Today we’d like to introduce you to Rebecca Worsley

Hi Rebecca, thanks for joining us today. We’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.

I met my fiancé Pete 10 years ago, I was 21 and had just come out of University – I graduated with a first class honours in International Fashion Marketing and dreamt of becoming a fashion buyer, I started my career working at a wholesalers supplying cotton and jersey products to major high street brands, my fiancé was just starting out in the dropshipping boom. On the side of working full time, I was trying my hardest to make more money, my first graduate job paid me a grand salary of £15k a year and I needed more! So I started launching mini businesses – first I learnt how to build an Amazon brand. This wasn’t successful but it gave me a taste of what it was like to be an entrepreneur. Then I started importing boho jewellery from China via AliExpress and selling at the Makers Markets every weekend around Manchester. I stood out in all weathers but had such a great time and was earning more money each weekend. I always knew I couldn’t be an employee, I needed to see scope and growth and if that wasn’t there I lost interest.

After a year or so Pete convinced me to hand in my notice, we moved to Barcelona to sell my jewellery online and at local markets, this proved a lot more difficult since I didn’t speak fluent Spanish but I gave it my best shot. We tried really hard to sell the jewellery online but didn’t know the importance of how to build a brand yet. We sat down and searched for dropshipping suppliers in the US. We needed quality products that would arrive to the customers quickly. We found an all-American T-Shirt wholesaler and built a store, started running ads and by month two we were turning over $175k, again we didn’t know how to build a brand and used freelancers to help build the site and make any changes we needed. Unfortunately, when Facebook’s algorithm changed we lost our main revenue source and didn’t have a sustainable business model.

We joined another programme and set out in creating a skincare brand La’Vive – we built more of a brand, manufactured our own products and I created my first Shopify store – out of the dropshipping world the cost of getting setup was much higher and I started building $200 Shopify sites for other members of the programme, I joined Upwork as a freelancer and it got to the point where I had to make a decision on the route I wanted to go – Shopify or Brand Building and I chose Shopify!

We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?

I think our biggest challenge has been growing organically whilst retaining our profit margins, we’re totally self-funded and have built the agency without any help. We’ve wanted to grow organically, meaning not over-hiring and trying to balance growth and bringing on the right team members at the right time. Recruiting at the moment is fairly challenging, the significant increase in salary expectations over the last 18 months and candidates not really looking to move has proven difficult. Especially for our industry – Shopify talent in particular is in short supply across the north west, but we’ve found some really great talent based in Manchester and like to try and hire locally as best we can.

As you know, we’re big fans of Rainy City Agency. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about the brand?

Rainy City is a Shopify Plus Partner who specialises in UX design, front and back end development and strategy for high growth Shopify Plus merchants. We like to work with brands over the long-term and work alongside them as a proactive partnership who are on the lookout for opportunities in the market. We’re not just a regular To-Do list dev agency, we care about our brands and their growth. Our projects consist of full website redesigns or replatforming over to Shopify from other CMS’s, Conversion Rate Optimisation projects and fast and hard scaling of DTC brands thru Meta Ads.

The struggle to scale an eCommerce giant is real – You’ve experienced the frustration of a store that doesn’t perform as expected, the tech glitches of an ever-increasing order record, new software and needs as a company ever-evolving, marketing efforts that don’t convert as high as you’d hoped and the high ad spends combined with a steady climb to the reputation you’ve earned now. This isn’t your first rodeo. And, you know there’s untapped potential in your brand waiting to be blown wide open. Let’s make it happen.

Once we can see the big picture, we create a custom strategy that aligns your online presence with your brand’s unique leadership and your customers’ deepest desires to build you a new digital experience that acts as your best-ever salesperson, 24/7, 365.

Here’s exactly how we help you blow the lid on your potential:

Design & development
Your Shopify store is where your brand comes to life, where your products shine, and where your customers fall in love with everything about you. But, whether we want to admit it or not, the online space is getting noisier by the second. There is no longer any such thing as an “unsaturated market”. A pretty store is no longer enough – everything you do needs to be intentionally designed to position you at the top.

That’s where our Shopify experts come in.

We’ll create a store that doesn’t just look amazing but performs like a dream. We don’t neglect a single detail, from intuitive navigation to lightning-fast load times, we know what it takes to create a digital shopping experience that turns casual browsers into loyal customers.

eCommerce Strategy
You’ve got big dreams, let’s be honest. That’s why we’re here. Nobody is doing this for the good of their health. But do you have the strategy to match? Is the strategy that got you here, going to be the same one to get you there? We’ve seen it all when it comes to eCommerce growth, so we know what works (and what doesn’t). Our strategic consulting services are designed to give you the insights you need to thrive without you and your team going bald with stress in the process.

Yes, we’ll design you a new site, but not just that
We’ll get to know your brand, your customers, your store and your competition better than you do. So that we can identify opportunities for growth, isolate anything that’s slowing you down, and develop a customised plan to help you achieve your goals. Whether you’re looking to break into new global markets, migrate to a whole new site, or simply revamp your customer experience, we’ve got you covered.

Meta & Facebook ad management
With over a decade of experience and $100m+ in revenue generated for our clients (and counting), you could maybe say we know a thing or two about creating high-performing ad campaigns. Bottom line is, our clients hire us when they’re ready to make serious money. We don’t stop at simple ad setup, either. We continually monitor and optimise your campaigns based on real-time performance data, so that every dollar of your ad spend is working as hard as possible to drive sales.

We want to help you build a real house. A real company. Something solid that gets immediate results but you know will stand the test of time.

Some things have changed in the last decade: we’ve grown a team of over 25 amazing, talented creative marketing minds. We’ve got our own headquarters in the Rainy City itself. We became the first female-founded Shopify Plus partner in all of Europe, and we’ve won countless awards. But what really matters, still, to this day, is that every single one of our clients is treated as if it were our own brand. We feel as excited about you as I did that first time I experienced the buzz of selling products online. Because I know what it’s like to build something from the ground up, and get stuck in a never-ending cycle of growth-to-obstacle-to-growth.

We help you recognise the challenges ahead before you even get there, prepare your brand for massive scale, and give you a digital home that is equal parts strategic, effective and somewhere you’re proud to send your people.

Are there any apps, books, podcasts, blogs or other resources you think our readers should check out?

I do love listening to the Diary of a CEO podcast, specifically listening to brand founder stories and the trials and tribulations they all face, more often than not there are similarities between the stories especially around growth, scaling and people.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.rainycityagency.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/rainycityagency/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/rainycityagency/