From PPC Plateau to Growth Engine: HBP Group's Digital Transformation

What happens when you hit a growth plateau after decades of growing through paid search? That was the challenge facing HBP Group as they looked to double their business — knowing that simply scaling their PPC efforts wouldn't get them there.

After years of relying almost exclusively on paid advertising, HBP Group recognized they needed to expand beyond the sharp end of the funnel. However, transforming their digital presence meant finding a partner who would challenge their assumptions and help them rethink their entire approach to marketing.

In a bold move for a UK-based company, they decided to look beyond their borders, ultimately partnering with Lean Labs despite the challenge of international time zones. The goal wasn't just a new website—it was a complete repositioning of how they communicated their value to customers.

The result? Visitors now spend meaningful time exploring HBP's solutions instead of converting instantly and disappearing. More importantly, the entire organization has embraced a clearer, more powerful way to articulate the real value they deliver: giving customers back their time to grow their businesses.

Lean Labs's Mallory Kuhn sat down with Phil from HBP Group to get all the details. 

Who is HBP Group?

HBP Group is a UK-based company with over 30 years of experience providing managed IT and ERP solutions that help businesses increase operational efficiency and drive growth. Since 1991, they've helped thousands of businesses transform their technology from a growth barrier into a growth enabler, focusing on making complex systems work better without unnecessary overhauls or downtime.

Image: HBP Group homepage

HBP Group's Website Redesign Journey

Mallory: What was the problem or trigger event that led you to seek some support with your marketing and messaging? How was this problem affecting your business?

Phil: It’s quite a long answer if I'm honest. So I'll start at the beginning and you can click what you like. So it would have been probably about a year ago now that we were looking at our options when it came to our website. Well, not just our website, our whole online presence, really. So we have been, for a very long time, very reliant on paid search.

I've been at the business for 17 years now and the business was doing paid search before I joined. And since then we've really taken it on board. We've done really well with it, obviously. We wouldn't still be doing it if we weren't. But the downside of that is we became almost entirely reliant on it. And that obviously comes with a risk, especially with the way that Google's gone over the last couple of years in terms of how much control they've taken away from us.

But it also came with a challenge in that as a business, we've been growing and growing and growing. And I've been very aware and obviously made the business very aware that there's only so much that we can do here. Ultimately, there's only so many people that will click on the ads and there's only so much you can get from a conversion rate and so much traffic you can get in there before things start to plateau. And we've seen that plateau happening really for two or three years in that our figures were great, but they were the same each year, maybe for three years. 

The question in my head was always, how do we double what we're doing now? And the answer was never gonna be just keep doing PPC. It was always gonna be how we do more. So we spoke to our existing web partner at the time. So we were on a WordPress site. 

As much as we had a great relationship with them, we didn't get that moment where we went, wow, that's it, that's what we're missing, or even that spark that made us think, yes, there's an opportunity there where we could do something different.

At that point, we started investigating HubSpot. So before we spoke to Lean Labs, we were already thinking, well, what do we actually need to change? And that's really where it came to a point of looking at a marketing platform rather than just a website platform of how do we start looking at opportunities to use different marketing mediums better? How can we open up our efforts in SEO more, use email marketing more, and kind of really adopt a funnel methodology rather than just existing at the very sharp end of that funnel from a PPC perspective, as in I'm looking to buy, great, we're here, we'll convert you and off we go, and actually building something more. 

I spoke to Kevin about this when I first spoke to Lean Labs. So we went through a process of almost deciding that HubSpot was the right platform, then said, now let's find a partner that can help us get the most out of it and actually really utilize it, not just as a CMS, but as a way of doing what we were looking to do. 

Being a UK-based business, we had confined ourselves at that point to working with a UK business. It's all we'd ever known. It's all we'd ever done. And we didn't find that partner that really had that ‘wow’ factor that made us think this is worth spending the money on until we decided to go outside the UK and open up worldwide effectively and start speaking to some other companies. And we decided straight away to speak to Lean Labs. I'd seen some of the marketing before. I liked it. It stood out to me. And it resonated with me to think that's what we need. 

