Word of mouth, not advertising spend, is what Shootup Media says has driven most of its growth to more than 200 clients over five years, a claim that puts the Delhi-based digital growth agency in an unusual position for a firm that also sells marketing services for a living.
Founder Maniv Romeo has said the agency spends little on its own paid customer acquisition, relying instead on referrals from existing clients who recommend the firm to other founders in their networks. According to the company, this pattern reflects the same startup PR agency positioning it markets to clients – that credible word of mouth tends to outperform paid promotion, particularly among founders who trust recommendations from peers over marketing claims made by the vendor itself.
The reliance on referrals is difficult to verify independently, since Shootup Media has not published data on what share of its client base actually originated through direct recommendations versus other channels such as its free website audit or inbound search traffic. Marketing consultants outside the company note that agencies frequently describe their growth as referral-driven because it signals client satisfaction, even when a meaningful portion of new business also comes through less flattering channels like paid search or content marketing.
A referral-heavy growth model does carry real advantages, particularly for a firm targeting startup founders who often belong to tight, well-connected communities – accelerator cohorts, co-working spaces, industry Slack groups – where a single strong recommendation can generate several new introductions in a short period. Shootup Media, which bundles website development, PR and media placement, branding and performance marketing into its core offering, says this network effect has allowed it to grow gradually without the customer acquisition costs that agencies relying on paid channels typically absorb.
That gradual growth pattern also has a ceiling: referral-driven pipelines tend to plateau once an agency has saturated its most connected client networks, at which point growth typically requires either paid acquisition or a broader reputation built through more visible channels like press coverage or search visibility. Shootup Media says its own media placement work and SEO-focused website builds serve partly as a visibility layer beyond referrals, though the company has not detailed how it plans to sustain growth if referral volume slows.
For founders evaluating any agency’s stated growth story, referral-driven growth is generally considered a positive signal, though it says relatively little on its own about service quality across an agency’s entire client base rather than the specific, likely satisfied clients who chose to make a recommendation in the first place.
Referral networks also tend to cluster by industry and geography, meaning an agency’s word-of-mouth reach can be strong within one community of founders while remaining largely invisible to startups outside that specific network. Shootup Media’s referral base, concentrated among Delhi and India-based startup circles by its own account, may not extend as naturally to founders operating in unrelated networks or regions who have no existing connection to the agency’s current client roster.
That geographic concentration is common among boutique agencies generally, whose growth in early years tends to mirror the founder’s own professional network before broadening later through client-driven referrals reaching new circles the agency itself never directly cultivated.
