In 2018, Toronto-based Emma Sweetnam and Mark More saw a gap existing in digital marketing agencies. They noticed these agencies had quick turnovers and clients who spent thousands of dollars without really understanding what had happened, the strategy behind the agency’s decisions, or how to improve and grow their business overall. They knew digital marketing could be exciting and collaborative, both improving and empowering the client’s business. They founded TwoBite as a passion project, and it quickly became an established digital marketing agency that does things differently. 

Pairing top talent with data-driven solutions, TwoBite focuses on paid acquisition and growth marketing for mainly B2B SaaS brands. With their proven full-funnel approach that builds, nurtures, and advances paid ad strategies to drive value and improve online visibility for clients, they’ve experienced rapid growth, considerable revenue, and consistent retainer contracts with notable clients like Konrad, Clio, Porter, and Blyth Academy. 

Exiting TwoBite to Focus on Other Things

With a strong foundation in place and a solid list of 25 actively managed clients, Emma and Mark knew TwoBite was ready to scale with the right buyer. After a few years of devoting themselves entirely to the agency and its development, they were ready to scale back their workload and focus on other things. They planned to stay on for 6 to 12 months to support the transition and were open to consulting afterwards. 

They partnered with us at Barney to find a buyer who wouldn’t just pay them for TwoBite, but would add value and help TwoBite grow at scale. They knew big things were possible for TwoBite, and they wanted to make sure the agency achieved its potential with the right buyer. At Barney, that’s exactly what we’re known for – helping game-changing founders exit their agencies with peace of mind knowing they’ve found the exact right financial, cultural, and strategic fit buyer to lead their business into the future.

A Scalable Business Model and Measurable Growth for Clients 

With TwoBite’s scalable business model, measurable growth for clients of every size and growth stage, performance-oriented team, streamlined agency processes, and strong margins with low costs, TwoBite is both unique and profitable. Their data-focused, hyper-growth approach to paid acquisition got results for their clients, built their revenue growth and healthy margins, and created expansion opportunities into other digital marketing services. A majority of their clients experienced 40%+ improvements in performance within the first 90 days of working with the agency, leading to referrals from happy clients as their top source for new business and a near 90% close rate across a wide range of businesses.

We loved how TwoBite was giving a human face and a human experience to digital marketing – an industry that sometimes can feel a little bit robotic and buttoned up. As they worked with their clients and not just for them, they were making online marketing digestible, collaborative, and a great investment. 

It was clear that TwoBite had great things ahead of them. With a long list of successful case studies and positive client testimonials, they had an immediate opportunity to initiate outreach efforts and explore non-referral acquisition. With various sales and marketing tactics they could increase leads, expand their existing pipeline, and initiate growth to a larger network of clients. They also had opportunities to grow through adding additional services like SEO and continuing to hire new contractors and freelancers who could aid expansion into other categories and facilitate growth within existing services.

A Buyer to Help TwoBite Scale

The last thing Emma and Mark wanted was a buyer who didn’t understand the digital marketing space, couldn’t support their current and future clients, and wouldn’t help their team grow and thrive. They had set up TwoBite with a solid foundation ready to scale, and they wanted to find a buyer who could make it happen.

Ensuring an Acquisition Experience Perfectly Aligned with Their Objectives

Successfully selling your agency is a significant undertaking. From financial and valuation assessments to analyzing the fit of the business model, culture, and growth strategy of the buyer, we’re here to ensure an acquisition experience that

aligns perfectly with your objectives. 

Excited to find the perfect buyer to help TwoBite scale, we got to know them inside and out from their culture to their business model to their numbers. With our deep understanding of and expertise in the agency market, we calculated TwoBite’s worth to buyers in today’s market and developed amazing marketing materials to help potential buyers understand their value. We reached out to targeted strategic buyers in our vast network and quickly landed on TwoBite’s perfect fit: Nowspeed.

Building From TwoBite’s Strong Foundation

A Boston-based digital marketing agency focused on helping clients grow through providing solutions specifically designed for their unique online marketing objectives, Nowspeed was the perfect buyer to help TwoBite scale. For decades, they had been providing expert marketing strategy, award-winning creative and flawless campaign execution across their services to generate more high-value sales faster for their clients.

With their expertise in innovative digital advertising, PPC, SEO, social media marketing, email marketing, marketing automation, and web design, they would be able to build from TwoBite’s strong foundation to help them achieve their potential at scale. 

A Win, Win, Win  

When all was said and done, everyone walked away happy. Emma and Mark exited with cash in the bank to seed their next venture and piece of mind knowing TwoBite was set up to thrive. Nowspeed got to expand their digital marketing offerings with TwoBite’s paid acquisition expertise, and TwoBite got a partner to scale. Win, win, win! 

And back at Barney headquarters, we celebrated another successful acquisition in the books. Helping entrepreneurs buy and sell amazing businesses is our bread and butter, but creating these happy endings never gets old.