Outbox Marketing Agency

Built an agency from scratch, 20 people, 10+ clients, five industries.

My roleSenior Marketing Manager

WhereAbu Dhabi, UAE

When2024-2025

ServicesStrategy and positioning, Paid media, Tracking, analytics and reporting

The business

A UAE marketing agency built from nothing into a 20-person operation serving hospitality, delivery, real estate, sports and building materials, with all creative assets, systems and client relationships created in-house.

This site is no longer online.

The brief

Create everything: the assets, the team, the client base, and the operating system that keeps ten concurrent accounts from degrading into ten different quality standards.

What was in the way

Building an agency from scratch, every asset, process and client relationship had to be created, not inherited.
Ten-plus concurrent accounts, each with different economics, sales cycles and definitions of a good lead.
Quality was person-dependent: results varied by whoever happened to be running the account that month.
Reporting could show what was spent, but rarely what it returned.

What I did

Built the agency and the team
Created all assets and grew the operation to a team of 20 from scratch, covering media, performance, content, design and video.
Built one framework, not ten
Content governance, a shared paid-ads structure and automation pipelines that any account could be dropped into. Category strategy stayed bespoke; the operating machinery did not.
Defined "a good lead" per client, in writing
A padel court booking, a marble project enquiry and an off-plan registration are not comparable. Each account got its own qualification standard before optimisation started.
Analysed consumer behaviour to steer campaigns
Campaign adjustments were driven by observed buying behaviour per category rather than by platform-default optimisation.
Built industry relationships as a growth channel
Relationships with key industry players were developed deliberately, and became a meaningful source of new client acquisition.

What changed

20 peopleTeam builtGrown from scratch across five disciplines.

Up to 9.5xROASPeak improvement in return on ad spend.

-35%Cost per leadReduction achieved across the portfolio.

10+AccountsManaged concurrently across five sectors.

Clients included Viking Restaurant, Bridge Retreats, AlBarq Express, LePadel Club, Marah Inflatables, GoldStone Marble, Akwan Construction and AlBahia Stables.