Running a web agency on referrals alone sounds perfect, right? No ad spend eating into your business margins. Clients who trust you and who you actually know. Growth that feels organic and sustainable.

But here is the thing: referral-based growth is fragile. One site goes down during a client’s critical moment, and suddenly your reputation takes the hit. Your setup that worked fine for five clients suddenly struggles with fifteen. Two or three failures, and the referrals stop coming. 

For Tyler Voase and his consultancy Nexus Lean, these stakes carried extra weight. His clients weren’t typical agency customers—they were people from disadvantaged backgrounds rebuilding their lives through entrepreneurship. When a website goes down for them, it’s not just lost revenue. It’s a setback that can derail everything they’re working towards.

The Hosting Decision That Makes or Breaks Referrals

Tyler’s portfolio grew entirely through word-of-mouth. Zero paid advertising. Every new client came because an existing client’s business actually worked.

“I’ve never run any paid ads. It’s all been organic. I love to engage and build—that’s the fun part for me.”

That model only scales when your hosting partner can keep up with your growth. 

SiteGround’s reliability made it possible for Tyler to take on clients who need education and hands-on support—the kind of work that requires trust—without worrying that technical failures would undermine everything.

“A good host could be the difference between somebody paying you money and not paying you money.”

In 15 months, Tyler scaled from only 2 clients to 39 active websites—every single one through word-of-mouth. That kind of growth only works when your technical foundation holds. This is how reliable WordPress hosting became the difference between managing chaos and confidently scaling a mission that matters.

From Personal Experience to Purpose

Tyler’s background wasn’t typical for an agency owner. Growing up in a challenging household gave him a different perspective on what people need when they’re trying to rebuild.

Sales became his strength. Before working for himself, Tyler spent years in sales roles, developing skills that would later drive his consulting work. When he finally started his agency, he didn’t have much—but he knew he wanted to build something that mattered.

His focus on helping disadvantaged communities happened organically. The early days were lean. Working with clients who couldn’t afford mistakes, learning web development as he went, running a business on tight margins—one hosting failure could mean someone giving up on their fresh start entirely.

“When I first started, I had this idea of an agency. I’ll find clients who are going to pay me thousands and thousands. But that doesn’t scratch the itch I have. I fell into a niche of people who needed the help rather than wanted the help.”

The Roadblocks That Stop Most Agencies Cold

If you’re running an agency—especially if you’re learning as you go—these challenges might sound familiar:

• You’re not a developer, but you’re expected to solve technical problems. Tyler wasn’t a coder. He was a business guy who learned websites out of necessity. Managing 30+ client sites without a technical background? That requires tools that actually make sense, not ones that demand a computer science degree.
• Support that wastes your time is support you can’t afford. When you’re juggling multiple client sites, waiting hours for help isn’t just frustrating—it’s losing you money.

“With other hosting companies, if you need help with something, they make it so difficult to just get something quick.” 

Recognize that frustration?

• Every decision feels high-stakes when you’re running lean. When Tyler’s hosting renewal with his previous provider came up, he was at a crossroads many agency owners face: Do you cut corners to save money, or do you invest in reliability your clients depend on? For Tyler, cutting corners on hosting meant cutting corners on his clients’ success.
• Your clients can’t afford your technical failures. Whether you’re working with startups, small businesses, or people rebuilding their lives, downtime isn’t just inconvenient—it’s revenue lost and trust broken.

SiteGround: The Safety Net That Never Failed

When you’re managing multiple client sites, your hosting needs to work as hard as you do. Tyler found that in SiteGround.

Tools That Don’t Require a Manual

If you’ve ever struggled with cPanel, you’ll appreciate what Tyler discovered in Site Tools. For someone managing 30+ websites without a technical background, the difference was immediate.

“It’s really nice being able to look at analytics all within the Site Tools section. Even if you’ve got 30 websites, you can go between them really easily and just go through the traffic. The built-in metrics and analytics—that’s super helpful.”

The best part? His clients could navigate it too. No more hand-holding through basic tasks.

Backups That Save Entire Projects

Here’s a scenario every agency owner dreads: You update a plugin, and suddenly half the site’s functionality disappears. Now what?

