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.
Matter Intelligence
- Founder: Oliver Allen
- Year founded: 2024
Tell us the story behind founding your agency.
Having worked in research and insights for 20 years I saw an evolving chasm. Investment in research, data and measurement has skyrocketed yet businesses didn’t have more clarity, they had noise.
They were measuring irrelevant things, focusing on distracting metrics and becoming paralysed by their data. Matter exists to solve this issue.
I started Matter as I had become disillusioned with the divergence in the industry. We were left with large corporate network agencies and cheap DIY tech platforms. The independent, consultant-led offering had disappeared.
Simultaneously, AI had created the opportunity for a small number of experienced, smart people to scale their outputs and serve clients with the focus they deserve. It had broken the constraint of senior people not having capacity to adequately serve a range of clients and still run the business.
What’s your favourite thing about running your own agency?
Focus. We choose what we spend our time on and what we don’t.
That keeps us laser focused on our clients and their needs. We’re in a service business, but large agency networks often pull their best people away from the coalface.
Running our own agency means we can dedicate more time to the questions that really matter to our clients’ business. I got into research 20 years ago because I love solving client problems. Running my own agency means I can do more of that, more often.
We run a fractional team of senior experts in specific fields (data analysis, qualitative moderation, ethnographic cultural research etc). Some also work on projects outside of Matter. This model means we’re not trying to shoehorn client needs into a fixed pool of expertise.
For each project, we build a bespoke, selected group based on matching client needs with the skills required. Half of our revenue is generated from clients outside of NZ, so having a dispersed team enables seamless servicing of these clients, and opens up a talent pool beyond NZ borders.
What’s the most important thing you’ve learned?
There’s a couple:
- Running your own agency means you don’t have the luxury of turning work off at 5.30pm and turning it on again at 8.30am. The business can consume a lot of your mental and physical energy, if you let it. I’ve learnt to live with loose ends in a way I couldn’t previously, and to switch off my work brain (mostly).
- Clients buy people and thinking, not models, logos and products. Dedicating your expertise to a client’s problem is the best possible way to spend your time as an agency lead. Don’t take that privilege lightly. Be constantly curious about their business, ask lots of questions. Clients mostly want a partner, not a vendor, but will treat you like a vendor if you act like one.
What’s the best piece of advice you’ve received or given out?
“We all must choose our regrets.”
This has helped me so much since starting a business. It frames our decisions and their impacts in a different way: every decision has consequences and trade-offs.
Choosing your regrets means being at peace with this. It means being proactive with our decision making and embracing the unavoidability of certain things.
Anything else we should know?
Matter was founded as part of the Multiplied Group of agencies however is an independent entity. More than half of our revenue is overseas, however we’re still very much a NZ agency.
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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