Be found. Be trusted. Be chosen.
Marketing, communications and PR strategy for organisations that need to be seen, believed and picked — by customers, by funders, by the people whose decisions shape your future.
The problem isn't your marketing. It's the gap between being known and being chosen.
Most organisations are not invisible. They're overlooked. The audience has seen the name, scrolled past the post, half-read the newsletter — and still gone elsewhere, because nothing in the encounter gave them a reason to act.
Closing that gap takes three things working together: paid and organic media that put you in front of the right people at the right moment, earned media that gets someone other than you saying you're good, and owned content that turns interest into a decision.
I'm Zack Grimes — a Chartered Marketer with over a decade in marketing, communications and PR. I work as a fractional marketing director and strategic adviser to organisations that can't afford wasted spend or a damaged reputation.
Two outcomes. One discipline.
Growth and acquisition
For commercial businesses that need a pipeline, not a poster campaign.
I build demand generation systems that stand up to a spreadsheet — search and paid media that acquire customers at a cost you can defend, content and SEO that compound instead of decaying, and digital PR that builds the authority both Google and buyers use as a shortcut for quality.
If you're asking: Why is our cost per acquisition climbing? Why do we lose to less capable competitors? Where does the marketing budget actually go?
Reputation, funding and influence
For public sector organisations, charities and membership bodies whose reputation is their balance sheet.
Funders, commissioners and policymakers back organisations they can see, understand and trust. I build the visibility and credibility that make you the obvious partner — earned media, stakeholder communications, thought leadership and evidence-led campaigns that hold up under scrutiny and inside a public sector budget.
If you're asking: Why do less effective organisations get the funding? How do we get heard by decision-makers? How do we protect our reputation when it's tested?
How I work across paid, organic and earned
Paid — buy attention efficiently Google Ads, paid social and programmatic built around what a lead is actually worth to you, not around impressions. Full-funnel tracking so you can see which pound produced which outcome. I've run paid campaigns from commercial revenue generation through to large-scale public consultation.
Organic — own the ground you stand on Search strategy, technical and on-page SEO, content architecture and community building. Increasingly this also means AI search — structuring your content so that when someone asks ChatGPT, Gemini or Perplexity to recommend an organisation like yours, you're the one it names.
Earned — get someone else to vouch for you Digital PR, media relations, executive profiling, awards and speaking platforms. Earned coverage does two jobs at once: it persuades the humans, and it builds the third-party authority that search engines and AI models weight most heavily. Around 85% of brand mentions in AI answers to high-intent questions come from third-party sources — earned media is no longer just reputation work, it's discoverability work.
Outcomes that outlast the contract
I'm not here to hand you a report and disappear. Every engagement is built around three commitments: protecting your reputation, demonstrating value for money, and leaving your team more capable than I found them.
Director-level, fractional — senior strategic ownership without a six-figure hire or an agency retainer built on juniors.
Chartered practice — CIM-accredited frameworks, professional standards, and a code of conduct I'm accountable to.
Training-first — I build internal capability deliberately, so results continue when the engagement ends.
Governance-ready — strategies that survive contact with boards, trustees, procurement, regulators and the public record.
Digital-native, measurement-led — every channel instrumented, every claim evidenced.
Recent work
Revenue generation through paid search — Google Ads campaign built for direct financial return.
Large-scale public consultation — paid and organic media driving resident and community participation.
Brand launch from zero — pre-opening campaign for a children's leisure brand.
Reputation under pressure — responding to VAT changes at an independent school.
Member and consultant for:
Accredited by:
Start with a conversation, not a proposal
A 30-minute discovery call. I'll tell you what I'd do, whether I'm the right person to do it, and roughly what it costs. No pitch deck.