There’s a strange thing about building a business for nearly 10 years...

You realise how much of it you were figuring out as you went.

The clients that leave. The hires that don’t instantly make life easier. The bigger numbers that somehow come with bigger worries. The decisions you make without knowing whether they’re the right ones. And the confidence you keep expecting to magically arrive one day.

In this episode of The Agency Diaries, Kate Williams, founder of award-winning digital agency KW Marketing, looks back at nearly a decade of agency ownership — what she believed when she started, what she’s learned the hard way, and the things nobody really prepares you for when you decide to build a business.

You’ll hear:

• Why losing a client doesn’t always mean you’ve failed

• Why more revenue doesn’t automatically make you feel more secure

• The reality of hiring, delegating and learning to let go

• Why being needed isn’t the same as being a good leader

• The decisions that have shaped the business over nearly a decade

• What building an agency has given Kate, and what it’s cost along the way

Because perhaps one of the biggest lessons from nearly 10 years of building an agency is that founders spend far too much time figuring things out alone.

And sometimes what you need isn’t another course, business book or person telling you they’ve cracked the formula.

You need a room full of people who get it.

That’s why The Agency Diaries is evolving beyond the podcast, with the launch of The Founding 100. The first 100 founders helping to shape a private community built around honest conversations, shared experiences and figuring out agency life together.

Because nobody teaches you how to build an agency. And nearly 10 years in, Kate is still learning too.

LINKS & RESOURCES:

• Join The Founding 100 and become one of the first founders shaping The Agency Diaries community.
• Follow @theagencydiaries_ for honest conversations about agency life
• If this resonated, leave a review - it helps more founders find this space.

No nonsense. No highlight reels. Just real stories, real lessons, and a reminder that you’re not doing this alone.

Nobody teaches you how to become the boss.

You start a business because you're bloody good at something. Marketing. Design. Strategy. Creative. Whatever it might be.

Then the business grows. You hire people. And suddenly, being good at the work isn't enough anymore. Your job changes.

You're responsible for leading people, making decisions, giving feedback, setting direction, having difficult conversations and creating an environment where other people can actually succeed.

But nobody really teaches you how to do any of that.

This week Kate Williams, founder of award-winning digital agency KW Marketing, is joined by Jess Wiggins, founder of Impact Coaching International (and former lawyer), talking about what actually happens when you go from doing the work to leading the people doing the work.

You'll hear:

• Why founders so often become the bottleneck
• Why trusting your team can feel so bloody difficult
• What happens when you employ people who are better than you at something
• The shift from being the doer to becoming the developer of people
• Why difficult conversations and feedback are skills you have to learn
• How to lead with kindness without lowering your standards
• The pressure of being the person everyone else looks to for answers
• Why being a perfect, polished version of a leader isn't necessarily what people need

Ultimately, you can't control how your team behaves. But you can create the conditions for them to succeed.

You can give people support. You can give them space to develop. You can trust them with genuine responsibility. And you can start letting go of the idea that being valuable means being needed for everything.

If you're growing an agency, managing a team, thinking about hiring your first employee, or currently somewhere in that slightly terrifying transition... this one's for you.

LINKS & RESOURCES:

• Join the movement at theagencydiaries.co.uk
• Follow @theagencydiaries_ for honest conversations about agency life
• Connect with Jess Wiggins on LinkedIn
• If this resonated, leave a review - it helps more founders find this space.

No nonsense. No highlight reels. Just real stories, real lessons, and practical conversations about building an agency that actually works.

There comes a moment in every founder's journey when money stops feeling exciting... and starts feeling heavy.

When it's no longer just about paying yourself. It's about payroll. Cash flow. Hiring decisions. Late invoices. Taking risks. Investing in growth. And carrying the responsibility of everyone else who depends on your business.

In this episode of The Agency Diaries, Kate Williams, founder of award-winning digital agency KW Marketing, unpacks the emotional side of agency finances, why so many founders avoid talking about money, and how financial confidence isn't something you magically wake up with... it's something you build.

From the reality of paying a growing team to learning how to separate emotion from business decisions, this is an honest conversation about what really happens behind the numbers.

