Divergent Digital

Current team (foundation we're building on)

Six people on delivery. Strong on technical execution (paid, SEO, dev, data). Thinner on the layers that scale a client book: operations, sales, account management.

Tranche 1 · Clients 1 to 3 (Hires: 2)

Two hires unlock everything else. Both are role gaps already costing the agency time today; both are non-negotiable for credibility past three new clients.

Tranche 2 · Clients 4 to 7 (Hires: 3, plus 1 status change)

The DoO has built the operating system. The Salesperson is producing pipeline. Now we add capacity where it specifically pinches.

Tranche 3 · Clients 8 to 10 (Hires: 2–3)

By the time we close client #8, the agency is real-sized. Hires here add management depth and protect quality at scale.

Trigger criteria (revenue-conditional hiring)

Each tranche-2 and tranche-3 hire is conditional on hitting the client count that triggers it, not committed in advance. This is the discipline that keeps cost growth tied to revenue growth.

Compensation framing

Working bands for new hires (final numbers calibrated to candidate + market):

• Director of Operations: $110–140K base + performance component
• Salesperson: $70–90K base + commission structure on signed MRR
• Account Manager: $60–80K base
• Content Writer: $55–70K
• Paid Coordinator: $55–70K
• Senior Web Developer: $90–115K
• SEO Manager: $80–100K

Summary

The plan can be paused, slowed, or accelerated at any tranche boundary based on actual signed-revenue performance. No hire commits without its trigger met. Every role has a clear owner of a defined function. No overlap, no kitchen-sink buckets once the DoO is in seat.

Below is the standard onboarding flow every new Divergent hire goes through; role-specific detail (which clients, which tools, which certifications) is filled in by the hiring manager against the template.

Target outcome: new hire is fully productive in their defined role by Day 90, with a documented path to performance review and continued growth.

Ownership

Hiring Manager by discipline:

Pre-Day 1 (Offer Accepted → Start Date)

Owned by the Director of Operations. Most failures of onboarding happen here. A hire who arrives on Day 1 without equipment, accounts, or a plan loses momentum that's hard to recover.

• Offer letter signed; NDA and employment agreement countersigned
• Background check / reference verification complete (if applicable to role)
• Payroll setup (W-4 / I-9 / direct deposit) routed to bookkeeping
• Equipment ordered and delivered: laptop, peripherals, monitor (shipping arrives no later than 3 business days before start)
• Account provisioning complete (full list below)
• Welcome package sent: Day 1 schedule, Divergent Guide, brand & voice guide, role-specific reading list
• First-week schedule pre-built in their calendar (orientation blocks, intro meetings, hiring-manager shadow sessions)
• Welcome email from CEO + DoO sent (warm, specific, names what we hired them for)
• Buddy assigned and briefed
• Hiring manager preps onboarding work plan for first 30 days

Account provisioning standard kit:

Role-appropriate access is determined by the hiring manager and provisioned by the DoO. Principle: hire arrives Day 1 with everything they need, not pinging the team for credentials throughout their first week.

Week 1 · Orientation

30 / 60 / 90-Day Milestones

The hire's first 90 days are structured around three escalating checkpoints. Each has a defined conversation and a defined deliverable.

Artifacts the Hire Receives

A small, intentional package, not a binder. Read in Week 1, referenced throughout the first year. Bullet-point and scannable; nothing the team won't actually open.

1. Welcome letter from CEO. Vision, expectations, what we hired them for, what we expect from them.
2. Divergent Guide. Bullet-point reference covering what we stand for, how we work, time-off and holidays, health reimbursement plan, expense norms, working-hours expectations, communication standards. Not prose; designed to be opened only when someone needs an answer.
3. Role description and 30/60/90 plan from the hiring manager.
4. Brand & voice guide. How we write, design, and present.
5. Active client roster and access map. Which accounts they'll touch and at what level.
6. Tooling guide. Links, credentials, and how-we-use-it notes for the agency's standard tools.
7. Internal SOPs for their discipline. The documented ways we do paid setup, SEO audits, dashboard builds, brand application.

Artifacts the Hire Produces

1. Day 30 reflection memo (optional but encouraged). Three paragraphs of fresh-eyes feedback.
2. First 60-day deliverable to a real client account, under senior review.
3. Documentation contribution. By Day 90, every new hire updates or adds one piece of internal documentation (an SOP, a checklist, a process note). Builds the habit of contributing to the org's operating layer from Day 1.

Ongoing Development (Post Day 90)

• Monthly. 1:1 between hire and hiring manager (30 min).
• Quarterly. 1:1 between hire and DoO (45 min); broader career and growth conversation.
• Annual. Formal performance review with compensation review attached.
• As-needed. Continued certifications and training, reimbursed against an annual learning budget per role.

Three Things This Process Protects

1. The hire's first 90 days are the expensive ones. A structured ramp converts that cost into a predictable investment. We know when they'll be productive, and we know how to course-correct if they're not.
2. Senior team's time during ramp is the single biggest non-salary onboarding cost. Assigning a buddy and pre-building the schedule reduces senior interruption load by an order of magnitude.
3. Every new hire is fresh data on our operating systems. The Day 30 reflection memo and the Day 90 documentation contribution turn each onboarding into a small upgrade to how the agency runs.

The list reflects what we actually deliver today and what we'd add as the team grows through the Tranche 1–3 plan. Services we don't currently offer are named explicitly at the end so the boundary is honest.

