How We Started

Our story

Introduction

My name is John Harkins and by clicking here you wanted to know my full digital marketing back story, now it isn’t a short one and I would suggest you get a drink and a comfy seat for it, but here it is anyway and it was nice, to be honest with myself for once and finally be on a path I have chosen… 

My Introduction to Digital Marketing

To find out where my interest in digital marketing was ignited we have to go way back to 1999 in my 3rd year of High School. In computing studies, is where I got my first taste of website development and programming and something just clicked, I loved spending time during my lunch break (in secret) and when I got home from school.


I just played about and learned what you could do with HTML and made my own very basic website with moving and flashing text, this was back in the days of the old dial-up connection on the family PC, which would need to be cut off when your mum needed to phone your auntie for hours, oh the good old days…

The whole thing intrigued me, but I didn’t pursue it, If I have any regrets this is definitely one of them, I wish I had, but the times and the social tag were something I didn’t want to deal with. I was already on the cusp of being outside the group, I was a very large kid 16 Stone at 16 years old and I was liked, but I was a bit of a class clown and trying to fit in so to do this full time would have made me the fat, ginger, “geek” which as an adult you don’t care about but as a kid it means everything and that was not for me, so I shied away from it and pursued other things but I do regret not pursuing it back then as I may have created Facebook, just kidding, but I would have been way ahead of the curve.

However, the interest, intrigue and want to learn have stayed with me ever since, as I have still been self-learning in private and using the skills for myself and my businesses over the years, saving hundreds and sometimes thousands of pounds on web design and marketing.

 

 

Book A call With Me Today

Digital Marketing Problem Within Your Company?

I am are here to listen and help solve your problems with practical solutions.

entreprneurship is addictive

Business Minded

My First Business and Website

It all really started though in 2005 when I was 18, I had been working for someone for around 2 years and after a disagreement, I left the landscape maintenance job and decided to go it alone, I sold my car, invested in tools, rented a van, designed the logo etc for the van and had it sign written all within a month.

I then had to build my first website for the business and it looked so professional (in my opinion), learned about SEO and spent days perfecting my keywords and writing some impressive copyright. I managed to get it ranked on the first page of Google and sometimes number one on Google search results for landscaping and maintenance in Fife which I was extremely chuffed with as it made the enquiries fly in and the phone ring enough to keep me busy. I also designed flyers, business cards, and workwear, I wanted the business to look and feel as professional as possible and present that image to clients and it worked. 

Mental Health Can’t Be Ignored

I ran that business successfully for over two years but unfortunately, this is when I realised I suffer from mental health issues and didn’t know how to manage myself from burning out.

I experienced my first black hole and it wasn’t fun, when I got everything back together, I had lost my relationship, home and business, so it set me back a lot and I just put being a business owner on hold and forgot about doing anything business related for myself for around 6 years and was a courier driver making good money but having to work ridiculously long hours and I was just existing.

Good Times Are Around The Corner

I then met my amazing and inspiring partner Jay and she lit my fire again, I went from being a single person with no responsibilities, living at home with my parents and no hopes or aspirations other than having a great weekend and feeling horrible all week to fathering three children, and I liked it, I loved the feeling of responsibility and it made me think about achieving more to give back to “my” kids and to better our life’s, but being a courier wasn’t going to cut it as it was a very unsociable job and the reason I was able to go on a loop for so long it was just eating, sleeping, working, repeating and it certainly didn’t make me happy, that job was one of the most stressful and physically demanding jobs, I have ever had and you are so undervalued as with most trades but this one in particular.

 

John Harkins a landscape gardener working in a garden 01218869 b8b0 4ed3 827b d8a14f2c6569
John Harkins a ginger man suffering from mental health depressi 21e22520 70c0 4565 902a a787a16fd516
John Harkins ginger man meets woman of his dreams and falls in 2d960378 c36f 40e8 960d 40e045f6cae0

Book A call With Me Today

Digital Marketing Problem Within Your Company?

I am are here to listen and help solve your problems with practical solutions.

John Harkins a landscape gardener working in a garden 01218869 b8b0 4ed3 827b d8a14f2c6569
John Harkins a ginger man suffering from mental health depressi 21e22520 70c0 4565 902a a787a16fd516
John Harkins ginger man meets woman of his dreams and falls in 2d960378 c36f 40e8 960d 40e045f6cae0
a new chapter

Determined and Driven

Time For a Change

So, following meeting Jay I started learning more about making money online and affiliate marketing and it inspired me to start up some affiliate marketing websites and to start my first YouTube channel about digital marketing and setting up your own e-commerce sites back in 2014, but I didn’t have time to just sit and learn a new skill when we needed money coming, so like most people, it went back on the back burner and haven’t really added much to it since.

