they ended the collaboration. Maria and I were facing what we had feared for a long time: this year would be the toughest the company had ever gone through.

I have a desire to transparently share what’s happening with us, and I know it’s usually appreciated, even though it’s somewhat scary for us. Here’s this year’s account.

It wasn’t entirely unexpected that we would lose our largest client. Not because they had any reason to be dissatisfied with the SEO results, but because they had been working for a long time to build their own SEO department. By recruiting a few of our employees, they started building a department that would be responsible for SEO at the company. No hard feelings there – I think it’s smart for larger companies, like the one in this case, to have their own SEO department. There’s no shadow cast on our staff members who moved there either; both Maria and I recommended they go when they were offered the opportunity. It’s a great chance to try their wings with their own project.

Still, it’s tough to lose 6 out of the 16 million the company had previously generated. We entered the new business year with 40% less revenue than the previous year.

As mentioned, we were somewhat prepared for this. We had built reserves, made sure not to get too lazy or complacent, and constantly worked to ensure we could handle this setback. Since they had started building their own department long before, we knew it was highly likely to happen.

That’s why we were able to get through the first tough months without laying anyone off or cutting costs in areas that would truly hurt. No one was fired during the year. However, new, larger office space in Stockholm had to wait, expansion plans were put on hold, and all focus had to shift to the core business. The full focus was on delivering and attracting – delivering to our existing clients and attracting new ones.

The year has also been full of successes

Despite the rough start and the fact that it led to some emergency solutions that we later regretted, the year has also delivered many successes. Not only in the form of the awards and nominations we’ve received (such as Normbreaker of the Year, Growth League in Västernorrland, a nomination for Most Entrepreneurial of the Year, and now a finalist spot for CEO of the Year for Maria). We’ve made significant progress with our service, which is in constant development.

Since, for obvious reasons, we’ve held back on new recruitments, we’ve worked hard with the staff we have. We’ve thoroughly reviewed each other, set goals, and come a little closer to how we should work to function perfectly. The work is, of course, far from finished, but we’ve taken a significant step forward this year.

We’ve become really, really good at SEM

One of the areas where we’ve grown tremendously this year is SEM. Our team working with AdWords and general advertising has taken a major leap forward and is, in my opinion, now one of the absolute sharpest teams in Sweden. This has been reflected in the fact that we’ve been awarded Premier Partner status by Google (and that they personally invited me to Amsterdam), something that only a few agencies are privileged to receive.

This has meant that we’ve grown significantly as an SEM provider, and the number of clients who turn to us for help with their search engine advertising has increased substantially. In fact, we’re actively recruiting for our SEM services. If you work with SEM yourself or know someone who does, feel free to recommend us!

We’re back on top

Despite the extremely tough start to the year, we’ve actually done well.
In the end, we saw a slight increase in revenue compared to last year and improved profitability. We’re ending this year significantly stronger, with our heads held high—both in management and among the staff. This was the most difficult year in the company’s history.

Some numbers from 2015–2016:

Our customer base is clearly stronger than before. We’re currently growing by about 5–7 clients per month (net), and we’re no longer as dependent on very large clients as we were at the beginning of the year. This has always been a goal: a broad and stable foundation rather than quick wins.

• Revenue landed at SEK 16.9 million for the year, which is a few hundred thousand more than the previous year.
• The profit margin ended up at 23.11%, which is noticeably higher than last year—though that number is somewhat misleading, as we’ve provided a significant amount of group contributions to the smaller companies in our group.
• Today, we are 25 people on the payroll, and that number is growing quickly. This is an increase compared to last year, although far from what we originally planned.

My thoughts on the year

If I may take a moment to reflect at the end of this article, I’d say this has been one of the toughest experiences of my life. When everything is going well, it’s easy to feel on top of the world—but it’s in the face of real adversity that you get the chance to prove your strength and resilience.

I want to extend a huge thank you to our leadership team, our staff, and our clients. You in leadership have done an incredible job this year. Every single employee has dug deep and put in real effort, and as a company, we’ve truly lifted ourselves.

A special thanks goes to all our clients who have given feedback, asked the tough questions that pushed us forward, and—most importantly—recommended us to their friends and networks. You are all incredibly important to us, and it means the world to me that you’ve stood by us during this challenging time.

Thank you.

Magnus