Scribe Media
Building the infrastructure to scale a high-touch marketing operation
The Big Picture
Scribe Media was best known for helping nonfiction authors turn their expertise into books. But for most clients, the book wasn't the end goal. They were using it to build their brand, attract clients, land speaking opportunities, grow a business, or create new professional opportunities.
Scribe's Impact department helped bridge that gap through PR, marketing, advertising, websites, brand design, copywriting, podcasting, and other services.
During my tenure, the percentage of Scribe clients purchasing marketing services grew from roughly 15% to 60%. As demand grew, so did the opportunity: turn Impact into a full agency that could support clients before, during, and long after publishing a book.
My Role
I worked alongside Scribe’s CXO to design the infrastructure for the new agency model, with plans to step into a VP-level role overseeing the business as it scaled.
The model needed to support three groups at once: Scribe's clients, its executives, and the company itself.
Rather than build separate teams for each, we designed one flexible infrastructure where strategists could identify the goal, then deploy specialists across PR, advertising, events, brand, web, content, research, and other disciplines as needed.
What I Delivered
Before developing the larger agency model, I'd already rebuilt the infrastructure for the Impact department and marketing services, creating a working proof of concept that supported 100–150 active clients at a time.
I developed:
Organizational structure, roles, and team expectations
Strategist and specialist delivery models
Operational workflows, SOPs, and client communication systems
Capacity planning, onboarding timelines, waitlists, and workshops
Hiring plans and job descriptions
Coaching and escalation systems for complex client work
Infrastructure designed to scale toward roughly 2x the active client volume
The operation was intentionally standardized behind the scenes without standardizing the strategy itself.
The Impact
Over my time at Scribe, I worked with 500+ clients, giving us an enormous amount of data to understand what worked, what could be systematized, and where strategic judgment mattered most.
The share of Scribe clients purchasing marketing services grew from approximately 15% to 60%, while we expanded the length and scope of engagements to provide more value and increase revenue.
A typical client generated roughly 15–20 earned-media placements during a 3-6 month engagement, alongside outcomes ranging from book sales and speaking opportunities to new clients and business deals.
The larger agency model was designed, roles and workflows were established, and hiring was beginning when an abrupt ownership transition changed the direction of the company.
Why It Matters
Scaling strategic work doesn't mean giving everyone the same strategy.
At Scribe, we built the systems around the work so the thinking could stay customized. A client might want a major national media hit, but if their real goal was winning business in a specialized industry, a trade publication could be far more valuable.
The goal wasn't to deploy every lever. It was to understand the outcome first, then know which lever to pull, when, and why.