Who we work with
We love helping small, dedicated teams build intentional and sustainable growth.
We have worked with teams in nearly every industry, from individual founders who are self-funded, to large established players with multi-million dollar ad budgets.
This diversity puts us in a position to learn at a high speed and make a significant impact.
Strong, purposeful partnerships
At Tuff, we believe the future of growth agencies is in being value drivers, rather than service providers. Sure, we have a number of top-notch services we regularly execute. But, it’s bigger than that. A great partnership is also about people. We team up with companies to deliver actionable strategies on how to attract and keep more engaged customers.
As growth marketers, we build and optimize our process to do our best work with your team. Here is a sample of some of our work.
“Tuff is amazing. For about 11 years, I’ve always been involved with or owned some element of a brand’s marketing efforts. I’ve been given teams that already existed or tasked with finding the right partner. Tuff is honestly the first time someone’s REALLY nailed it. I mean completely nailed it! They understood us quickly. They report in weekly and the reports make sense to me. They have awesome ideas and follow through.
I feel completely at ease that they are in charge of that critical part of the our SaaS business. They truly know everything there is and give amazing advice, direction, and take action constantly on our behalf.”
Kristi Anderson | ThalamusGME
“Tuff is amazing. For about 11 years, I’ve always been involved with or owned some element of a brand’s marketing efforts. I’ve been given teams that already existed or tasked with finding the right partner. Tuff is honest the first time someone’s REALLY nailed it. I mean completely nailed it! They understood us quickly. They report in weekly and the reports make sense to me. They have awesome ideas and follow through.
I feel completely at ease that they are in charge of that critical part of the our SaaS business. They truly know everything there is and give amazing advice, direction, and take action constantly on our behalf.”
Kristi Anderson | ThalamusGME
Engagements at every stage.
We have found success working with teams in nearly every industry, from early traction startups to large enterprises. The most basic guidelines: our best fit is anyone looking to acquire new customers and scale their company through modern channels, tools, and frameworks: primarily founders and business owners.
We get our best results when we work with clients looking for a strategic, proactive team that values transparency, communication, and shared KPIs.
FAQs
Should I hire a growth marketing agency like Tuff or full-time marketer instead?
Finding a full-time hire is a great option for many companies. But they come with their own set of pros and cons when compared to a plug-in growth marketing team.
The major benefit is the expertise and time they bring to the team. The biggest downside is the high cost. Full-time hires can easily cost $100,000+ per year and it takes work to find the right fit. You need someone who can set the marketing roadmap and execute on a variety of channels. If you know the channels that work for you and just need someone to help you refine and grow those 1-2 channels, a full-time hire can work great. We talk about this in more detail in this blog post: You’re a Startup. Should You Hire a Growth Marketing Agency?
However, if you’re tight on budget and your primary goal is building a foundation for growth, testing acquisition channels to start getting traction, etc. then we generally recommend finding a growth marketing agency like Tuff. We’ll work with you to produce the same results as a full-time hire, at a lower cost and flexible monthly contract.
How long is the typical contract?
We start with a three month contract and then move to monthly. This gives us enough time to integrate as a team, run multiple experiments, and deliver meaningful results. We don’t like long-term contracts or trapping anyone into an agreement if they are unhappy.
While we prefer short-term contracts, we enter every partnership as though it’s a long-term relationship. Our average partnership is 12+ months and we work to fold into your company as an extension of your team. To learn more about our working relationship with clients, hear directly from them.
In addition to the cost of working with Tuff, how much should I budget for running ads?
While sometimes we only focus on organic channels, ads are generally part of the overall strategy. While a budget of $5-7K is typically enough to gauge the potential of 2-3 different ad channels, we tailor the budget to your goals within the first week of working together.
If you can only put aside $1-3k for ads, instead of testing 2-3 channels at once, we’ll customize your strategy so you focus on the single ad channel most likely to succeed. Either way, we like to start lean, learn fast, and scale up from there.
How does it work week-to-week?
Here’s what a typical week looks like with our team:
- We start the week with a shared priority list: what did we accomplish last week, what are we working on, how are we pacing towards our goals.
- We meet to discuss the focus areas and review data from recent campaigns.
- We connect via Email, Google Drive, and Slack for asynchronous communication throughout the week.
Who will I work with?
You’ll be working with a small, dedicated team of marketing experts built to fit the needs of your company.
Each client has a primary growth lead that they meet with weekly. Then, depending on the channels we are testing, you’ll also work with channel experts on a regular and on-going basis.
Is my company a good fit for Tuff?
From a founder with early traction to large enterprises and everything in between, we have worked with teams in nearly every industry. Our team is a fit for anyone looking to acquire new customers and scale their company through modern channels, tools, and frameworks: primarily founders and business owners.
We get our best results when we work with teams looking for a strategic, pro-active team that values transparency, communication, and shared KPIs.
Do you offer any performance-based pricing models?
To serve you as effectively as possible, we focus on services provided rather than hours worked only. Instead of paying us an hourly rate, you pay us a fixed rate, and then we allocate our time, people, and resources that make the most sense for your strategy at that point in time.
We also have a performanced-basd pricing model for specific partnerships. This typically is a lower fixed rate + an agreed percentage of top line revenue from our campaigns. If you’re unsure on how this works, we encourage you to schedule a call with our team.
Hire us to be your plug-in growth marketing team.
We like to share these case studies to articulate how we help businesses grow. But, a great partnership is also about people. Ready to learn more?
