When Hayley Carruthers gave birth to her daughter, little did she realise that it would mean a realignment of her life!
Like any first time parent, having Piper—her daughter, amid the pandemic made her rethink her priorities. She craved more flexibility, and that ignited the birth of the “other baby”—her full-service digital marketing agency —Piper & Digital Co, with a client base spread across Bulgaria, USA, Canada & Australia.
For a passionate marketer with years of experience under her belt, the change was a big decision.
It meant moving away from something known to something new…
It meant switching from being an employee to becoming a CEO…
But most importantly, it meant juggling things while keeping the faith alive.
We recently chatted with her to know more about her entrepreneurial journey, her passions and the role Lawpath played in her success.
Read along
Tell us a little about yourself —who you are, why you started this business and what interests you in life?
To me, being successful in life is about doing what you love and being surrounded by the people you love. I’ve been fortunate enough to have both. For over 15 years, I’ve explored and accelerated my passion for marketing. My experience stems primarily from working in the corporate environment, building out and executing brand and digital strategies for growth. COVID-19 and pregnancy was a new juncture in my life, a turning point that allowed me to re-evaluate how I worked and lived.
We’re a full-service digital agency with a focus on helping small-medium businesses succeed. Our business model is simple – we’re a small and nimble team of remote workers with a range of digital expertise across social media advertising – Facebook/Instagram, TikTok, SEO + Google My Business, Google ads, website design & builds, email marketing and social media content creation.
You’ll find Piper And Co professionals all over the world – for us, this means reduced operating costs, diverse thinking and expertise and, for our customers, it means we can pass on these savings and provide competitive pricing.
What interests me in life? The great outdoors – there is nothing better (whether it’s the surf, snow, bush or my backyard). Seeing others succeed – nothing makes me happier than seeing other business owners excelling and reaching their goals.
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What were some of the challenges that you faced at the beginning of your journey to entrepreneurship? What were the rough bits?
Figuring out the right business model – Something that allowed me to operate at low cost but offers extremely valuable and expert services – While we are diverse, our team members have at least 5 years of marketing experience before starting with us.
Finding the right team members – I cast a wide net (geographically speaking). I like having a diverse team (in every way). Finding the right talent and building the operating model that allows us to stay connected and be accessible for clients was challenging.
We are keen to know the history of the product/service how you launched it and what has changed over the years?
I’ve been operating for nearly a year now – our services have definitely evolved as the landscape changes and as we understand more about our ideal clientele. We’ve created a range of services that are cost-effective for small businesses, everything from brand awareness to lead generation and product sales. While we have these great packages, it’s not cookie-cutter, our strategies for every business vary depending on their product/service and objective.
The digital landscape is changing – “the wild beast” (data privacy) is finally being tamed – which means accessibility to data for marketers and businesses has changed. Many of our offers now are omnichannel focused because the reliance on utilising just one channel has changed.
What’s unique about your business and in what ways has it helped to grow your business?
I think our operating model is unique. We have a phenomenal range of thought diversity and most of us have walked in the shoes of a small business owner (having run or owned small businesses). The majority of our team members run personal businesses (e-commerce or bricks & mortar stores), so there is a deep and mutual understanding when it comes to many of the challenges small businesses face.
We’ve been able to grow because of our ability to support a range of small business needs, and we’ve strategically chosen key core services to support these. We don’t pretend to do the whole mar-tech stack (and we don’t want to) because our expertise lies in areas of digital marketing that the team love and enjoy.
How did you first hear about Lawpath and which service/s have you used since then?
Lawpath came up in a Google search (see, Google works great if you’ve optimised for it)! I saw a paid advertisement on Google for Lawpath and found that it met all my needs. I’ve worked with lawyers from your team to create a range of detailed contracts as we work with a range of clients across the world.
Would you describe a few of the reasons you decided to go with Lawpath?
Seamless online experience. Easy brief and booking system. Great packages for small businesses. Not to forget, cost, efficiency, availability.
What has changed since you started using Lawpath
I feel very comfortable with the contractual work through Lawpath. There was a lot of legal documentation I needed, and having the ability to map this out and talk simply with Lawpath made the process really easy.
What advice would you have for business owners like yourself at the start of their journey?
Lawpath literally provides all your legal solutions in one platform— the documents library means you can quickly tailor a template to your business or speak with a lawyer for anything that needs a bit more specific detail. I personally found the service phenomenal, friendly and fast.
Keep your eyes peeled for more Lawpath customers in this Q&A series. And if you’re looking for a one-stop solution for all your legal needs, sign up for Lawpath. With Lawpath, you get access to over 350+ legal documents, lawyers on-demand and more when starting a business.
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