About NOVOS
We’re making SEO simple for eCommerce brands. We deliver an organic growth strategy, then help you to action it.
What the team are best at
NOVOS exists as a vehicle for client and employee growth. Each month we track happiness of employees and clients to ensure they align.
Strategy & Consultancy
We're your outsourced SEO team. We'll tell you where the opportunity is and how to capitalise on it. We'll then hold your hand to ensure it's implemented correctly (or if you're not much of a hand-holder, that's cool too, we know when not to get too close)
Content & Digital PR
We create content & campaigns that attract new customers. All of our creative is driven by data & strategy.
Migrations
We'll help you to migrate across eCommerce platforms and ensure you're set up to scale the new platform so that the investment was worth it.
Meet the team.
Sam previously headed up SEO for Made.com across all major European markets. His achievements include growing Made's non-brand SEO traffic by over £10.4million, you'll hear him say this about 100 times in the first 3 months of working with us. He also won the best use of SEO in retail for OKA.com. Brands he's worked for include Made.com, Deliveroo, Pottery Barn, JD, Simba, Patch and Bloom & Wild to name a few.
Before setting up NOVOS, Antonio led the digital growth at luxury men’s publication Gentleman’s Journal where he brought value from declining print sales to huge online subscription revenue growth. Antonio’s also worked agency-side before, where his global viral campaign “Find the missing Easter Egg” with Bloom & Wild set him up for life. He still talks about it in every pitch. Nominated for The Drum’s rising star, and a UK Search Award winner, you’re in good hands here.
Olivia leads our Digital PR work for clients. She has a unique skillset of having worked at a traditional PR agency, then a performance led Digital PR agency. This allows her to build a relationship easily with inhouse PR teams while training them on the ways of the SEO. She also leads our internal Culture Club where she allocates over 90% of the budget towards food & drink for the team!
Dan leads our SEO team. Having previously worked at many agencies before NOVOS, he knows what clients want and how to deliver. In his spare time, he does triathlons and supports QPR for some reason. At every ideation meeting, Dan suggests creating a fake product for our clients. Still the only man we know who can go transparent.
Nicole loves food almost as much as she loves tech SEO... not really but this is an agency website. Nicole was our first recruit, and it's all gone downhill for her since. After we made a large investment to our first private office at Citypoint, Nicole made it very clear that she loved our first office more (they did call her Queen for some reason). Due to a lack of microwaves at Citypoint, we had to move to WeWork for Nicole. She also killed all of our office plants in protest. She also loves dogs and hates this pic of her.
Mira joined us from Trainline at the end of 2019. Mira brought a wealth of knowledge and love for all things data-led content as well as an intense passion for all things Spain. Since she's joined, a day hasn't gone past without Antonio announcing that he loves Jamon, which Mira brings back from Spain (before COVID-19) in bulk. Safe to say, Antonio's struggled during COVID.
Alfie
Head of Partnerships
Alfie was hired for his ability to attract attention, raise awareness and build relationships with strangers. His first strategic partnership was with www.bark.london - he's done nothing since.
Laura joined us in the middle of a global pandemic, and we didn't actually meet her F2F for 4 months. If you'd like to chat with Laura, you can join this Google meet link every Friday at 4 pm where she will be there without fail with a massive glass of wine or/and gin [First on and last off] meet.google.com/muo-cuvq-ymt
Georgia's from Australia, so we can now tick off Australia & New Zealand from our list of employees origins. Georgia is very good at talking to the press but very bad at participating in internal virtual quizzes & games. She used to be a reporter back down under, but now she's chosen the dark side of SEO, we're not sure if she's having a good time or regrets her decision. Time will tell. Oh, and Antonio's favourite sweet food are Tim Tams, so this recruitment was also strategic.
Hollie is a fantastic writer. She also has a popular blog, so it makes sense. Hollie also can neck Pornstar Martinis like there's no tomorrow at work events. Quite literally, there isn't a tomorrow for her when she does that. She's also getting married soon, so if you read this, drop her a LinkedIn message congratulating her. She'll be confused.
From day 1, Tom was thrown into the largest migration project we've ever done, 1 month later, he developed a trigger finger (and not tinnitus for reference) from working so hard and now can't type anymore. Luckily he's good at impressions which is all we pay him for, some are questionable, request his Gandalf, and you'll get Attenborough.
