GUEST PROFILE  ·  Creative Agency  ·  Content

Problems Excite Me

Marc Webbon co-founded Wonderhatch as a production company six years ago and has spent the last eighteen months completing its transition into a full-service creative agency with strategy, creative, and production under one roof. He came from seventeen years in the premium end of sports photography and media at Getty Images and brings an outsider’s honest curiosity to everything he does not know.

Discover the Episode
The Business of Marketing Season 3  ·  Episode 33  ·  32 min

“Making content look good is easy. The best content feels like the brand made it, not an agency.

Marc Webbon is Co-Founder and CEO of Wonderhatch, a creative agency specialising in strategy, creative, and production for consumer brands. Wonderhatch’s client roster includes Cafe Nero, Spotify, Ford, Knight Frank, the BFI, Tango, and 888. Marc also runs MWeb Media Ltd, a consultancy providing content, commercial, and media solutions to clients in sport and media.

Marc spent nearly eighteen years at Getty Images, joining what was then Allsport as a picture researcher before moving into sales and ultimately becoming Senior Sales Director for Sport across EMEA. That career gave him an unusually deep education in the commercial value of visual content, and a conviction that authenticity in imagery is the only thing that creates genuine emotional connection. He left Getty in 2015 and co-founded SilverHub Media in 2016, then launched Wonderhatch in 2018.

Wonderhatch is the product of deliberate reinvention. What started as a transactional production company has been rebuilt into a creative agency that goes upstream into strategy and challenges clients’ assumptions before a camera is ever switched on. Marc describes the turning point as the moment the agency stopped offering solutions and started asking better questions. He gave the mandate for their brand film, website relaunch, and creative director hire to younger members of the team. He took the entire company to Cannes Lions. He describes the operating principle as growing from the inside out.

25+ years
2018–Now
Wonderhatch
Co-Founder and CEO. Grew the agency from a production company into a full-service creative agency with strategy, creative, and production. Clients include Cafe Nero, Spotify, Ford, Knight Frank, BFI, and Tango.
2015–Now
MWeb Media Ltd
Founder and Managing Director. Consultancy providing content, commercial, and media solutions in sport and media, including projects with Augusta National, Trinity Mirror, Future Publishing, and the R&A.
2016–2018
SilverHub Media
Co-Founder. Built the visual content platform before transitioning to Wonderhatch.
1997–2015
Getty Images
Senior Sales Director, Sport, EMEA. Nearly eighteen years at Getty, starting at Allsport as a picture researcher before the Getty acquisition in 1998. Built a career at the premium end of sports photography and visual media.
18Years at Getty Images and Allsport
6Years Since Wonderhatch Was Founded
1First Cannes Lions the Entire Team Attended Together

“Culture isn’t something I impose on my team. When the team builds the culture themselves, they never want to leave the boat.

How he thinks 03 convictions
01The best content feels like the brand made it, not an agency

“If the content looks like it came from the client, that is success. We are there to facilitate, not leave fingerprints.”

High production value is not the goal. A piece of content for Spam should look completely different from a piece for a super-prime property residence or a luxury hospitality brand. The test is whether the consumer feels the brand speaking directly to them with no visible creative machinery in between. Getting there requires spending real time with clients before any briefs are written: going for coffee, going to the pub, understanding how they think before understanding what they want. The authentic answer only comes after the trust is built.

02Always lead with WHY before WHAT

“People don’t buy a house for the bricks and mortar.”

Marc uses property as the clearest illustration of a mistake that runs across almost every sector. Clients arrive knowing the product details and want to lead with them. The content that works leads with what the product does to how you feel, not what it is. Buying a home is one of the most emotional decisions a person makes. Buying a car, choosing a university, selecting a gym membership: all of these operate on the same emotional logic. The product specs come in at the point of comparison, not at the point of inspiration. Marc’s job is to persuade clients to trust the sequence.

03Culture belongs to the team, not the founder

“I do not believe I know what our culture should be. Build boats together and people never want to be anywhere else.”

Marc gave the responsibility for hiring Wonderhatch’s incoming Creative Director to younger members of the team. He took the entire company to Cannes Lions for their first visit. He runs Wonder Chats: informal, unbranded networking events where the only agenda is introducing clients to other clients they might like. The operating principle across all of it is the same: grow the agency from the inside out, not by imposing a vision from above. People who build the place they work are more invested in it than people who were hired into someone else’s vision.

Hear Marc on
The Business of Marketing
Season 3Episode 3332 min