I built Newcastle Digest from zero to more than 7,000 subscribers with a 60% average open rate - learning how to earn attention and trust in a local market, week by week.
Then I built Testimo from scratch: a platform that helps businesses turn completed jobs into reviews, testimonials, referrals and other useful follow-up.
Digest Studio is where those experiences meet Newcastle businesses that need a stronger brand, a clearer website, or marketing that still matters after launch day.
When you work with Digest Studio, you work directly with me.
I didn't start Digest Studio because I wanted an agency. It grew out of Newcastle Digest and Testimo - work I was already doing for myself, that other businesses started asking about.
What I enjoy is fairly simple: solving practical problems, building useful products, and helping a business become easier to find, trust and choose. That's the through-line between the newsletter, the product and the studio.
So Digest Studio stays small. You get me - the same person who writes the Digest, ships Testimo, and cares whether the thing we build still works a few months later.
Newcastle Digest wasn't built as a marketing channel. I started it because there wasn't a local newsletter I wanted to read. Over time it became one of Newcastle's largest local email communities - and teaching me, edition by edition, what people here actually care about. That kind of understanding doesn't come from analytics alone.
I live here, work here and build businesses here. Everything I recommend is grounded in the Newcastle market.
You work directly with me from the first conversation through to launch and beyond.
I don't just recommend tools and strategies - I build, use and improve them through my own businesses every day.
Owned media
A weekly email for locals - written because I wanted something worth opening, not because I needed a lead magnet. The numbers matter, but the point is the habit: showing up every week and earning trust in a city I live in.
In-house product
Most businesses finish a job and then forget to ask for the review, the quote, the photo or the referral. I built Testimo to catch that moment - proof that Digest Studio ships products, not just advice.
If you want practical advice, honest conversations and someone who actually enjoys building things - I'd be glad to talk.
Book a free strategy call and tell me what you're working on.