However, I will be soon adding to the channel and will be focusing on building a portfolio for this site and giving you all the step-by-step instructions to create your own website from scratch and how to market your business online, so please feel free to check it out.

I worked for the council as a gardener and street orderly (street sweeper) and I hated that job just because I knew I could do so much more than that, so I did it again packed it in and went to do my own thing.

New Adventures Begin

In 2015 with my partner Jay we started running a vehicle valeting and detailing business and this business is where I first got into daily social media marketing and content creation and advanced my digital marketing skills to publicise and promote the company. We operated the unit for 6 months but we decided to move the business fully mobile and ended up winning decent contract washing caravans which we both did for two years before Jay got pregnant and we were expecting our fourth child and first child together. Jay worked right up until she couldn’t and she was a superstar but as it grew closer I felt myself feeling lower and lower and I couldn’t quite understand it as I was doing good but did not expect what happened next.

Mental Health Is As Important As Physical Health (Maybe More)

This then led me to another dark period in my life as while running this business and doing well just myself and Jay being a team we gave birth to our first child together and it hit me hard, that I hadn’t achieved anywhere near what I wanted by now for the kids we had and now I had another feeling I hadn’t felt before as strong and that was self-doubt and worthlessness it was horrible everyone around me was congratulating me and so happy and I just wanted to cry all the time with no reason or explanation for it as I have always worked hard but I felt I wasn’t good enough. But in hindsight I wasn’t happy and I wasn’t doing what I enjoyed it was just a means to an end.

Book A call With Me Today

Digital Marketing Problem Within Your Company?

I am are here to listen and help solve your problems with practical solutions.

Mental Health

Is for Life...

Mental Health Is As Important As Physical Health (Maybe More)

This then led me to another dark period in my life as while running this business just myself and Jay being a team, we gave birth to our first child together.

Now what should have happened was I should have been overcome with joy and motivation to do my best for this baby but it hit me hard in the completely opposite direction.

I couldn’t stop thinking I hadn’t achieved anywhere near what I wanted by now for the kids and our family, I was a failure to the family we had now and if that wasn’t bad enough I had another feeling I hadn’t felt before, especially as strong and that was self-doubt and worthlessness.

It was horrible, everyone around me was congratulating me and so happy and I just wanted to cry, all the time, with no reason or explanation for it. I am not the most emotional person at the best of times and I have always worked hard but I could not shake the feeling I wasn’t good enough to provide what they needed.

But in hindsight I wasn’t happy and I wasn’t doing what I enjoyed, it was just another means to an end and something I did enjoy to do on my own car but day in day out is a very different thing and soon turn into just boring and monotonous and all my jobs have been brawn and not much brain after the start up.

Mid-Life Crisis during Covid is Real…

Now this next part, I don’t know if this is classed as a mid-life crisis but it happened and I learned so many skills from this period so it’s getting told.

I had the vision when lockdown started that I was going to be a gaming “YouTuber” now and I do love gaming, always have, always will, but I sold everything in the business and set myself up with a streaming setup and banked the rest to live from and dived in feet first. After around 6 months I was getting nowhere other than spending all day playing games and couldn’t see I was doing the exact same as the last time and was not acknowledging there was something up with me. I almost lost everything again! 

I lost the business or should I say sold it to fund my life for 6 months and what I thought was making me happy, I was laughing, joking having the best time in this virtual world and what made it easier was everyone I knew was furloughed and it was so busy online but I was in a darker place than ever before and as soon as I turned it off the demons crept in.

I was just playing games, broadcasting, recording and  editing videos from the moment I woke until it was time to sleep and I was getting views and producing decent content but I had no plan in place to make it payback and I was just destroying everything around me.

I wasn’t being who I should be, wasn’t pulling my weight and it was all an act when I was online, I fell deeper than ever to the point I was back in my mother’s house and not thinking rationally at all, living in dreamland but locking yourself indoors for 6 months will do that to you. 

Enough was enough I had to get proper help this time and I went to the doctors and got medication, now at first I didn’t notice any difference but I was out of options and was willing to try anything and whether it was a placebo or not it worked very slowly but what helped was being able to secure employment when no one was taking on right in the middle of lockdown and the only people working were the essentials and the building trade so I grabbed it with both hands.

