Amanda Dempster is the founder of Milk Marketing and Holiday Brands. Brisbane-based creative marketing agencies that provide the full range of brand development and marketing services to their clients across the country in SME Business and the Tourism Industries respectively.
What sets these agencies apart is their diverse range of services, strategically structured to take care of their clients’ every need in how they present their business to their customers, and how they promote it. Backed by some of the latest tech and insights, and using cutting-edge AI advancements, these agencies are providing a new type of service to help their clients see substantial returns and exposure for their marketing spending.
For more details about Milk Marketing, visit their website here.
What Inspired you to become an entrepreneur?
Amanda: I guess it’s always been ‘in me’. I started my first freelance business toward the end of high school, and even very early in my career in full-time corporate roles, I always had 1 or 2 side businesses building on the side. I think at one point I was working 1 job and had 4 side hustles going! Building something from scratch that starts as just a good idea and then watching it grow into a business or service that customers find useful or helpful gives me an enormous thrill.
As a true creative type, I’ve always loved working for myself and having the freedom to switch things up and try new approaches without anyone telling me I couldn’t do it, or that it wouldn’t work. I love to see an idea take off, from the planning and the brand, to the success with profit. I’m known to work crazy and unconventional hours with ridiculous focus too – especially when I’m driven by a new idea or concept – so the entrepreneur life tends to suit me!
How did you get started?
Amanda: My first official business Milk – a graphic design, marketing and print business – launched in January 2008. I was working in a senior creative role for a nationally known brand and I noticed there were so many missed opportunities for customers in terms of brand support and marketing as a whole cohesive service. I had also become more and more frustrated seeing the lack of value and the massive margins the clients were paying for even basic products like business cards.
So driven by that fire to see better value and services that work together for my clients, I decided to leave my role and go on my own! Back then, ‘mobile’ marketing or design or printing was really unheard of. Straight away, I was able to offer convenience to my business owner clients that meant they didn’t have to try and get down to a local shop to order brochures or plan their next marketing campaign between 9-5 or the hours when they were most needed ‘in’ their business. I’d often (and still do) visit clients’ homes, have coffee around their kitchen table, at whatever time or day that suited them best, and actually listen to what their needs and their challenges were across the business. That has enabled me to offer more than just a basic marketing, print or design service. It meant they got more value and better results, because I could taking care of their brand in a way that allowed me opportunities to fill other gaps – like taking social media to match the designs we were already doing on offline collateral or designing their website to either match their style or to deliver more leads, or using new market insights and tech to get them more brand exposure or better ad performance for their marketing spend.
It’s really about having the right conversations, knowing the right questions, and looking at a business with expert brand and marketing insights and services together that delivers the best results.
Since then I’ve also started (and in some cases sold) other businesses in tourism, fundraising, and online e-commerce stores. One business I’ve since sold started as a christmas gift idea for family and turned into a really fun e-com business – Coffee Snob Cups!
What was your biggest startup challenge? What steps did you take to overcome it? What did you learn?
Amanda: I think with anything in life the biggest challenge is always fear. Or the ‘what if’s’.
Part of the excitement though is pushing beyond the fear and all the cells in your body screaming at you to hold back or be safe, and to just take the risk with a bit of planning and see what happens!
It’s always hard not to play it safe, stick to a 9-5 structure, and just take a regular paycheck. But I’ve learned and seen my biggest achievements and successes when I’ve pushed past that place where everyone is telling you it’s not a safe idea or that you’re a dreamer!
Maybe that’s why I’m such a skydiving fan!
Even though I’m petrified of heights, I love it. It’s a mini business scenario in a way, getting in that little rickety plane, pushing aside the fear and what if’s and just leaping out and enjoying the ride and the rush (even though for those first few seconds it’s a bit terrifying!)
What is the Most Memorable Thing You’ve Done Since you Started your Business?
Amanda: There are a few things I can think of particularly in terms of some of the nationally recognized brands I’ve designed, but one thing I’m proudest of recently is that this year I was selected as a top 5 (and the only female) finalist for the 2021 Australian Caravan Industry Future Leaders Award in recognition of the results we’ve been achieving for our clients.
The tourism industry is one I’m passionate about, especially given it’s recent challenges so that recognition meant a lot.
Another project I’m enormously proud of is a few years ago a friend was given an opportunity to support the setup of a safe home to help women out of sex slavery in Africa.
I was chairperson for a charity at the time so had the means to provide fundraising support and came up with concept for ‘Love Hope Jump’. It was an event about 8 weeks in the making and we had 50 odd young people register to skydive to raise money for the cause. With the help of a couple of friends for the event planning, I set up the brand, e-commerce giving website, promotions, and did the PR to secure us some radio coverage and as a result we were about to raise over $55,000 in just a few weeks to fund the setup of the home in Cape Town.
What are your top 3 favourite online apps, tools, or resources and what do you love about them?
Amanda: I’m a big sucker for data. Probably because of my role and the fact that’s where the value lies in helping my clients. You’ll always find me flicking between Google Analytics, Ads, and tools like that on my phone – even after hours. But what I’m really loving is what my world of marketing is now seeing in terms of AI insights and opportunities. Using some of our new AI systems, it’s allowing us to deliver insights and optimized results faster than we ever could as mere humans reading data and graphs!
In terms of legacy, what is the mark you’d like to leave on the world?
Amanda: I know it sounds corny. But when I think about legacy, and what I want my girls to believe in, I think it’s just to believe you can follow your dreams and that no idea is a bad one. The other thing is the value and importance of generosity.
I think if I can model that to my family, friends, and to the world I come in contact with, and show that having the courage to back yourself even when you look crazy to everyone else and that when you push past the fear that’s where the good stuff happens, then I’ll feel like I’ve left a good legacy behind.
In one sentence, what’s the best advice you’d give to someone just starting out on their entrepreneurial journey?
Amanda: Get a little, give a little, back yourself, fail heaps, and learn from everything!
To Keep up to date with Amanda Dempster, connect with her on her Facebook.