Core Disciplines

Retainer Tiers

Project-Based Work (Outside Retainer)

Major one-time builds and creative production are billed separately from retainer so we can size capacity to scope without distorting monthly economics.

Monthly Add-Ons

For clients whose retainer doesn't natively include these but who want them layered on:

What We Don't Offer

We are explicit about boundaries. An honest “no” sharpens the “yes.”

• Radio advertising / media buying. Not Divergent's discipline; we'll refer to a specialist partner if a client needs it.
• Print media buying and placement. We design print collateral (a meaningful part of Ian's work, surfaced under Brand & Creative) but we don't run print media buys or coordinate fulfillment with printers. Referral to specialist if needed.
• PR / press release distribution. Available through partner agencies only; we don't position as PR practitioners.
• Influencer marketing programs. Project-based at most, not under retainer.
• Cold-call sales for the client's business. We market; we don't run client sales floors.

Pricing Summary

The tiers, scope, and pricing are calibrated to support a 50/50 SMB and mid-market book: roughly half the new clients on Enter, the other half on Control, with a smaller share at Command where genuinely warranted.

The $12K–$18K gap between Control and Command is deliberate. Most agencies blur a soft middle ($13–17K) that lets clients dictate scope below what the work warrants, leading to scope creep and under-resourcing on both sides. We force the commitment: clients either land at true Control or step up to true Command scope. The Command tier is reserved for clients where full-funnel work is genuinely warranted; selling Command scope where Control fits the work is a credibility risk we will not take.

The cadence is part of the product. Most agencies treat reporting and meeting cadence as overhead they minimize. We treat it as the trust contract that makes the work itself credible. This section defines what you receive from us, when you receive it, who delivers it, and what we expect from you in return.

Client Onboarding (Days 0–30)

The first 30 days set the relationship. By Day 30 your campaigns are live, your KPIs are defined, and the cadence is running. Below are the seven stages with their owners and the artifact that closes each one.

Ongoing Cadence (Post-Launch)

Cadence scales with retainer tier. The principles are constant; the volume and depth scale with the engagement.

Response SLAs

What clients can expect when they reach out, regardless of tier.

Response SLAs are reciprocal. We measure ourselves against them. If we consistently miss on a specific channel, raise it. Don't let it drift.

What You Receive (Reporting Artifacts)

Documented artifacts you can refer back to without asking. These aren't generated on request. They arrive on schedule.

• Weekly written status. Friday email; what was done, what's planned, signal on performance vs. plan.
• Monthly dashboard. Live Looker Studio (or BigQuery-backed bespoke for Command / by add-on). Always available, not just at meeting time.
• Monthly performance report. Channel-by-channel narrative paired with the dashboard.
• Monthly call recap. Within 24 hours of every recurring call: agenda discussed, decisions made, action items with owners.
• Quarterly strategic summary. Roadmap, KPI recalibration, scope adjustments, items for next quarter.
• Quarterly business review (Command). Forward-looking strategic document covering wins, gaps, next-quarter focus, what we'd change.
• Annual business review. Year retrospective, contract anniversary conversation, retention and expansion discussion.

Escalation Path

When something is off-track, you should know who to contact and at what level.

You should never feel like you don't know who to call. If you do, the cadence isn't working.

What We Expect From You

The relationship is two-way. The cadence requires reciprocity. Here is what we ask from clients to make the work compound.

• Decision turnaround within 3 business days on approvals required to keep work moving (creative review, plan approval, scope changes). Slips on the client side stretch the timeline more than slips on ours.
• One named decision-maker authorized to approve work and respond on strategic questions. If decisions require multiple internal stakeholders, please tell us the chain so we can set realistic timelines.
• Honest feedback within the cadence cycle, not after. If a piece of work isn't landing, surface it in the weekly or monthly meeting, not three months later. We can adjust in motion; we can't adjust retroactively.
• Access to the data we need to do the work. GA4, Search Console, ad accounts, CRM. If access is gated, the audit-quality of our strategic recommendations drops accordingly.
• A response when we surface a risk. When the work we recommend differs from the work the client wants, we will name it once in writing. If the client wants to proceed differently, we will. The decision and its rationale get documented either way.

What We Don't Promise

Most agencies promise what they can't deliver; we name the boundary upfront.

• We don't promise rankings. No SEO practitioner can ethically promise specific rankings on specific queries. We promise the work that compounds toward visibility; the rankings are an outcome of that work, not a deliverable.
• We don't promise specific conversion rates without a baseline. Until we've measured what's happening today, any conversion-rate claim is fabrication. After baseline, we set targets we believe we can hit.
• We don't say yes to scope outside the retainer without a written change order. Scope creep is the silent killer of agency relationships; we name it the moment it happens and route it through a defined change-order process.
• We don't ship work we don't believe in. If a client requests creative or strategic work we think will undercut their results, we will say so. If they want it shipped anyway, we will. Once. After that, the conversation escalates.
• We don't replace in-house marketing leadership. If you have a marketing team, our role is to multiply their effectiveness. We won't override their strategy or step on their authority. If you don't have one, we provide the marketing capability your business needs. We won't pretend to be your fractional CMO. The business decisions about your goals, priorities, and direction remain yours.

The Single Standard

The Divergent standard, written so it can be checked: at any given moment, the client should be able to articulate what work is in flight, what work landed last week, what's coming next week, and what the path is to their quarterly KPIs. If they can't, the cadence has failed. Not the client.

Every deliverable, every meeting, every artifact in this section exists to make that standard achievable. The cadence is not overhead. It is the measured, scheduled, and owned contract that the work itself stands on.