 

John Harkins a landscape gardener working in a garden 01218869 b8b0 4ed3 827b d8a14f2c6569
John Harkins a ginger man suffering from mental health depressi 21e22520 70c0 4565 902a a787a16fd516
John Harkins ginger man meets woman of his dreams and falls in 2d960378 c36f 40e8 960d 40e045f6cae0

Book A call With Me Today

Digital Marketing Problem Within Your Company?

I am are here to listen and help solve your problems with practical solutions.

John Harkins ginger haired male website designer finalising the bbe07df9 b7c9 4bb4 bbae 0af21ec54612
John Harkins couple mourning a miscarriage 33bb23f3 bcd8 41cf 8809 0c24a9f44ffa
John Harkins ginger man meets woman of his dreams and falls in 2d960378 c36f 40e8 960d 40e045f6cae0
working my way

Moving In Wrong Direction

Just Working Any Job Isn’t The Answer

I went back to work and started providing again and managed to patch things up at home and just kept my head down and moving forward no matter how much i didn’t want to “I had to” as it was making me feel worse sitting and just spinning my wheels with no vision of where I was heading, but it is just replacing one pain for another as none of these jobs so far are ever what I have wanted to do and felt it was the only option I had.

I found myself a job as a labourer in a student accommodation build and worked my ass off for a year solid looking for the next opportunity to get more money, and I found it at Mcqueens Dairies and felt as though I was in a good job and was making very good money for the shifts, within a month of being in the job I was promoted to a Team leader and since have worked my ass off again for almost two years.

One Of The Toughest Years

I’m not going to lie there were some very sad and dark times in this period my grandad passing and a miscarriage to name two but I managed to keep telling myself “I should be grateful for a job” and kept moving forward and turning up to work, but again like I said earlier I started to realise I was not happy and felt trapped.

Light At The End Of The Tunnel

Then Jay managed to get pregnant again and we were happy, but both very worried and it was a very difficult pregnancy which had us constantly dreading the worst. This put us under severe pressure at home and on me being able to turn up to work and I was getting disciplined at work for the absences to the point I was being told just before I left for Christmas that the last time I was absent “HR wanted my head” and this played on my mind all over Christmas.

I don’t know if it was all the stress of this, but I was very ill over the festive period and ended up having to use holidays to avoid anymore absence reports but I had severe breathing problems which I ended up on steroids and an inhaler from someone who was used to walking over 15,000 steps a night with ease to barely being able to take a breath without coughing so hard I wanted to vomit it was scary.

I was under constant pressure from work which then rolled into the birth of our fifth child “Alfie” and my first boy, that’s when I felt the same feelings at the birth of our first daughter “Jenny-May” come back and because of everything happening up to this point I felt myself falling into another black hole and going through the whole self destruct and breaking myself down.

Now, I think it is because I know deep down I could make my partner, kids and me so much more proud than I am doing, I have so much more to offer than where I was, and working nigh shift full time is hard as you barely see your family even though your providing and its a big compromise so the self-doubt and worthlessness sets in and I knew I needed to get help but I also had to return to work before I did the whole self destruct thing again as we needed the money more now than ever.

Knowing What You Should Do And What You Feel Like Doing

I missed my first shift back to work I didn’t want to do it, but I was just so lost again, so I let them know how I was feeling and that I needed some help to return to work and I was ultimately dismissed, they rushed my P45 through, withheld my paternity pay and they then said I resigned even though I did not ever tell them I wanted to leave, neither verbally nor written and was in contact daily right up to, during and after, making it very clear I was not doing good at all but did not want to resign from my job, just a bit of understanding to the situation I was in.

Legal Battles Ongoing

After two to three weeks of sending emails and being promised an investigation all contact ceased and haven’t had a single contact since, that it is just disgusting behaviour and the most disrespected and worthless I have ever been made to feel by any employer, period.

With no other choice I started to look at what else I could do as after four weeks of no contact with McQueens Dairies and there complete stonewall and refusal to conciliate through ACAS which is a free service to resolve employer disputes and they flat out refused to talk to them and so a certificate was released to take them to tribunal.

I had no choice but to take it to a tribunal which honestly I think they did on purpose as knew I couldn’t afford it our would put me through so much stress I would give up, but I won’t as this for me is a very personal issue as you will see I have had to deal with this my whole life and found that the understanding of the conditions is still not properly dealt with.

No Support Available and Left Feeling Alone

Help is advertised and men are advised to talk out when they are not feeling ok but when you are sacked and help isn’t available when needed these problems only grow and the suffering for the individual. As of today the 12/04/2023, I still haven’t managed to get any medication, an appointment with a doctor until the 27th of this month and have had to chase up the call I was meant to receive from the mental health nurse 3 times and complained to the practice manager and still haven’t got any of it. So I am dealing with all of this at the moment on my own.

and this has given me the time and motivation to chase a dream.

