Richard Michie had worked in marketing since 1999, agency side and client side, without ever running an agency of his own. Then he was made redundant, and in 2016 he started The Marketing Optimist, now a Leeds agency whose clients stay for years.
We asked Richard how he won his first clients, what he got wrong early on, and where he thinks agencies are heading. The Marketing Optimist is listed on AgencyIndex.
Take us back to 2016. Why did you set up The Marketing Optimist, and what were you trying to do differently?
I started in marketing back in 1999 working in Direct Mail for Leger Holidays in Rotherham. I stayed in direct mail for quite a while working in big book mail order for Grattan and as all this continued the internet arrived and mail order became e-commerce very quickly. I worked agency and client side my whole career but never ran an agency, that is until I was made redundant and had nothing to fall back on so I thought what have I got to lose and started The Marketing Optimist. It's the best thing I ever did and I wish I had done it far sooner. So it was the depression of the job centre that made me do it.
What we do differently is we become part of the client's team, we embed ourselves in a nice way and get to understand them as well as we can, the whole team are proactive and really do care about the marketing strategies we put in place. I also wanted to run a great place to work so all the team work flexibly and are brought in on the direction of the business. Nice places to work produce great work in my experience, bad ones the opposite.
How did you win your first clients?
I asked people directly. On day one I posted to Facebook "I'm free to help with marketing, who needs some help?" I landed a tiny job that day for a school website and we went from there. That's something that stayed with me, go and ask people if you can help. And remember to keep helping people, you don't always get a client from it but passing that on gets you a good reputation and someone who knows what they are doing and can help.
What's the biggest lesson from the early days, maybe one you learned the hard way?
Get to know how much to charge fast and don't undersell your services. Understanding the numbers is the toughest part of running an agency because most people start one because they love marketing, not because they like to understand a P&L. Oh and get a good accountant early on.
Understanding the numbers is the toughest part of running an agency because most people start one because they love marketing, not because they like to understand a P&L.
What was the turning point, when you knew it was really working?
When I told my wife I was stopping looking for a job because I was so busy (had in fact already stopped looking a few weeks before I told her).
Your clients stay five years on average. What do you put that down to?
You'd need to ask them but I think it's the passion we put into each client's work, we work on retainers mainly and that means we are consistently building, growing and developing with the clients over a long period. That means we see things coming before they do sometimes and they know they can rely on us every step of their journey.
Which piece of work or client win are you proudest of?
The work I'm proudest of is Multiply North Yorkshire. For three years we ran the whole marketing campaign. The aim is to help people get back into maths, without them really knowing they were doing maths. The programme, which was supported by North Yorkshire Council, North Yorkshire Combined Authority and the UK Government, achieved amazing results and was the most successful programme in the UK.
- Over 15,000 in York and North Yorkshire engaged with Multiply and its delivery partners
- 400 families benefited from free air fryers, helping them to reduce costs and prepare healthy meals at home
- 1000 people used the Century app, the online system which helps develop numeracy skills
- Helped countless people improve their numeracy skills and, as a result, their social mobility
- Several people launched their own businesses as a result of their engagement with Multiply North Yorkshire
It was really nice not to be selling things but improving lives, there were some really emotional days on that campaign.
How are you adapting to the AI era, both in how you work and in what clients now ask for?
I made a pledge that we'll never use AI as our final output, and I'm sticking to that as the backlash continues against AI slop. My thought is if you can't be bothered to create content properly why should customers be bothered to act on the messaging? We use AI because we'd be dumb not to but we use it for the more mundane parts where my team would be wasting time doing it manually.
My thought is if you can't be bothered to create content properly why should customers be bothered to act on the messaging?
What's next for The Marketing Optimist?
The plan is to grow the business to be large enough that I can focus on the operational side more and spend more time with my family who are getting into working age themselves now.
I never want to be a huge agency because then I'll be too far from the coal face and that's the part I love and why I launched The Marketing Optimist in the first place.
Where do you think agencies are heading over the next five years?
The threat from AI is real for agencies so you can't ignore it. So I think the agencies that will survive in the next five years are those that use it in smart places but that don't sacrifice creativity to it. Add value and you will do well, get lazy and you'll be eaten by AI.
What would you tell someone thinking of starting an agency today?
Do it. You'll thank yourself later, after lots of tears :0)
Interview from September 2026, lightly edited.