You'll hear:

• Why revenue and profit are two very different things

• The emotional weight of payroll and leading a growing team

• Why pricing still feels uncomfortable for so many agency owners

• Cash flow, forecasting and the systems every founder should understand

• Why investing in growth often feels terrifying (but necessary)

• The importance of removing emotion from financial decisions

Whether you're freelancing, building your first team, or scaling an established agency, this episode is a reminder that financial pressure doesn't mean you're failing. It usually means you're growing.

And the more openly founders talk about money, the easier it becomes for everyone else to build businesses that are not only ambitious, but sustainable too.

LINKS & RESOURCES:

• Join the movement at theagencydiaries.co.uk
• Follow @theagencydiaries_ for honest conversations about agency life
• If this resonated, leave a review - it helps more founders find this space.

No nonsense. No highlight reels. Just real stories, real lessons, and a reminder that you’re not doing this alone.

What does it really take to build an ambitious agency without losing yourself in the process?

Creative businesses can look polished from the outside, but behind every beautiful brand is a founder carrying responsibility, pressure, self-doubt, and the constant challenge of balancing creativity with commercial growth.

In this episode of The Agency Diaries, Kate Williams - founder of award-winning digital agency KW Marketing - sits down with Sophie Bride, Co-Founder and Creative Director of Hooey, for an honest conversation about creative leadership, founder pressure, confidence, boundaries, and building a business that still feels true to who you are.

This is a conversation about ambition, authenticity, emotional resilience, and the realities of agency life that rarely make it onto social media.

You'll hear:

• The emotional weight of running a creative agency

• Why leadership can feel lonelier than people expect

• The pressure of showing up honestly online

• Balancing creativity with commercial decisions

• Founder confidence, comparison and imposter syndrome

• Why money conversations are still so difficult for agency owners

• The importance of protecting your energy, time and boundaries

• How to build an ambitious business without sacrificing yourself in the process

Whether you're an agency owner, creative founder, freelancer or business leader, this episode is a reminder that you don't have to carry everything alone.

Because building a successful business shouldn't mean losing the person who built it.

LINKS & RESOURCES:

• Join the movement at theagencydiaries.co.uk
• Follow @theagencydiaries_ for honest conversations about agency life
• Connect with Sophie Bride on LinkedIn
• If this resonated, leave a review - it helps more founders find this space.

No nonsense. No highlight reels. Just real stories, real lessons, and practical conversations about building an agency that actually works.

What happens when your business evolves faster than your brand?

For many founders, there comes a point where the company they've built no longer reflects who they are, where they're going, or the level they're operating at.

In this episode of The Agency Diaries, Kate Williams - founder of award-winning digital agency KW Marketing - sits down with Matthew C. Gough, Creative Director at Yugen Agency, for an honest conversation about founder identity, brand evolution, positioning, confidence, and what it really takes to stand out in a world where everyone is competing for attention.

This is a conversation about growth, perception, ambition, and the emotional side of building something bigger than yourself.

You’ll hear:

• Why so many agencies struggle to articulate what makes them different

• How founder identity impacts brand identity

• Why businesses often outgrow their branding

• The role confidence plays in visibility and positioning

• Imposter syndrome, comparison culture and showing up online

• The biggest branding mistakes agency founders make

• How to know when it's time to evolve your brand

• Why people buy from people in the age of AI

• The difference between looking good and being strategically positioned

Whether you're a founder, agency owner, creative, marketer, or simply navigating your next stage of growth, this episode will leave you thinking differently about the relationship between your business, your brand and yourself.

Because the strongest brands aren't always the loudest. They're the clearest.

LINKS & RESOURCES:

• Join the movement at theagencydiaries.co.uk
• Follow @theagencydiaries_ for honest conversations about agency life
• Connect with Matthew C. Gough on LinkedIn
• If this resonated, leave a review - it helps more founders find this space.

No nonsense. No highlight reels. Just real stories, real lessons, and practical conversations about building an agency that actually works.

If your agency has hit a plateau… this might be a tough listen.

In this episode of The Agency Diaries, Kate and Laura unpack one of the most uncomfortable truths in agency growth:

The thing holding your agency back… might be you.

From being in every client call, every email thread, and every decision, to learning how (and when) to step back, this episode is an honest look at what it really means to move from doing the work to leading the business.

