PR Agency (Part 2)

Cat — PR for Sustainable Textiles

Part 2: When the Foundations Compound

Monthly Strategic Business Coaching | Year 2 | Location: London | 2024

Where We Left Off

If you haven’t read Part 1 of Cat’s story, you’ll find it here. But here’s the short version.

Cat came to me after being made redundant from an in-house PR role when her second daughter was a few weeks old. Rather than build the safe, generic PR agency that her professional network could have supported, Cat made a braver strategic choice: to specialise in the sustainable textiles industry - a sector she’d studied at degree level but had never worked in professionally.

We designed a foundation year. Cat used her existing network to win retained PR clients and generate a stable income, while systematically building her presence in sustainable textiles - attending industry conferences, validating the market through desk research, developing relationships, and creating a brand and website designed specifically for textile and fabric brands.

By the end of Year 1, Cat had five high-value retained clients, a trusted team of freelancers, a clear positioning in her target market, and a pipeline of opportunities she’d built through conferences and industry events. Turnover was around £12,500 a month.

The foundations were in place. The question was what to build on them.

Building A Team That Could Deliver Without Cat

One of the most important decisions Cat made going into Year 2 was about how she spent her time.

She had a network of freelancers she’d built in Year 1 - women she already knew and trusted, PR professionals who had turned freelance after facing pressures that simply didn’t align with raising a family. Cat trained them in the specifics of the textiles sector so they could deliver client campaigns to the standard she expected.

This was a deliberate strategic choice that cost her margin. Bringing in freelancers increased Cat’s direct costs and reduced her profit on each account. Some founders would have resisted this, preferring to do everything themselves and keep the margin. We discussed this carefully and decided the trade-off was worth it, for three reasons.

• First, it freed Cat to focus on growth. If Cat was delivering all the client work herself, she had no time to promote the agency, build her pipeline, nurture relationships, or win new business. The founder who does everything is the founder whose business can’t grow beyond what they can personally deliver.

• Second, it built consistency. As the team learned how Cat wanted campaigns delivered, the quality of work became less dependent on Cat being personally involved in every detail. Clients received a consistent experience, which is essential for retention and referrals.

• Third, it started to build something bigger than Cat. An agency where every client expects to deal only with the founder is not an agency — it’s a freelance practice with higher overheads. Cat was building a micro-agency with a team, a culture, and a delivery model that could scale.

The fact that Cat’s freelancers were women who’d left traditional employment for the same kinds of reasons Cat herself had faced wasn’t incidental. It meant they understood the culture Cat was building. They were committed, reliable, and deeply motivated by the flexibility and respect that Cat’s agency offered them - things their previous employers hadn’t.

Focused Business Development

With her team handling delivery, Cat could concentrate on what Year 2 was really about: building the pipeline of clients in sustainable textiles.

The strategy wasn’t complicated. But it was disciplined and consistent, and it built on the relationships and visibility Cat had started developing in Year 1.

Industry Conferences and Events

Cat continued attending the conferences and events where her target market gathered. But there was a difference now. In Year 1, she’d been an outsider building initial relationships. In Year 2, people recognised her. She had conversations that picked up where previous ones had left off. The investment in showing up consistently was compounding into genuine industry presence.

LinkedIn and Social Media

Cat built an active presence on LinkedIn, engaging directly with people in the sustainable textiles space. This wasn’t about posting for the sake of visibility. It was about identifying people in her target market who were new to her - founders and decision-makers she hadn’t yet met at conferences - and doing informed outreach. LinkedIn became a tool for expanding the pipeline beyond her existing network, not a replacement for the relationship-building she was doing in person.

Collaborations

Cat looked for opportunities to collaborate with agencies already working with clients in the sustainable textiles space. These weren’t competitors - they were complementary businesses offering different services to the same market. These collaborations led to referrals, expanded what Cat could offer her clients, and gave her access to potential clients she wouldn’t have found on her own.

