Tom Buckland owner of HQ SEO and several other businesses tell us his story on how he created his digital companies to help others.
Here is his Under 25 story!
“HQ SEO is an SEO agency based in Cardiff. Established in 2012 with the sole goal to increase profits through smart result focused digital marketing, technical search engine optimization & content marketing services, at our core, we want to help business owners succeed and gain more free time so that they can give their customers more value.
HQ SEO looks at all aspects of a client’s site – technical, content, UX and links. We help websites in different niches increase their search visibility in Google and other search engines. More traffic will lead to more customers = increased revenue.
I started off studying Finance at Bournemouth University despite dropping out after two years due to boredom, instead, I opted to develop online marketing skills and eventually launch a business in the space. Creating my personal blog – SEO Oasis, by utilizing my knowledge, contacts, and skills.
I have managed to build a further 3 successful businesses – Ghost Marketing; an Outreach Agency, HQ SEO; an SEO Agency and AmazonSEOConsultant; an Amazon SEO agency. Finance was a solid career move but it didn’t inspire me, my passion was in digital marketing and I felt I would be more successful at this as I would enjoy the work and my passion would transfer over to potential clients in sales meetings and new business.
The main thing I learned was that I can’t do everything myself and to employ the right people and trust them, Learn to delegate and let go and avoid micromanaging was my biggest learning curve, but also my most rewarding.
Putting the trust in employing people to work on their expertise and/or cover tasks I couldn’t physically do. Spreading myself too thin would have resulted in lower quality work.
The best advice I got, which stopped me from throwing the towel in – was don’t take things personally. If a client cancels, then it is just business. If an employee quits, it’s not personal. If your staff doesn’t invite you to Friday night drinks, it’s because you’re the boss!
This helped me see that I am their boss and a businessman first. To maintain the respect of your employees you can be informal to a point, but you need to keep a certain distance. The balance is crucial to keep both the respect and have your employees like you. That always helps.
I want to grow my team by 50%, as we have new clients on hold as we don’t have the capacity to do the extra work at the moment. I have recently embarked on a new venture with my affiliate website Ghost Fitness – as I am into fitness and plan to turn another hobby into a reputable business.
Bodybuilding is another one of my hobbies. As with digital marketing, I feel it is more likely to be successful due to my passion for it. It is trading already and we have good numbers when we have more staff manpower I can allocate more time to it, to build up the customer base and increase brand awareness.”
The Under 25 section of 1PRCNT is meant to showcase to everyone that there are plenty of young entrepreneurs out in the business world making strides to better themselves and the world around them.
If you are an entrepreneur under the age of 25 and have a story you would like to share then please feel free to email us and we would love to interview you!