Because scaling isn’t just about more clients. It’s about founder evolution.

What we cover:

• Why most agencies stall at the 3 to 8 person mark
• The hidden comfort in control (and why it’s dangerous)
• The moment you realise you’ve become the bottleneck
• Why founders struggle to let go, even when they need to
• The balance between caring deeply and controlling everything
• What happens when your team is actually better than you (yes, really)

This episode isn’t about having it all figured out. It’s about going from spinning too many plates and inbox overwhelm to learning to trust your team, sitting in the discomfort of letting go, and building a business that doesn’t rely on you for everything

If you’ve ever thought “it would just be easier if I did it myself”…

This one’s for you.

LINKS & RESOURCES:

• Join the movement at theagencydiaries.co.uk
• Follow @theagencydiaries_ for honest conversations about agency life
• Connect with Kate Williams on LinkedIn

If this resonated, leave a review - it helps more founders find this space.

No nonsense. No highlight reels. Just real stories, real lessons, and practical conversations about building an agency that actually works.

Starting an agency is brave.

Growing one at the same time as your peers? That’s confronting.

In Episode 4 of The Agency Diaries, Kate Williams - founder of award-winning digital agency KW Marketing - is joined by Hanna Mepstead from UnScripted Marketing for a raw, honest conversation about what it really looks like to build an agency from the ground up, at the same time, in the same industry, and facing many of the same challenges.

Having started their agencies around the same time, Kate and Hanna share a founder-to-founder conversation about the moments that looked successful from the outside… but felt incredibly heavy behind the scenes.

From imposter syndrome and financial pressure, to leadership responsibility, burnout, parenting, and the difficult middle years of growth, this episode explores the realities that many agency founders experience but rarely talk about openly.

You’ll hear:

• Why growing alongside your peers can be both motivating and confronting
• The reality of agency years two and three - and why they’re often the hardest
• How financial pressure and responsibility shape founder decision-making
• The truth about imposter syndrome in agency life
• The difficult decisions founders face - including client conflicts and growth trade-offs
• Why networking and relationships have driven the majority of growth
• Why sometimes the goal isn’t scaling… it's simply surviving

This is not a polished conversation about success.

It’s an honest discussion about surviving, learning, and growing through the hardest stages of agency life.

LINKS & RESOURCES:

• Join the movement at theagencydiaries.co.uk
• Follow @theagencydiaries_ for honest conversations about agency life
• Connect with Hanna Mepstead on LinkedIn
• If this resonated, leave a review - it helps more founders find this space.

No nonsense. No highlight reels. Just real stories, real lessons, and practical conversations about building an agency that actually works.

What if the real reason your agency feels heavy… is because it can’t run without you?

In this third episode of The Agency Diaries, Kate Williams - founder of award-winning digital agency KW Marketing - is joined by Ali Newton-Temperley - agency growth expert, COO of Unusual Group, and author of Agency Exits - for a powerful conversation about what it really takes to build an agency that works without the founder being at the centre of everything.

Together, they unpack one of the biggest problems agency owners face: accidentally building a business that depends entirely on them. From founder-led sales and delivery bottlenecks to process gaps, burnout, and the pressure of trying to grow while holding it all together, this episode gets honest about what is really happening behind the scenes in agency life.

This is not just a conversation about exits. It is about building a better agency, one that gives founders more freedom, more clarity, and more room to grow.

You’ll hear:

• Why so many agencies become overly dependent on the founder
• The common growth ceilings agencies hit as they scale
• What “exit ready” really means... even if you never plan to sell
• The warning signs that your agency is too reliant on you
• Why process, structure, and leadership matter more than most founders realise
• Three practical moves agency founders should make this quarter to reduce chaos and create breathing room

If you are running a 4–8 person agency, feeling stretched, and wondering how to grow without everything relying on you, this episode will hit home.

LINKS & RESOURCES:

• Join the movement at theagencydiaries.co.uk
• Follow @theagencydiaries_ for honest conversations about agency life
• Connect with Ali Newton-Temperley on LinkedIn
• If this resonated, leave a review - it helps more founders find this space.

No nonsense. No highlight reels. Just real stories, real lessons, and practical conversations about building an agency that actually works.