In the June-August 2026 issue of NZ Marketing magazine, we asked agency founders to tell us the story behind why they started their agency, their favourite thing, what they’ve learned and their best advice.
Elevate Consultancy
- Founder: Karenna Wood
- Year founded: 2014
Tell us the story behind founding your agency.
Too many businesses were spending marketing budgets without a strategy to back them up – and too many of them couldn’t access senior strategic advice because they weren’t big enough, or were handed off to juniors once the contract was signed.
I wanted every client, regardless of size, to work directly with someone who genuinely understood their business.
With Elevate, that’s always me. Built around mum life from the start, Elevate runs as a small, trusted team that flexes up and down around projects, rebrands, consultations and babies.
Now stationed in New Zealand with the kids getting older, Elevate is ready for its next chapter of growth – but will always be shaped by that same founding principle: selective, personal and unapologetically strategy-led.
We work across tourism, development, tech, service businesses and more – in Australia and across New Zealand, including as startup coach for the Nelson, Tasman and West Coast regions.
What’s your favourite thing about running your own agency?
Two things: the freedom to do work that actually matters – with people I believe in.
I care deeply about people and conscious marketing. Good marketing should do good. On the personal side, Elevate’s model was road-tested – literally.
Two years travelling Australia with the family proved that great strategic work isn’t tied to a desk or an address. Along the way I picked up Mumpreneur of the Year and a Women in Business award. My girls grew up watching their mum build something meaningful on her own terms. That’s the thing I’m most proud of.
What’s the most important thing you’ve learned?
Strategy has to come before execution – every time.
The businesses that get the best results aren’t necessarily spending the most, they’re the clearest on who they’re talking to, what they’re saying and why it matters. Without that foundation, even brilliant creative gets lost.
I’ve also learned to stop doing marketing that grinds against who you are. When the strategy, the message and the medium actually fit the business and the person behind it, everything becomes easier – and more effective.
Authenticity isn’t a buzzword, it’s a competitive advantage. The same goes for running an agency. I stopped trying to build what I thought an agency should look like, and built what worked for my life, my values and my clients.
Genuine, values-led marketing is at the heart of everything Elevate does – for ourselves and for every client we work with.
What’s the best piece of advice you’ve received or given out?
Be you. It’s the advice I live by and the advice I give every client.
Elevate is deliberately selective, unapologetically strategy-led and designed around the team – not what an agency is supposed to look like.
I teach clients the same: stop doing marketing that feels like a performance. Marketing that fits who you genuinely are as people and the brand, will always connect with people more deeply than chasing trends or doing what you think you ‘should’ be doing. Authenticity has cut-through.
Anything else we should know?
Elevate works with clients as a fractional CMO, marketing coach and strategy training partner – depending on what the business needs at that moment.
Whether leading the function, building internal capability, or full-scale marketing delivery, the goal is always marketing that connects to revenue, reputation and long-term growth. And always with Karenna at the table!
This story comes from NZ Marketing magazine issue 87, June-August 2026. Why not subscribe? Get four issues a year for just $50 (including delivery) if you autorenew.
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