Case Study
A Global Brand.
A Digital Footprint to Match.
How Full Stack Media has led digital at one of the world's largest independent wealth managers for over five years, building the SEO presence, PPC engine, and proprietary client app behind a $2 billion practice with 18 offices worldwide.
754%
Increase in organic search visibility
155%
YoY growth in revenue from online enquiries
The Flagship Build
A proprietary client app, built to replace a third-party platform.
Holborn's bespoke client app gives policyholders self-service access to their portfolios, advisers a complete tool for managing their books, and prospects a free-to-use value layer that doubles as a lead generator. Over 1,500 downloads in. Five stars on both stores.
Client view
Policyholders access portfolios, documents, and valuations — self-service, on any device
Adviser tools
Advisers manage their books, track client activity, and handle policy admin from one place
Lead generator
Free utility layer for non-clients, delivering value before any sales conversation begins
5.0 — Apple App Store & Google Play
1,500+ downloads
The Challenge
A global brand.
A digital footprint that didn't match it.
Holborn Assets is one of the largest independent wealth managers operating in the international advice space: 18 offices around the world, over $2 billion in client assets under management, and a footprint spanning the GCC, Europe, Africa, Asia, and beyond.
The brand was global. The digital presence wasn't.
Despite the scale of the business, Holborn's organic search visibility was a fraction of what it should have been for a firm of its size, and its paid media wasn't delivering the kind of return that justified meaningful investment. Beyond search, the client experience itself was being held back: policy management was outsourced to a third-party platform that didn't reflect the Holborn brand and that the business couldn't shape to its own roadmap.
Three challenges, one mandate: bring the digital operation up to the standard of the brand it represented.
"A brand this size should be impossible to miss online. Make it impossible to miss."
The brief, in essence.
About the client
Client
Holborn Assets
Industry
International Financial Services
Scale
18 global offices · $2bn+ assets under management
Services delivered
Live site
holbornassets.com
What We Did
Build the search engine.
Then build the actual product.
The engagement is an unusually deep one. Full Stack Media have led digital at Holborn for over five years, not as a project-based agency, but as an embedded operator with end-to-end responsibility for the firm's digital channels. That depth is what's made the scope of the work possible.
The SEO programme rebuilt Holborn's search foundations from the ground up. A clean technical base, a content structure aligned to high-intent commercial terms, and a sustained programme of optimisation have driven the kind of compounding visibility growth that's only possible when SEO is run as a discipline rather than a campaign. Today the site ranks on the first page for hundreds of relevant search terms, including average positions inside the top three for some of the highest-value queries in the international wealth space.
In parallel, PPC was rebuilt around return on investment rather than volume. Tighter audience segmentation, landing pages aligned to the channels feeding them, and a relentless focus on the enquiries that actually convert into clients have driven a 155% year-on-year increase in revenue from online enquiries — a figure that compounds the SEO gains rather than competing with them.
"Most agencies run campaigns. This one runs the function, and has done for half a decade."
The app is the most visible piece of the work. Holborn had been running client policy management through a third-party platform that constrained both the brand and the roadmap. We designed and built a proprietary app to replace it, giving clients self-service access to their portfolios, advisers a tool to manage their books, and non-clients a free utility layer that doubles as a lead generator. Over 1,500 downloads in, the app holds a five-star rating across both the Apple App Store and Google Play.
How we worked
SEO foundation
Full technical and on-page rebuild across Holborn's websites — crawl, indexation, and content structure rebuilt to compete for the terms a firm of this calibre should own.
PPC engine
Paid campaigns rebuilt from the ground up — audience segmentation, landing page alignment, and ROI-first bid strategy designed to convert enquiries at scale across multiple regions.
App design & development
Native mobile app built end to end: client policy management, adviser tools, and a free value layer that generates leads from non-clients — replacing a third-party platform Holborn had outgrown.
Ongoing optimisation
Five years and counting of continuous digital leadership embedded inside the business — strategy, execution, and iteration on every channel that touches the bottom line.
The Results
Numbers that speak for themselves.
754%
Increase in organic search visibility
155%
YoY growth in revenue from online enquiries
100s
First-page rankings across high-value terms
The SEO programme has fundamentally changed how Holborn is found. Organic search visibility is up 754% across the period, with the site now ranking on the first page of Google for hundreds of relevant terms. The rankings are concentrated where they matter: average position 1.3 for "Wealth Manager in Dubai," 1.6 for "Financial advisers in Dubai," and top-of-page positions across the high-intent commercial queries that bring in qualified enquiries. These aren't vanity keywords. They're the search terms a high-net-worth prospect actually types when they're ready to talk to an adviser.
The commercial impact has followed. Revenue from online enquiries grew 155% year on year between 2024 and 2025, the result of SEO and PPC compounding against each other, with the app deepening the relationship once a prospect becomes a client. Over 1,500 people have downloaded the app, and it holds a five-star rating on both stores — proof that the same standards applied to the search work have been applied to the product itself.
Looking Ahead
Five years in.
Still compounding.
The work continues, and the gains continue to compound. SEO of this kind isn't a campaign that finishes — it's a discipline that gets stronger the longer it's sustained, and the longer Holborn invests in it the harder it becomes for competitors to catch up. The app roadmap is similarly long. Each new feature deepens the value the product delivers to clients and advisers alike, and each release tightens Holborn's grip on a client experience it now owns end to end.
That long horizon is the whole point. The partnership isn't structured around discrete projects — it's structured around the long-term health of Holborn's digital operation, with full ownership of strategy and execution sitting in one place. Five years in, the foundations are deep, the channels are humming, and the next chapter is already underway.
What's next
App roadmap expansion
New features for clients and advisers, deeper integration with Holborn's internal systems, and expansion of the free-tier lead generation layer.
SEO and AEO leadership
Defending and extending the rankings already won, with a particular focus on AI-driven search results that are increasingly shaping how prospects find advisers.
A partnership built to last
An embedded relationship now in its sixth year, and showing every sign of running for many more.
"Shane and Alex have been critical in Holborn's growth and digital adoption over the years. Their work on Holborn's SEO has increased our digital visibility, and their recent work on the App is a huge step towards Holborn's strategy of automation, AI adoption and full digitisation."
Simon Parker
Chief Operating Officer — Holborn Assets
I'm in!
Where do I start?
Let's map out your digital inventory, eliminate bottlenecks, and build a scalable ecosystem designed for long-term growth.
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