From Side Hustle to Sustainable Family Business with The Digital Brew

In our Customer Spotlight series, we’re interviewing experienced freelancers in the Rounded community to share their stories and the lessons they’ve learned. This month, we caught up with Angela and Stewart Rodgers, the husband-and-wife duo behind The Digital Brew.

The Digital Brew specialises in all-in-one website packages for solo and small business owners, including website strategy, SEO, content, design, development, and management.

Angela also runs her own copywriting business, helping B2B businesses write SEO content and website copy that converts.

Angela and Stewart walk us through:

• How they got their start freelancing

• Balancing running a business with raising a family

• Pricing and package strategies for a sustainable business

Let’s dive in!

Angela and Stewart’s journey as business owners

I was working as a Marketing Manager in a small business right out of uni," Angela recalls. "After about a year there, I realised I wanted to work with more of a variety of businesses.

Taking on a few freelance clients under her name quickly snowballed into something much bigger – so big that she had to rope Stewart in.

The timing was perfect. Stewart's role as Indoor Plant Technician wasn’t fulfilling his creative potential, and those website-building skills were practically begging to be used.

The couple ran their first business, Big Idea Marketing, for two years before putting their work on pause for a more important project: parenthood.

Things went a bit nuts for a while after that, as they do when you have kids,” Angela says. “Stew had to go back to the day job so we could eat. I got back into freelancing once our youngest was about six months old and really dove into the copywriting side of things.

By 2018, Angela’s client list had picked up enough that Stewart could drop the day job to help juggle work and kids. A year later, the pair prepared to launch The Digital Brew as their next joint venture.

Unfortunately, COVID threw a spanner in the works.

We were so fortunate to have some great projects early on, but it was a lot with the pandemic and having small children at home. Like many business owners, that time broke us for a little while, but we persevered. And in the last couple of years, we’ve gotten back into the flow.

Working with your other half (without killing each other)

When people hear Angela and Stew work together, they usually ask, "How's that going?" with a worried look. But these two have got it figured out.

We haven't even come close to killing each other, so that's good!

The secret? They stick to what they're good at.

Angela brings in the clients and handles all the words, while Stew works his magic behind the scenes. “I pull the clients in, he dazzles them with his work, and they stick around.”

Currently, the duo’s biggest challenge is juggling work while raising two small boys.

One of the hardest things is that we're selling our time and, in a way, our creative energy,” says Angela. “If I’m sick one week, or the kids are sick, or a client is slow to get back to us, that flows into the next project. It can be difficult to catch up.

And there's always a limit to how much work you can take on in this type of business without bringing on extra people. That's not our vision – we’re happy just the two of us.

So that is a challenge, but that's okay. It means we get to say no to other challenges that bigger businesses deal with.

What lessons did Angela and Stewart learn from their first business?

By the time we began The Digital Brew, we'd had a lot of experience in what not to do in business. So it was nice to start fresh with a new brand, package up our services, and price them more appropriately than we did the first time.

Here are the duo’s top 5 takeaways:

Upfront pricing

Like most business owners, we're awkward about prices. We don't want to have to talk about money in a discovery call.

Instead, the Digital Brew website clearly displays project costs, ending those uncomfortable conversations before they begin.

Having our prices front and centre means by the time we chat with a potential client, they’re keen to work with us. They know what to expect. We can invest a lot of energy upfront in having that conversation and really scoping the project out, which can take a couple of days.

Apart from attracting fewer tyre-kickers, this strategy also helps eliminate some of the stress around quoting for projects.

It's so much easier when you figure it out ahead of time. You've made it public, and you can stick to that – that's your source of truth.

Packaging services

While Digital Brew does offer individual services such as website copywriting, design, or development, they mainly focus on website packages.

Instead of clients having to source a freelance copywriter, web designer, developer, or SEO person, they can just come to us. For most sole traders and small businesses, that’s exactly what they need. It’s a lot simpler because they don’t have to juggle the project, and we can manage it all by ourselves.

