Category: Company News

Air Marketing Group (Air), the UK’s leading supplier of outsourced sales services, are delighted to announce the appointment of Non-Executive Director (NED), Clodagh Murphy.

In a move that re-enforces Air’s relentless ambition to scale, the appointment of Clodagh as Non-Exec represents an important step in the future of Air Marketing and its sister company, Roots To Market.

As the previous Managing Director of Eclipse part of KCOM Group PLC, Clodagh impressively led the diversification and digital transformation of the business growing revenue from £20m to £38m over a 5 year period. And its that experience that Air is so excited to have around the board room table.

Clodagh now holds prestigious positions across a number of Exeter based organisations including ExIST (Exeter Initiative for Science and Technology), Exeter Chamber of Commerce, and has also launched her very own lockdown start-up, Larks Live.

Air are on an exciting growth journey and are working hard to scale to the next level. In its first 3 years, after launching in 2016, the group’s revenue grew to more than £2million with its team growing to more than 55 people.

Like many businesses, Air is now navigating its way through a very unusual 2020 but is one of a few services led businesses looking at going forward across the year, despite temporarily losing ground in this first half of the year.

Air is now delighted to be looking up and forward and couldn’t be more delighted to have Clodagh onboard, contributing to the company strategy, direction and mission.

Planning for the next stage of growth, Air are undergoing a brand re-fresh, having significantly outgrown their start-up look over the past 4 years. They’re also working on building a new custom-CRM, to further advance the abilities of their current custom-CRM improving the experience further for their client base.

Managing Director, Owen Richards, said: “We’re really excited to have Clodagh onboard. She’s a fantastic asset and influential within many successful businesses. Clodagh is fully brought into our vision and is already helping us to achieving this”.

Clodagh will also be joining the board of Air’s sister company, Roots to Market – a demand generation agency specialising in delivering marketing with a sales attitude.

“I’ve really enjoyed the time I have spent working with Owen and the Leadership Team this year. Air Marketing and Roots to Market are fantastic businesses with hugely committed teams. I’m delighted to join and be part of the team which will see us deliver exciting plans to accelerate growth.” – Clodagh Murphy

If you would like to join Team Air and play your part in their growth journey, you can learn more about our live roles and apply here.

Earlier this year we rolled out our Partnership Programme and are thrilled to already have a growing list of partners working alongside us, including local businesses as well as those further afield.

Our Partnership Programme aims to be a 2-way street, where both our partners and their clients benefit from our combined networks, reaching business that they may not have had access to before entering a partnership with Air.

The rewards are simple really. We are asking you to be open to wider opportunities and in return, we’ll provide you with an additional revenue stream. By referring Air to your clients and wider network, you’ll get a financial reward in turn when they sign up to work with us – easy.

In addition to the financial benefit, we will also help to promote your brand through our social media channels and by promoting you as a partner on our website.

Heading up our Partnership Programme is Anne Benham-Clarke. Anne has been working at Air for almost two years now and has quickly progressed, beginning her Air journey as a Business Development Executive she progressed into an Account Executive role and now Partnership Relationship Manager. With 25 years of sales, marketing and business development experience behind her, in a wide range of industries and business sizes, she is very experienced in liaising with organisations to help them grow their connections and, in turn, their business. In fact, developing relationships is the key thing that Anne knows how to do best.

“As the Partnership Relationship Manager for Air, I’m looking forward to the opportunity to build new relationships with likeminded businesses. We want to make sure that we thank Partners who talk about us and help our business to grow and in turn, help those in their network and customer base to grow their business.  Please contact me to find out more about becoming an Air Partner, I’d love to hear from you.” – Anne Benham-Clarke, Partnership Relationship Manager, Air Marketing Group

If you’re looking to grow your network or feel that you have clients who could benefit from our services and are looking for a simple way of creating an additional revenue stream, get in touch. Call 0345 241 3038 or email anneb@air-marketing.co.uk

This appointment feeds into the accelerated growth journey that Lightfoot has been on in the last year. Air Marketing Group will work with Lightfoot to bring Exeter based businesses onboard with a ground-breaking initiative the company is launching for 2019.

Breathe Exeter is a community initiative, launched by Lightfoot and supported and led by a number of local businesses, with a simple goal – a cleaner, greener Exeter by the end of 2019. This whole initiative is focused on encouraging small behavioural changes we can all make that, en masse, will become greater than the sum of their parts. To reduce air pollution in the city, Breathe Exeter will be promoting and utilising Exeter-made technology, innovation, and community spirit. The businesses supporting the initiative will be investing their own money into making the project as accessible and valuable as possible for everyone.