Kriti joins us as Marketing & Communications Manager after previously running an agency in London, on the side she also runs her own company. Kriti loves organizing a photoshoot. She also lived in the largest house in Poland. She now lives in the UK with the worst internet imaginable.
Simon joined as our HR consultant. He strategically times his office days with our pub visits. He talks with his hands and is the only man we know to pull off a moustache. He & Olivia have struck up quite a relationship, you can often find them with a bottle of wine & a couple of cigarettes strutting around Moorgate on a Monday evening. He still holds the record as the only Novae to get a round in (outside of Sam/Antonio).
Tom G joined as the second Tom of the company, he also became the first Novae to announce he will become a Dad in the coming months - at which point, Simon (the HR Guy) had to create a paternity policy for us. Tom's dedication was highlighted when he mentioned he does dog walks with his Novos work flying around in his head (think Alan in Hangover) https://images.app.goo.gl/MLwvS5oh9aNasR3x8 - his biggest accomplishment by far is taking the crown of "King of Puns" from Dan.
Ollie Blazey
Head of Fitness
After lockdown 1.0 we all gained weight. After lockdown 2.0 it was a right off, so we decided to get a head of fitness. Olly does PT sessions for the company. He looks nothing like this picture, but it's the best we could find. Everyone has a love-hate relationship with Olly, which he enjoys. He often borrows money off Dan to cover his extravagant lifestyle.
Xavier or Professor X to the rest of the world is not a bald man in a wheelchair (Xmen reference if you're confused). He's actually the polar opposite, X joined us in late 2020 and quickly established himself as the tallest Novae (away from Dan). The only thing taller than X himself is X's fringe. He joined us right at the start of Movember and successfully sported a cracking moustache for a month, topped only by the HR guy. X loves nerding out in our D&D group and once paid over £150 to play a video game (still don't understand how).
Hannah joined us in December 2020 as a Senior Digital PR Strategist and now she finds herself with the wonderful opportunity of being a Digital PR Manager. Hannah’s love of her old city of Salford is undeniable. We’ve never seen someone rave so highly about a place before. That is sarcasm. Once Hannah had settled into NOVOS and had got a good grasp of the team, she swiftly messaged Olivia and recommended her to read the book “Surrounded by Idiots”...Read into this how you wish.
Sacha joined us in February 2021 as Senior Digital PR Strategist. Firstly she lives just down the road from Antonio in the middle of nowhere (Near Stamford & Oakham) which is a slim chance in itself, but secondly her French Bulldog Arnie just turned 1 and he’s the cutest thing ever, so we just knew it was meant to be. Within a month of Sacha being here, Arnie had already received a delicious array of goodies such as a trachea and so much more that sounds so amazing. It’s wise to note, Sacha is a vegetarian herself so this box of goodies was probably not the best idea.
With more than a decade of hands-on experience in SEO and Digital PR, James most recently formed part of the management team for the award-winning agency, Verve Search. It was here that he honed his commercial skills and ability to grow agencies both in terms of revenue and people.
Phil joined us as a Senior SEO Strategist from Fraser Group in March 2021. Not only is he great at SEO but he’s also become the king of forecasting. Not sure he’s happy about that though, but we are. Thanks, Phil. “SEO – I found it by chance rather than it finding me,” Phil says. Tres romantique. Phil is also strangely obsessed with Michael Owen to a worrying degree. Phil’s name is actually Paul.
If you ever see a Brummie bouncing between connections to get home, it’s probably going to be Louise. Her approach to London transportation is chilled, to say the least. You can take Louise out of Birmingham, but you can't take Birmingham out of Louise. Louise is the bubbliest Brummie you will ever meet & sends daily compliments to Tom G to keep his spirits high.
Come rain or shine, Amy always joins a video call from her garden with the sound of the ocean in the background. We have 2 facts about Amy: 1) She has a pet Alpaca. 2) She often gets abused by the PR team about her feet (only one of these is true, you decide which one). She will also soon be joining the NOVOS puppy posse led by Lord Alfie. In her interview she mentioned that she can make a mean Old Fashioned and obviously, we hired her instantly. Speaking of her interview, Seb also insisted on us writing this: when we asked her to tell us about something that wasn’t on her CV, her response was one step beyond anything we’ve ever heard.