It was pretty clear to us after our first conversation with Kevin that this was a very different conversation. He didn't speak to us about what we wanted the website to look like. He asked us about the business. 

Probably the biggest question he asked me, which really got us all thinking was when I told him how brilliant we were and all the fantastic things we did. And then he said, ‘prove it.’ And we said… ‘we can't, we can't do that.’ And it got us thinking about that journey.

It was more of a case of looking at it and thinking actually this is a messaging problem, this is a positioning problem, not a website problem, so to speak.

Mallory: Let’s drill into that a little more with regard to exactly what you were looking for in a solution. So you said you evaluated, I think you said six other HubSpot partners and you were looking in the UK, you weren't necessarily finding what you were looking for. Do you recall exactly what that X factor was, like what you were looking for in a partner?

Phil: Itwas nice that when we spoke to Lean Labs, there was some nice alignment around our sales process. Actually, we were a big fan of the Challenger sale. And I know Kevin is as well. And it was quite clear he was following that methodology because we use it as well. 

It was also the reframe: looking at it and saying, actually, you haven't got a website problem here. If you're going to double it, which is what we're looking to do, which is a big move for already doing well. We're not doubling it from nothing. We're doubling it from a business that's established for 30 years. A leading IT partner in the UK. That's a big move to double that. We needed someone to come in and say, ‘you can't think about it the same way.’

We needed someone to be blunt with us. We needed someone to challenge what we were thinking and where we were looking at it. Kevin was just the first person that did that. He was the first person that came in and said, ‘I will challenge you. I will tell you what you're doing wrong.’ And we will get to the other end of that. Whereas everyone else we spoke to was asking us what was already working that we could build on as opposed to what wasn't working. 

To be fair to Kevin, he looked at what we doing from a PPC point of view, and he said, that's great, keep that. Let's now do all the other stuff that you're not doing that isn't working. So do you mean it simplified that understanding for us in the, well, if you want to double it, keep that half that's already working really well. Don't rip that up, keep that going, and then look at all this opportunity that's over here. 

Most other people actually came to us and went, ‘this is how we can improve the PPC bit. This is how we can do a bit more with it.’ And I already knew that you couldn't double that. I already knew that. it was never going to work from that perspective. So there was never a ‘wow’ factor there because we were being told stuff that we didn't believe in, suppose. And what we did know is that there was a huge chunk of marketing that we weren't doing or we weren't doing well. So to be able to have someone come in and say, ‘we've done that and we've done that well before,’ that's where your ears prick up and you start to listen and you start to get interested in doing it.

Mallory: What would you say made you choose Lean Labs in the end?

Phil: The biggest reason we chose Lean Labs was that they were direct about what we needed to do. There wasn't any flattering of us in terms of what we were already doing. It was about, well, if we're both on the same page here and we both want to achieve the same goal, then let's not beat around the bush. Let's talk about what's not working and what we can do to fix it. That's refreshing because you don't hear that very often.

We aren't going out to an agency to be told that we're doing a brilliant job. We're going out to an agency to be told what we're not doing brilliant. Otherwise, why would we go to someone? If we were doing a great job, didn't need anyone. Why would we go out? 

We need someone to come in and be blunt with us and to do it quickly as well. That's the really important thing. mean, this is time sensitive, not just in terms of the project, but in terms of meetings. We can't all be sitting on meetings and going through loads and loads of stuff. We want someone to come in and find those problems and find those solutions as quickly as possible.

That's exactly what Kevin and Lean Labs did for us very early on, identified where the opportunity was and got us in a position where we could crack on.

Mallory: I'm sure you had some doubts during the buying process. Can you speak to any concerns or doubts you might have had and how Lean Labs was able to address those doubts for you during that process?

Phil: There's probably two main doubts when we were dealing with the nerves. Geography was the first one. This is the first time we've ever had a partnership of this size and importance that hasn't been within touching distance that I could get in a car and drive somewhere and sit down face to face and have a conversation. So we were for the first time having a meeting, all of our meetings remote in different time zones a lot of the time. So there was a concern there. 