As a business with a high profile both in the local area and within their own industry, the appointment of Air was an easy decision for Lightfoot. There are clear synergies between the two businesses, with both focused on relentless growth, an important core culture and the thrill of being a young, energetic and dynamic start-up. When selecting a partner to accelerate growth, Lightfoot knew they could rely on Air Marketing Group to deliver the quality they expect with their highly trained and motivated team.

Owen Richards, MD of Air Marketing Group, said: “We’re really excited to have been chosen by Lightfoot to help them promote their offering. Breathe Exeter is an amazing campaign that aims to make a true difference to everyone in and around the city, and we’re delighted to be able to play our part. Air and Lightfoot have a lot in common, so the relationship feels like a good fit for everyone and hopefully, we’ll be working together for a long time.”

Mark Roberts, CEO of Lightfoot, said: “A local initiative, focused on protecting and promoting our city, needs partners who represent the best that Exeter has to offer. Air are exactly that – a smart, proactive business who understand what we are trying to achieve and have the tools to help us do it. With the support of Air, Breathe Exeter should be a huge success.”

If we look back to just over three years ago, Air Marketing Group as we know it today was still merely an idea, a business plan being written. When we were then up and running, it was out of a boardroom in someone else’s office, with three members of staff who were working tirelessly to secure us enough clients that would allow us to get to an office of our own.

I can remember walking down the street trying to have a phone conversation with prospects in-between other prospect meetings, battling to hear them over the sound of the wind and the traffic… Things have definitely changed now! It was an exciting time, definitely a stressful one, we didn’t really know what lay ahead of us and certainly didn’t predict the rapid growth that we would see in the coming year. In 2016, the vision was to employ 100 staff in 5 years, we’re 3 years in and already employing 60+ people, have moved offices three times and have ambitious plans for further growth in the coming year.

That’s not to say that the past three years have been without their challenges and setbacks. With rapid growth came a need to quickly hire staff and, to our frustration, that sometimes came at the cost of our team culture. In looking at our on-boarding of staff, we also looked to staff retention. As part of this growth journey, on a few occasions, we’ve acknowledged that the structures we had in place did not aid the size of company that we were becoming and that they didn’t allow for our driven team to progress as we would like them to. Since moving into offices of our own we have restructured four times to ensure that we are happy with the processes we have in place – this includes implementing a new Quality Assurance system and hiring an in-house Learning and Development team.

I don’t think that it is a weakness to look back and dwell on the challenges, quite the opposite. We grow from the hurdles that are placed in front of us and from the mistakes that we make along the way. They only make us stronger as a team and as a business. If we don’t look to them to better ourselves moving forwards then we are not being honest with ourselves.

If there is one thing that starting Air has taught me, it’s that it is important to have a strong team behind you. From day one, Air have sought to employ those who are driven, talented and can bring something different to the company – from Keryn and his Paralympic accolades to Verity, who brought marketing expertise and assisted the set up and management of our sister company, Roots to Market, and Marco, who rose to Client Services Director at just 24. It’s been a real privilege to watch Team Air grow with like-minded people who want to push the business forward. Having an inclusive and supportive team culture is vital to me and at any opportunity I show gratitude, from running weekly team meetings and incentives to nurturing our early hires and watching them rise through the ranks to management roles – allowing them to inspire new starters and those already wanting to develop their careers.

Looking to the future, I am excited to see where we go next. So far this year, we have already rolled out a flexible workers hiring campaign, launched our Partner Programme (we’ve already partnered with three local businesses) and won the Exeter Living Business Services Award.

I’m so proud of how far we have come in such a small period of time. My team continue to surprise and amaze me with their talents and competency – for the large part of the beginning of the year I was out of the office for the birth of my second child and the team still managed to secure an Ad Hoc contract with a major household name. With a team that are capable of such amazing successes, who knows where we will be in the next three years?

Owen Richards, Managing Director 

Last Thursday (March 7^th), Air Marketing Group turned three years old. And what a three years it has been! From day one, we have been an ambitious company but looking back, we never could have anticipated the success we have been lucky enough to achieve. We’ve grown beyond expectations, worked with amazing household names, been nominated for national awards (BESMA and Amazon Growing Business) and won local awards (Express and Echo). At Air, we have one big force driving our success, our team.