For Tyler, this wasn’t hypothetical.

“I’ve made a change to plugins, and suddenly half the functionality is completely gone. I hadn’t made any backups. But then I realized—SiteGround has regular backups made automatically.”

This automatic daily backup service has saved Tyler from recreating entire projects multiple times. When you’re learning on the job with clients who can’t afford mistakes, that’s not just convenient—it’s business-saving.

“There’s been times where you guys have completely saved me having to recreate like seven pages of a website because of my own mistake. Little things like that—the security features, the Optimizer that SiteGround puts on all their websites, the WebP converter for images. There’s so many extra steps that SiteGround takes that separate them from the competition.”

Support That Actually Supports

You know what’s better than support that solves your problem? Support that shows you how to solve it yourself next time.

When Tyler hit an SSL issue he couldn’t figure out, SiteGround’s approach surprised him:

“The guy was just like, ‘Yeah, give me two minutes.’ Not only did he fix it for me, he also taught me how to fix it in the future. That’s when someone goes above and beyond.”

This approach mattered enormously to Tyler and it wasn’t just about hosting.

“There isn’t another service provider that I pay for—there isn’t a better company than SiteGround that I’ve used.”

When Your Hosting Matches Your Ambition

When your hosting infrastructure works, you stop firefighting and start building. Tyler’s journey shows what you can achieve when technical failures stop holding you back. 

His client results tell the story: One clinic increased revenue by 268%, collected over 133 five-star reviews in months, and now appears in ChatGPT search results—not just Google—attracting higher-value clients who find them through AI-powered search. Another eliminated nearly £5,000 in platform fees by bringing ticketing in-house, sold 1,600+ tickets generating £45,000 in revenue, and landed a partnership with Nike.

“That Nike partnership—that’s probably the biggest work I’ve done. We built the booking system, the email capture, everything in-house.”

These aren’t outliers. They’re what happens when an agency can focus on client success instead of technical problems.

3 Lessons From Tyler’s Journey

Tyler shares what he’s learned building a business that matters:

1. Admit What You Don’t Know

Early on, Tyler did what a lot of new business owners do—he pretended he had all the answers. Clients would call asking if he could deliver something, and he’d immediately say yes without knowing if it was possible. The result? He’d end up looking foolish when he couldn’t deliver.

“Don’t be embarrassed to admit you don’t know things. At the very start, clients would ask, ‘Can we do this?’ And I’d just say, ‘Yeah, of course I can’—without actually knowing if I could.”

His advice now: abandon the notion that you know everything. Start from scratch. If you have questions, ask.

2. Care About What You’re Doing

Tyler’s definition of success isn’t measured in revenue alone. He believes that if you only chase money and fall short of your financial goals, you’ll always feel unsuccessful. But if you genuinely want to help people—whether that’s through creative work, business growth, or transformation—helping even one person means you’ve done well.

“Be violently committed to what you’re doing. Care about what you’re doing. If you care, you will do well.”

That commitment shows. It’s what turns clients into advocates and builds the kind of reputation that brings referrals without advertising.

3. Choose Partners Who Support Your Mission

Tyler knows that choosing the wrong partners can sink a mission. You need people who understand what’s at stake—where quality isn’t negotiable and reliability matters more than a low price tag.

“SiteGround is the perfect middle ground. You’re not super expensive in the grand scheme of things, but the service, delivery, and quality are exceptional.”

Whether you’re serving clients rebuilding their lives, creative agencies launching campaigns, or startups racing to market—technical failures aren’t just inconveniences. They’re reputation risks that can stop referrals cold. That’s why choosing partners who understand the stakes matters. Tyler chose SiteGround—the partner who gets it.

When Your Agency Needs Infrastructure That Keeps Up

Tyler’s growth shows what becomes possible when you can stop worrying about whether your hosting will hold up and focus on the work that actually matters—whether that’s serving disadvantaged communities, scaling your creative agency, or building something that makes a difference.

The technical stuff should be the easy part. Your hosting should work so well you forget it’s there.

Ready to build something that matters? Join the businesses who’ve chosen SiteGround WordPress Hosting to handle the tech while they focus on changing lives—because when your hosting just works, you get to focus on what drives you.