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Celebrated Partner Spotlight: Grow NZ Business

Text Microsoft Advertising Partner Celebration, Recognizing our Partner Tier written over a blue background.

Have you ever wondered what makes a Microsoft Advertising Celebrated Partner special? How they utilise Microsoft Advertising to drive business and reach new customers, or what their company culture and vision looks like? We caught up with Grow NZ Business, our New Zealand Celebrated Partner for April 2022, to get an inside look at the amazing work that earned them this exclusive title in the first place!

Celebrating our partners is an exclusive benefit of the Microsoft Advertising Partner Program where we highlight the hard work our partners have accomplished throughout the year.

You could be a Celebrated Partner too—apply to enroll in the Microsoft Advertising Partner Program for a chance to become a Celebrated Partner when our next round of nominations opens in September of 2022.

Grow NZ business’ logo.

We had the opportunity to interview the Managing Director of Grow NZ Business and our April 2022 New Zealand Microsoft Advertising Celebrated Partner—Jamie Farmer.

Q: Tell us a little about Grow NZ Business—history, current size, audience, and business objectives.

A: “Grow NZ Business commenced in July 2017, and we currently have over 8,000 kiwi businesses as members and execute marketing for over 200 clients. Our purpose is to help kiwi business owners to not just survive but thrive and achieve their business aspirations. We achieve this by sharing expertise and by providing access to world class partners such as Microsoft Advertising, helping our members to have the confidence to act and grow.”

Q: What is Grow NZ Business’s vision, mission, or specialisation?

A: “We specialise in business model optimisation, marketing strategy, and marketing execution.

We have deliberately had a marketing division in the business to help our clients due to the highly varied level of marketing quality in market, especially with understanding customer journeys, margins, cashflow, customer lifetime value, customer acquisition cost, and most importantly, profitable growth.”

Q: What product features offered by Microsoft Advertising do you rely on the most to achieve your vision?

A: “It is more than the product features, it is about our clients being able to access new customer segments, who we generally find are more affluent and deliver a higher marketing return on investment for our clients in a comparatively less competitive environment.”

Q: How has Microsoft Advertising been able to help you reach new customers and grow your business?

A: “Being a Microsoft Advertising Partner creates a point of difference in the market where the competition tends to focus on Google, Facebook, or Instagram. It helps to create conversations that demonstrate we put the client, their objectives and their customers first, and we have the breadth of options to generate profit in the most cost-effective way.”

Q: What impact on your business have you been able to drive with Microsoft Advertising?

A: “It has helped us accelerate our new customer acquisition and reduce attrition to almost zero. We have created a new role totally dedicated to Microsoft Advertising acquisition and onboarding which has doubled our lead to conversion ratio by ensuring strong knowledge and smooth onboarding of new clients.”

Q: How does Grow NZ Business embody inclusivity and giving?

A: “Our team and our client base embody inclusivity via our cultural backgrounds and respect for our differences, understanding, and embracing that those differences create combined value greater than the one individual. New Zealand, while not perfect, is a naturally inclusive country across many facets, and Auckland is one of the most culturally diverse cities in the world.

Throughout the Covid-19 lockdowns, we held free webinars for hundreds of businesses giving advice on cashflow management, supplier negotiations, market trends, and where we saw headwinds and tailwinds. We also waived our annual membership fee to all new members and to any current member who stated affordability was an issue.

Currently, we have our 2022 Grow NZ Business Marketing Grants programme underway where three businesses will be awarded $10,000 Marketing Grants each.”

Q: How have you adapted to recent changes in consumer trends brought about by COVID-19?

A: “This might seem a bit strange, but we really haven’t, we have always had a flexible, digitally enabled model with a flexible workplace. What it did force was for many of our staff to have to work from home when they would have liked to be in the office. What the recent changes have done is reinforce the value we create 24 hours a day as we are not constrained by physical locations or time zones.”

Q: Has your digital marketing strategy changed since the pandemic?

A: “Fundamentally, not really, with the exception of more webinars being utilised for engagement and education. What has transpired is we have moved from a “selling model” to a “customer buys model”.”

The Grow NZ Business team poses for a photo while on a boat.

Thank you to Jamie Farmer and the Grow NZ Business team for showing us how their drive for results, in combination with Microsoft Advertising, helps customers succeed in a rapidly changing digital marketplace! Don’t miss out on any of our other spotlighted partners in Canada, the United Kingdom, and the United States as well as upcoming events for partners on every tier.

If you haven’t enrolled in the Microsoft Advertising Partner Program yet, make sure that you apply at microsoftadvertisingpartners.com so you’re eligible for the next round.

If you’re an enrolled partner, stay connected with us and up to speed on all things partner-related by joining the Microsoft Advertising Partner Community on LinkedIn.

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