Ever seen those music videos with the artist's hair blowing everywhere looking super stylish? That’s what a PR update from Chloe is like, come rain or shine she’ll come equipped with her trusted fan strategically placed out of sight. In all seriousness, Chloe has got e-commerce PR nailed down, gaining product placement links in every national and lifestyle you can imagine. Once she’s set the strategy she’s off. Her mother’s also got an evil cat, think this guy: https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/51EVxK5KGvL.jpg but way more evil.
Ben is the world’s tallest DJ. Fact. He has officially taken the mantle as the tallest Novae from X. He’s also managed to make a commute from Germany equivalent to the same time as a commute from Manchester. Respect. Ben once turned up to work with a black eye after attempting a backflip into a swimming pool. Less respect. We all know it’s because a ping pong ball hit his eye.
Joanna is the world's only superstar DJ neuro-scientist. Fact. She joined us straight from university and was instantly the smartest Novae. Dan tried to join in on the brain talk but failed miserably. Ever since Joanna joined there has been a tug of war between the strategy and Digital PR team for her talents, the battle continues as Joanna has yet to commit her allegiance.
Our Story
2017
statement.digital was set up, operating as a side hustle while Sam was still at Made.com and Antonio at Gentleman’s Journal. The name was pivoted from another side hustle which was a men’s accessories website called Statement Accessories. Once the marketing started getting too expensive we started freelancing. The freelancing was making money, the accessories site was losing money so it was a no brainer to focus our attention on statement.digital.
2018
Antonio quits Gentleman’s Journal to work on statement.digital full time in March. Sam finishes at Made.com in December 2018. It’s clear here which of the two works harder on NOVOS.
December 2018
After an intense year of working every weekend, many long nights, juggling a full-time job and 10 clients, we can now both dedicate our full attention to our business.
….but first…
We go to Madrid for a long weekend to celebrate!
Sam then buggers off to Asia for 2 weeks so the business will have to wait until 2019…..
January 2019
2019 is the first year both Sam & Antonio work on statement.digital together.
We start January in ‘freelancer’ / ‘consultancy’ mode by working from home with no proper routine.
We soon realise this isn’t for us and we need to get an office. We move into co-working space Huckletree. A massive commitment for us at the time, to pay for a desk when we have one at home that works just fine. So we understand how hard it is to pay for something for the first time…
March 2019
March 2019 was one of the biggest changes ever for the business.
We rebrand the company from statement.digital to NOVOS.
“Novo” means ‘New’ in Portuguese. Then we added an S as SONOS did to Sono. If it works for them it’ll work for us. It’ll do, basically.
This symbolises a new start for us as we now decide to hit growth hard and build NOVOS into a full-service SEO agency. To do this we need to start hiring…
March 2019
Maddy & Nicole join us on our journey.
Antonio took these pictures of them very quickly for a pitch deck.
Little did they know that we’d use them for every reference for the next 2 years!
June 2019
The concept is proven, we now start to scale the business and have an epic portfolio of brands with us on the NOVOS journey.
October 2019
Sam gets a dog & spams the About Us page.
November 2019
After an intense few months of growth, we invest heavily in 3 new employees, a leadership team for the agency and our first private office.
November 2019
We then move into our first private office at Citypoint.
Nicole quickly discovers there’s no microwave…so we hand in our notice not long after it.
February 2020
Growth continues and we put out 4 new job adverts after working with some amazing brands.
We also go on our first trip to NYC to see our US clients.
Dan starts acting a bit odd.
March 2020
Georgia joins the PR team & Hollie joins as our inhouse content producer, & their work has taken our PR & production to a whole new level.
March-April 2020
Coronavirus hits the UK hard & we all get used to working from home.
We get some great headshots of the team on video calls, & we’re sure there are some HR issues here but we’ll look over this for now.
April 2020
Laura joins us, but we’ve had to onboard her remotely which was a challenge. Little did we know she’s obsessed with Sistrix and must work on commission.
May 2020
Kriti joins us as our sales and marketing manager. She used to run her own agency in London – her first main project was award submissions which paid off in the end!