I think the way that the world is now, probably that was less of a concern than ever before, but it certainly was a concern for us. And Kevin put us at ease very quickly on that one, one in terms of just from both sides being flexible and making sure we worked with each other around times and being kind of aware of responsibilities outside of work and things like that. But also the fact that Lean Labs is global and there were people all around the world in different time zones. We've probably worked with people in at least three different time zones over the project in the end and it hasn't been an issue for anyone. It's worked out absolutely fine. So yes, that was quite an easy one. 

Cost obviously comes into these things when you're dealing with it. Cost wasn't our major issue here. We've always worked on an ROI basis. So this is kind of makes money kind of, doesn't matter how much you spend on there. So it was never about how much it was going to cost. I was about how confident we were in that was going to provide an ROI. 

If I'm honest, I was, I was more confident at the price and the proposal that I got from Lean Labs than some that were at least a quarter of the price that I had no confidence in whatsoever. There was nothing there. And that would have been money thrown in the bin straight away because there was nothing to back it up. 

It was about proof, about being able to see that one that Lean Labs had done it before, which helps. But also in what we were being told and what we were being shown very early on in the process. Just the simple conversations, the questions being asked. you start getting asked questions that you don't know the answer to, or that spark a debate amongst the whole leadership team in the company, which was what was happening. I was repeating some of Kevin's questions to the leadership team here at HBP and still getting no answer in fact of actually, we don't know why, we don't know why our customers chose us. So that very quickly justifies the price when you can see that the knowledge.

Mallory: Now, let's talk about the project experience and how it felt for you and your team. How did it feel to work with us and our team?

Phil: It was really, really easy. One of the concerns we had before working with Lean Labs about working remotely, again, different country, different time zones, was how that communication was going to work. 

With Lean Labs, it felt like a more consistent conversation on a regular basis. I was using Slack exactly the same as in some from my experience, except all the other project management tools we've got unless people respond quickly. And when they respond quickly, all of a sudden it's a really good experience. And we've mentioned it to several members of your team about just how responsive they were in the project. 

If I'm allowed to name check, Edward is just an absolute godsend. He's absolutely fantastic. He responds so quickly. He responds so concisely. If he needs to look into something, he tells us he needs to look into something. He feeds back when he says he's going to feed back. That kind of transcends time zones and countries and all of that. If people are responsive and quick and get back to you and say that they're going to do something and keep you updated, you don't mind what happens in the middle.

 think one of our favourite moments of the project when we look back is when Tess sent me something to review and I rewrote it and she told me off and said that I wasn't allowed to rewrite it and that she'd never learn about how to get it right if I just rewrite it for all. And she was absolutely right. So we went back and we had conversations around it and obviously that improved the whole process as well. again, having the bluntness again to go back and say, no, this is how we work. This is what gets results. Stop reverting back to how ever you've done it before and do it our way. It was nice. 

It was refreshing to be able to see that confidence in the process and know that it had obviously worked before and it was going to work again. 

Mallory: I know it's hasn’t been very long since the launch, but what results are you seeing so far?

Phil: One of the changes that we had rather than being so blunt with our PPC and that someone comes in, they hit a page, it's designed to convert, they convert, then they go. I mean, one page visit and a thank you page and that's it, gone.

We're seeing people actually come in now and look at the problems we solve page, look at the our approach page, look at the solutions page, and then make the inquiry. 

Now the reason why that's so important, or we believe it was so important for us is the quality of qualification then that we get on the lead. It's going to be so much higher rather than just someone who's come in, probably put in through other inquiries elsewhere straight away, as opposed to spending three, four, five, six minutes on the website understanding us, understanding our process. 

Again, we're at the very early stages of it, but the feedback from the team so far has already been that the quality of those leads has been great because people have come in understanding how we work, understanding what we're going to do, understanding what the next steps are, as opposed to just filling out a form and keeping their fingers crossed that something positive is going to happen. So that's been really, really good. 