On Angela and Stewart’s end, packaging their services has also helped:

• Clearly outline to clients what is and isn’t included

• Create efficient, repeatable processes

• Bring in more revenue per project

Detailed proposals

We do extremely detailed proposals. We often include diagrams, and we really break down our terms and conditions and the process. Everything the client could possibly want to know about the project is in there ahead of time so they know exactly what they’re getting when they sign up. We find it’s a great way to give them a preview of what it’s like to work with us.

Apart from providing value to clients upfront, this approach also serves as a good roadmap for Angela and Stewart, ensuring all promised work is delivered on time and that scope creep is kept to a minimum.

It also helps weed out clients who may be a bad fit. Some people get a bit overwhelmed because they aren’t as detail-focused as we are. But I would say those people aren’t the best clients for us, because it can be harder to get them to give you detailed feedback.

Flexible payment plans

Understanding that websites are a significant investment for small businesses, Angela and Stewart have developed a clever approach to payment plans.

For our main package, we offer by default a 12-month payment plan. We know it’s expensive for many people to pay upfront. We can do custom payment schedules – say, 24 months, or paying it all before the end of the financial year – but that’s all spelled out in the proposal before we take on the client.

One of their most successful innovations has been bundling in hosting with a12-month package.

We wanted people to get used to being on hosting and maintenance with us, as we found that a lot of people don't understand or value what goes into looking after a website. Thankfully, the strategy has paid off. They realise how awesome it is by the end of 12 months They don't ever have to worry if their website is down or if there are broken links. Because Stew has all these things set up to check that.

Predictable revenue

Offering ongoing services like website hosting and maintenance has helped Angela and Stewart develop a more predictable revenue stream for their family during quieter months.

Even though we give clients access to make updates in the backend themselves, most people find that they don't fully understand how to do it. We've tried in the past to give them training and things like that, but it's just so much better to offer ongoing support instead.

They don’t have to worry about their site while running their business. Now, they can just contact Stew with an update and he'll just make it live for them.

How do Angela and Stew use Rounded?

After trying several options, Angela and Stewart have settled on Rounded for their business.

When we started our business journey in 2014, we tried Xero, Quickbooks, and Wave. Wave wasn’t too bad, but it didn’t include all the features we needed. Rounded is much nicer to use than most other solutions and is a good fit for a business like ours.

Stewart’s favourite feature: Bank Feed

I jump in around once a month to reconcile our expenses, and it’s really snappy. It’s easy to filter by quarters and financial years, and adding receipts and checking expenses is quick.

Angela’s favourite feature: Recurring Invoicing

It saves so much time and I don’t have to think about it. I can just set it to run for 12 months and then stop, making it easy to manage payment plans. We’re also really excited about the new subscription feature that’s coming, so we can set up automatic credit card payments with clients and make that process even easier on their end.

Angela and Stewart’s #1 tip for business owners

Be helpful, but charge for that helpfulness. There’s no point in being helpful for free because free doesn’t put food on the table.

It's a lesson they've learned through experience, particularly for Stewart, who Angela says "can't help himself. He just loves to help.

What’s next for Angela and Stewart?

Angela and Stewart are currently focusing on helping their existing clients, refreshing websites, and adding new pages where needed.

But their biggest priority?

Just working on being as healthy as we can be, being the best parents we can be. Angela shares. Because those things will help to increase our capacity and energy to do the work in the business. We're not trying to build an empire. We're building something that works for our family, delivers real value to our clients, and lets us do work we enjoy. That's success for us.

Need help with your website?

Connect with Angela and Stewart:

The Digital Brew: https://thedigitalbrew.com/

Angela Rodgers (Copy & Content): https://angelarodgers.com/

Connect with Angela on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/theangelarodgers/

Follow The Digital Brew on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thedigitalbrewau/