June/July 2020
We’re fortunate to still grow through covid with Tom B, Tom G and Seb joining the team.
August 2020
Lockdown starts to ease so we start to go to the office more with more cultural days in the evening
August 2020
Dan continues to act a bit odd. His latest activities involve wearing a tux to the office for no reason and going transparent
September 2020
We win 3 awards in a week:
- Best use of SEO in eCommerce at the Global Search Awards with Bloom & Wild
- Best Small SEO Agency at the Global Search Awards
- Best SEO Agency at the Global Search Awards
October 2020
More awards! This time a DADI from The Drum & the UK search award for best use of search in e-com. Boom. Not bad right?
We celebrate with a bottle of Dom at the rack & t. A fine establishment for such a tipple.
November 2020
We’re free! But not for long as Lockdown 2.0 hits and we go back to our homes. To keep up fitness and to encourage people to get outdoors we launch The Autumn Awards where people submit pictures of their walk for prizes. Laura wins. We also start to pay for the teams personal training sessions and hire a ‘head of fitness’, Ollie (again looks nothing like this picture).
December 2020
December’s a write-off. Xmas is cancelled.
To get home to her beloved Sheffield – Nicole gets herself into a mass brawl at Kings Cross – the picture on the right is her mid-battle. She loves it (actually didn’t happen).
Despite lockdown, Dan somehow figures out a way to go transparent and goes into full Ghost mode (actually did happen).
January 2021
January 2021: There’s no light at the end of the lockdown tunnel. The world goes mad.
Despite lockdown 4.0 (or 3.0? lost count at this point), we continue to grow and aim to hire at least 7 new people.
We do 4 perfect migrations in a week and no one really acknowledges it – business as usual now?
We launch 2 epic team groups:
- Dungeons and Dragons (I know right, full nerd mode!)
- Spanish lessons with Mira (I know right, how cool is that?)
February 2021
Yep still in lockdown. Yep still growing.
We hire 7 people in the space of a few weeks.
One of which is yet another Tom. And yet another Tom who’s a dad. Team Tom Tom is now Team Tom Tom Tom. To make things worst Tom N successfully clones himself and dials into a catch up with Tom B.
Tom B also reverse image searches himself to figure out he is indeed a man and does indeed look like a common criminal.
March 2021
There’s a light at the end of the lockdown tunnel and we start planning an office return.
We hit some big milestones: exactly 2 years since we hired Nicole + Maddy we hit a £1,000,000 agency with 20+ staff. Not bad with no investment…
Oh and Tom G has a baby, that’s way more interesting!
Q2 of 2021
We decided to sign a lease for our largest office in Aldgate and embark on a whole new renovation to brand it the NOVOS way. Sam & Laura lead this, as apparently, they’re the design snobs at the company.
We hire rapidly with James, Paul, Chloe C, Chloe B & Amy all joining.
As lockdown restrictions ease, more people come to the office as renovation slowly come to an end. Our HR guy, Simon, ensures windows are open, hand sanitiser is everywhere, wipes & lots of lateral flow tests are present. Thanks, Simon.
We also start working with Not on the high street – what a win!!
We’ve also just closed our last financial year at over a £1m agency. Amazing to see the growth from the start, when Antonio & Sam were slacking in Madrid, to now.
We’ve also started the 2021 award season in style like we did with 2020 – winning a Drum Search Award for Best use of Search in eCom, we’ve been featured in the 100 best workplaces, top 100 fastest growing global companies & classed as a Best Place To Work 2021. It’s been a good quarter!
August 2021
We announced 2 massive sponsorships.
NOVOS sponsors its first football team. I know right, huge.
With the slow demoralising decline of Swansea City, the all-round uselessness of Cardiff City and Ryan Reynolds Wrexham, the only competition, it’s safe to say we sponsored the best football team in Wales: BrynRovers.
Sam’s cousin, Rachel, models the new kit here.
Available from all major sports retailers by September 2021.
The second announcement is a bit more serious. We are very proud to have sponsored the Women in Tech SEO podcast and to support Areej + Sarah with their great community. Laura does a talk about all things eCommerce SEO — listen here
We're eCommerce specialists for a reason, get in touch with us today and find out more.