Internally, we really like the site. We really think it represents what we do for the first time. Again, Kevin didn't necessarily change what we were doing. He just squeezed out of us what we were doing and then packaged it up for us nicely. So this is what you already do. I mean, a lot of the time he would say to me, you're not an IT company. You're saving people time. You're giving them their time back. You're letting them have the ability to run their businesses better, to grow their businesses and all of that.

And he's right. And I think that message has not only hit the website, but it's kind of transcended into our sales process now as well. And it will transcend into the whole business. It takes time for these things to happen, but we're actively working on that, of updating paperwork in the business, making sure we've got the measurables that we're promising to our customers all the way through to the other end. 

So I can do exactly what you're doing to me now and sit down with our customers and say, so we said we were going to save you an hour a week. How much time have we actually saved you? And we can do that for the first time ever. Not because we weren't doing it, but because we've, we're saying it at every single stage. Whereas before it was, it was almost a surprise. 

So yeah, so although not direct feedback on the website, I suppose, the feedback from the business as a whole has been really positive and has resonated really well with everyone. And again, I think it's so much better than what you could do, which is just say, here's a new slogan, this is a new bullet pointed list and a PowerPoint presentation, this is now how we sell ourselves, to actually saying, look, I haven't gone in and told anyone they're doing anything wrong. I said, you're already doing this. All we've done is put it in the right order and given it a name or put it on a slide. And now you can communicate that better to our customers. Now you can communicate that better to anyone at any stage of that process. So we get very little friction.

Mallory: Amazing. What would you tell, so say there's another business leader that is in kind of the same situation or similar situation to where you guys were before working with Lean Labs? What advice would you give to a person in that seat that you were in?

Phil: The biggest piece of advice I could probably give now, having gone through this process, is that your website is just one small part of the challenge. Whether it's a problem or not, or a challenge like we had in that we were doing well, but we wanted to do more, so we didn't see it as a problem. And everything tends to get focused on the website, of how can that single website perform better? Do I need more traffic to it? Do I need to focus on the conversions?

And actually what we found was that a lot of our challenges, a lot of our probably problems existed outside of that website in that actually if you sat down any member of the team and asked them the same question, you might get a different answer. 

So if that's happening outside of the website, how could the website possibly reflect what you actually are as a business? And that's where, like I say, it's become more of a website project for us now. It's become a messaging, it's become a positioning project that happens to have ended up with a website, but has influenced those other areas of the business. 

So I think, yes, a website is, it gets the glory, doesn't it? gets the inquiry at the end. That's what goes on the marketing report. But the design of it, the colors that you use on it, where they make the logo bigger, bigger. Do you mean they're so irrelevant compared to actually what the message is for the company? And then the website becomes a reflection of that.

And I think that's a journey we went through. Whilst I believe we're quite open-minded to these sort of things, I still think we saw it as a website project initially. And we are just about to start on a second project with Lean Labs after our first one. And we are already calling it the messaging and positioning project, not the website project. 

Mallory: Amazing! Is there anything else that I haven't asked about that you'd like to add about your experience that you would like to put onto the record?

Phil: The only other thing I’d say is that the support material is fantastic. We used the Growth Playbook to make sure that we were on the same page at the beginning. I think it's important to make sure that there is some alignment within the marketing team as well about what we're trying to achieve. We use the podcasts as well. Some of it, reinforces it. mean, I listened to the AI one yesterday and it was like, I'm digging to be AI and we build GPT first. Actually, we wrote half the web copy with exactly the sort of GPT that Kevin was talking about. It's nice to have that alignment to know that you're on the same page and to know as well. isn't just you go in, you work with the company and they're gone. 

That, continued advice through the, through social media, through podcasts, through videos is there. That helps to make sure that you're on the right track. As a company that's brand new to HubSpot as well. Obviously that we've got that two sides to it as well, because HubSpot are brilliant at that as well. So we get great content from HubSpot that's helping us to use the tool better all the time.

And then we can dip into the stuff from Lean Labs and say, ‘how do we kind of focus the strategy around the tools and that alignment between the two.’ 

Mallory: Incredible! Thanks for chatting with me today, Phil! I appreciate your insights and feedback.