Thought Leadership and PR

Cat practised what she preached. She used her own PR and communications expertise to build her profile as a specialist in textiles PR - writing, speaking, and positioning herself as someone who understood the industry from the inside. This is something I encourage all my clients to do, but it’s particularly effective when the founder’s expertise is genuinely deep, as Cat’s was.

Case Studies as a Sales Tool

This was a deliberate strategy we developed together. As Cat delivered successful campaigns for textiles clients, we documented the work as case studies - not as an afterthought, but as a core part of building her credibility in the sector. Every completed project became evidence that Cat could do this work at a high standard. For a founder building a reputation in a new industry, that evidence is invaluable. It answers the question prospective clients are thinking but rarely ask: has she actually done this before?

The Discipline That Made This Work

Underneath all of this was a simple principle: Cat had made clear strategic choices, and she stuck to them.

She didn’t turn down non-specialist work in Year 2 - she was selective, and the generalist clients she’d won in the foundation year continued to provide a stable base. But every business development effort was focused on the textiles industry. Every conference, every LinkedIn conversation, every collaboration, every piece of thought leadership pointed in the same direction.

This is what I mean when I talk about foundations compounding. The brand and positioning Cat had developed in Year 1 meant that when textile brands encountered her - at a conference, on LinkedIn, through a collaborating agency - everything about her said specialist. The website, the visual identity, the case studies, the way she talked about the industry. There was no gap between what Cat claimed to be and what the evidence showed.

Because Cat’s client base from Year 1 was sufficiently diversified, she had the financial stability to be choosy about new work. She didn’t need to take every enquiry that came through the door. She could focus on building the portfolio of textiles clients that would define the agency’s future, turning down work that wasn’t aligned with her vision rather than accepting it out of financial anxiety.

That’s the compounding effect of good foundations. The financial cushion from Year 1 gave Cat freedom. The positioning gave her clarity. The team gave her capacity. And the strategic patience - the willingness to build relationships over months rather than chase quick wins — gave her a pipeline that converted reliably because it was built on trust.

Year 2 Results

• Twelve retained clients - more than doubling the portfolio from Year 1.

• Turnover exceeding £30,000 a month - growth of approximately 140% year on year.

• A growing proportion of clients in the sustainable textiles sector.

• A team of trusted freelancers delivering consistent, high-quality work.

• A portfolio of textiles case studies building credibility and serving as a sales tool.

• An established presence at industry conferences, with relationships that were compounding.

• Active business development channels - conferences, LinkedIn, collaborations, PR — all focused on the target market.

Why This Story Matters

Cat’s story is not about exceptional talent or unusual luck. It’s about the power of making clear strategic choices and having the discipline to stick to them.

In Year 1, we built the foundations: financial stability, a clear positioning, a validated market, a brand that spoke to the right people, and the support structures Cat needed to do good work in difficult personal circumstances.

In Year 2, those foundations compounded. The relationships Cat had started building in Year 1 converted into clients. The freelancer team she’d invested in gave her the capacity to grow without sacrificing quality. The positioning and brand assets made her findable and credible. The case studies turned completed work into a sales tool that kept working long after the campaigns were delivered.

None of this would have happened if Cat had taken the safe, generic route in Year 1. She’d have had clients, certainly. Revenue, probably. But she wouldn’t have had the specialist reputation, the industry relationships, or the clarity of purpose that made Year 2’s growth possible.

And she wouldn’t have had a business she genuinely loved running.

That’s the thing about building from what’s true. When your strategic choices are grounded in real passion, real expertise, and a genuine vision for the future - rather than in fear or expediency - the work of growing the business stops feeling like a grind and starts feeling like a mission. Cat didn’t have to force herself to attend conferences or write thought leadership pieces. She wanted to be in those rooms. She wanted to talk about sustainable textiles. That energy is something clients and collaborators can feel, and it’s something no amount of marketing can manufacture.

Whether you’re in your first year laying foundations or in your second year wondering why the growth isn’t compounding yet, the answer is almost always in the strategic choices. If you’d like to talk about yours, I’d welcome the conversation.

Denyse Whillier | The Purpose Company

Helping founders grow their business without losing what makes it special