Team Air are driven, dedicated, fun and absolutely the root of our success. They tirelessly work for our clients, undertaking in-depth training sessions, seeking feedback, visit our clients on location and basically becoming an extension of their team. There is never a dull moment in our office. Whether we’re celebrating an impressive set of weekly leads, taking part in brilliant buzz meetings or generally having a well-deserved laugh, there’s always something inspiring Team Air to push forwards. On our birthday you can bet there was a massive cake and a delicious party feast!

Team Air have supported the business from the get go and been involved in our growth from a team of 4 to now over 60! From working out of a boardroom, to three office moves, a major on-boarding of new talent, the establishing of our sister company, Roots to Market, and much more, they have always been our greatest cheerleaders. What an amazing way to recognise the hard work and journey of Team Air, than with our win at the Exeter Living Awards last week. Third time lucky, on our third birthday, in the third month it of the year – it seems 3 is our lucky number!

For Team Air, it means a lot to be listed as a finalist and to win an Exeter Living Award. It feels so fantastic to have our hard work recognised by our business peers. When our MD, Owen, moved back to the UK from Australia and brought the idea of Air with him, he soon discovered that Exeter would be a great place to base his company. It is a dynamic city that has so much untapped potential. Owen knew that there was talent in the city and that it afforded him with the opportunity to start a company with an engaging big city culture, in Devon where there was a better work life balance.

Since starting we have created over 60 jobs in the local community, established two new local businesses, brought business from all over the country and as far a field as Bermuda, given thousands to local charities and we aren’t looking to slow down anytime soon. It’s safe to say that we raised a few glasses of fizz at the awards night, here’s to the future of Team Air!

“What an amazing way to celebrate a wonderful growth year, for us. Our local community is important to us, so it’s great to be recognised locally by our peers. Congratulations must also go to the other finalists in our category; we were up against some amazing companies.” – Owen Richards, Managing Director

After a whirlwind of a week #TeamRoots is now up and running in our lovely new office, raring and ready to go, helping our clients accelerate their businesses.

#TeamRoots is so happy to still be sharing the space with our sister company, Air Marketing, whose successes over the past two and a half years have given us endless amounts of inspiration. After starting in May of this year (2018), we’re now actively working with 10 brilliant clients and always looking to work with more.

Starting with only one member of staff we now have four full time staff who are all creative, driven and dedicated to ensuring the success of our clients.

Moving from Queen Street to The Forum has been an exciting new chapter in our story, with a bigger space and more people around us, our potential to grow is limitless. And, to top it all off, we’ve even got office deck chairs (complete with a faux grass garden) and there’s talk of a giant Jenga set!

If you fancy coming to have a look around our new home, or chat to us about how we could help you with your marketing please pop in and see us. Or you can give us a call: 0345 2413 038

At Air we have an ambitious and driven team. We continuously go above and beyond for our clients to ensure that their investments are worthwhile, and their businesses are a success. It is for this reason that our own success continues to grow month on month.

When we began, just two and a half years ago, we worked out of someone else’s borrowed boardroom, with a grand total of two employees. From there we swiftly grew and began to develop into the company we are today.

During 2016, our staff numbers grew from 1-15 and so, to accommodate our growing workforce and business needs, we moved out of said boardroom and into Brittany House, our new head office that accommodated 15 people. However, never a workforce to slow down, our business continued to grow and so, Brittany House only lasted us a year and we moved into our Queen Street office in 2017. With the ability to accommodate 40 people, we had capacity to more than double in size. Little did we know that we were going to achieve this in the space of 6 months. In 2017, we grew to 40 employees and knew that going into 2018 we would need to pack up the boxes and call the removal company once again.

Signing new and exciting clients, including well-known household brands, our staff numbers have now grown to more than 50. Excitingly, in March 2018, we were able to launch our sister company, Roots 2 Market, to assist with the marketing of our clients and potential clients.

And guess what? We aren’t looking to slow down anytime soon. For that reason, we have moved again! Leaving our office on Queen Street, we are now based at the Forum, on Barnfield Road and today marks our first day of operation in our new home. We are ready and raring to go, all set to help our clients boost their business and also take on new clients. We always welcome visitors, so please do pop in and have a look around our new office, or just say hello!

With a potential capacity of 100 seats, we are always looking for ambitious Business Development Executives to join our exciting and ever-growing team. This move has also allowed an office restructure and some well-deserved promotions. After a whirlwind two and a half years, we are eager to see what the future has in store for us. Watch this space!