Book A call With Me Today

Digital Marketing Problem Within Your Company?

I am are here to listen and help solve your problems with practical solutions.

John Harkins a landscape gardener working in a garden 01218869 b8b0 4ed3 827b d8a14f2c6569
John Harkins a ginger man suffering from mental health depressi 21e22520 70c0 4565 902a a787a16fd516
John Harkins ginger man meets woman of his dreams and falls in 2d960378 c36f 40e8 960d 40e045f6cae0
working my way

Moving but wrong direction

Just Working Any Job Isn’t The Answer

I went back to work and started providing again and managed to patch things up at home and just kept my head down and moving forward no matter how much i didn’t want to “I had to” as it was making me feel worse sitting and just spinning my wheels with no vision of where I was heading, but it is just replacing one pain for another as none of these jobs so far are ever what I have wanted to do and felt it was the only option I had.

I found myself a job as a labourer in a student accommodation build and worked my ass off for a year solid looking for the next opportunity to get more money, and I found it at Mcqueens Dairies and felt as though I was in a good job and was making very good money for the shifts, within a month of being in the job I was promoted to a Team leader and since have worked my ass off for almost two years.

I’m not going to lie there were some very sad and dark times in this period my grandad passing and a miscarriage to name two but I managed to keep telling myself “I should be grateful for a job” and kept moving forward and turning up to work, but again like I said earlier I started to realise I was not happy and felt trapped.

Light At The End Of The Tunnel

Then Jay managed to get pregnant again and we were happy but both very worried and it was a very difficult pregnancy which had us constantly dreading the worst and put severe pressure at home and on me being able to turn up to work and I was getting disciplined at work for the absences to the point I was being told just before I left for Christmas that the last time I was absent “HR wanted my head” and this played on my mind all over Christmas.

I don’t know if it was all the stress of this, but I was very ill over the festive period and had severe breathing problems which I ended up on steroids and an inhaler from someone who was used to walking over 15,000 steps a night with ease to barely being able to take a breath without coughing so hard I wanted to vomit it was scary.

I was under constant pressure from work which then rolled into the birth of our fifth child “Alfie” and my first boy, that’s when I felt the same feelings at the birth of our first daughter “Jenny-May” come back and because of everything happening up to this point I felt myself falling into another black hole and going through the whole self destruct and breaking myself down.

Now, I think it is because I know deep down I could make my partner, kids and me so much more proud than I am doing, I have so much more to offer than where I was, and working nigh shift full time is hard as you barely see your family even though your providing and its a big compromise so the self-doubt and worthlessness sets in and I knew I needed to get help but I also had to return to work before I did the whole self destruct thing again as we needed the money more now than ever.

Knowing What You Should Do And What You Feel Like Doing

I missed my first shift back to work I didn’t want to do it, but I was just so lost again, so I let them know how I was feeling and that I needed some help to return to work and I was ultimately dismissed, they rushed my P45 through, withheld my paternity pay and they then said I resigned even though I did not ever tell them I wanted to leave, neither verbally nor written and was in contact daily right up to, during and after, making it very clear I was not doing good at all but did not want to resign from my job, just a bit of understanding to the situation I was in.

Legal Battles Ongoing

After two to three weeks of sending emails and being promised an investigation all contact ceased and haven’t had a single contact since, that it is just disgusting behaviour and the most disrespected and worthless I have ever been made to feel by any employer, period.

With no other choice I started to look at what else I could do as after four weeks of no contact with McQueens Dairies and there complete stonewall and refusal to conciliate through ACAS which is a free service to resolve employer disputes and they flat out refused to talk to them and so a certificate was released to take them to tribunal.

I had no choice but to take it to a tribunal which honestly I think they did on purpose as knew I couldn’t afford it our would put me through so much stress I would give up, but I won’t as this for me is a very personal issue as you will see I have had to deal with this my whole life and found that the understanding of the conditions is still not properly dealt with.

No Support Available and Left Feeling Alone

Help is advertised and men are advised to talk out when they are not feeling ok but when you are sacked and help isn’t available when needed these problems only grow and the suffering for the individual. As of today the 12/04/2023, I still haven’t managed to get any medication, an appointment with a doctor until the 27th of this month and have had to chase up the call I was meant to receive from the mental health nurse 3 times and complained to the practice manager and still haven’t got any of it. So I am dealing with all of this at the moment on my own.

and this has given me the time and motivation to chase a dream.