AgencyAnalytics hasn’t just saved us time—it’s helped us build a more scalable, more confident, and more effective agency. Reporting is no longer a chore or a bottleneck; it’s a strategic asset. We wouldn’t go back.
Hello Starling isn't your typical "everything to everyone" agency. Founded by James Robinson in 2008, this specialist media planning and buying agency is based in Cardiff, Wales, and built for organizations that need their marketing spend to withstand heavy scrutiny. They focus specifically on the public sector, charities, and higher education—areas where budgets are tight and effectiveness genuinely counts.
What makes them different is their "commercially honest" approach. They stay channel-agnostic, translating deep regional insights into smart media choices across everything from paid search and social to out-of-home and BVOD.Â
James and his team also have deep roots in Wales. They understand bilingual audiences and regional landscapes in a way that large network agencies often miss.
Hello Starling is built for organisations that value insight over noise, results over scale, and partnership over volume. Our niche focus, disciplined model, and reputation for delivering measurable impact give us a clear, solid position in the market.
As Hello Starling’s client base grew to over 30 accounts, managing the reporting process became a significant operational bottleneck. The agency was stuck in a manual loop, pulling data from a fragmented mix of platform-native dashboards, spreadsheets, and bespoke slide decks.
Reporting was eating up 60-70 hours per month across the team. Because the process was so manual, it relied heavily on senior resources to gather, check, and format data. Any change in a client's scope or campaign timing meant the team had to start from scratch, making it nearly impossible to scale efficiently.
None of these issues was fatal on its own, but collectively they created friction. Reporting was starting to act as a brake on growth, absorbing time, limiting scale, and increasing operational complexity rather than as a tool that supported sharper decision-making and better client communication.
AgencyAnalytics provided Hello Starling with a centralized, intuitive platform to replace their fragmented reporting workflow. The transition was almost instant, transforming reporting from a monthly chore into an ongoing management tool. James found that the ease of setup and reliable data integrations allowed the team to duplicate and adapt dashboards for new clients in seconds.
The platform does the heavy lifting by automatically aggregating data from paid search, social, and other channels. This shifted the team's focus from "grunt work" to high-level strategy and optimization. Reporting is no longer a fixed point at the end of the month. It's now a live, always-on resource that the team monitors continuously to spot trends and add annotations as they emerge.
Day to day, the platform is easy to use and intuitive. Dashboards are quick to set up, data sources are reliable, and once a reporting structure is in place, it’s simple to duplicate and adapt it for new clients or campaigns.
The transition to AgencyAnalytics changed how James manages his agency operations. The team reclaimed 50 hours every month by eliminating manual data entry. This efficiency improved the agency's bottom line and shifted the culture toward strategic partnership.
Senior staff now spend their time on strategy and optimization, and they have more meaningful conversations with clients about performance. Clients use their live access to build transparency and trust, which are vital in the public sector.
Hello Starling built a resilient business designed for consistent outcomes. James and his team view reporting as a strategic asset. It helps them stay focused on helping their clients succeed.
Reporting is clearer, more transparent, and far easier to engage with. Clients value having live access to performance data and a reporting experience that’s easy to understand, particularly for senior or non-marketing stakeholders. That clarity has improved conversations, strengthened trust, and elevated the perceived value of our service.
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