Free Consultation
Book a Free Consultation
A certified valuer will listen to your situation and answer any questions you may have, at no cost.
A Burleigh Heads branding studio, a Southport digital shop or a Broadbeach agency running launch campaigns for developers: priced on net revenue once media and production have passed through, and on how much of it renews without a pitch.
A Gold Coast marketing or creative agency is valued by reducing billings to net revenue, paying the founders market salaries and capitalising the maintainable earnings left over. The capitalisation rate turns on the share of income held on retainer, how long clients have stayed, how much depends on the biggest accounts, including developers whose launch budgets come and go with the building cycle, and whether clients deal with the agency or with one founder.
A change of ownership is usually close at hand. The founder of a Burleigh Heads design studio plans to sell a stake to two long-serving staff. A Southport performance agency has received a term sheet from a national holding group wanting a presence on the coast. Two Robina and Varsity Lakes studios with complementary skills are discussing a merger and need a fair split. A founder is separating, and the agency must be valued at a fixed date for proceedings in the Federal Circuit and Family Court's Brisbane registry. Or the agency is being restructured into a new company, and the ATO will look for a market value to support the transfer.
Consolidator offers deserve close reading. Many pay only part of the price at settlement and hold back the rest as an earn-out linked to later results, which leaves the founder carrying much of the risk after the sale. Knowing what the agency is worth on its own numbers is how you tell a genuine sale from something closer to a deferred employment contract.
A certified valuer will listen to your situation and answer any questions you may have, at no cost.
The Income Approach leads. What a buyer acquires is a set of client relationships producing fees month after month, so the value rests on what those relationships will dependably earn after a team on market pay has been covered.
Capitalised future maintainable earnings is the usual method. We adjust the results for founder pay and any personal spending put through the business, then build a capitalisation rate with three agency-specific loadings: how widely revenue is spread across clients, the mix of retainer and project fees, and how much the business leans on its founders.
A discounted cash flow fits an agency in the middle of a change: absorbing a studio it has bought, converting campaign clients to retainers, or facing the known end of a major contract inside the forecast period. If losing one account would alter the agency's direction, a year-by-year forecast shows it, where a single capitalised year hides it.
Prices paid for agencies of similar size and discipline test whether the income figure is reasonable. Multiples quoted on billings or gross income need handling with care, because billings include media and production money that goes straight to suppliers. Agencies can only be compared fairly on net revenue.
Useful only as a floor. Debtors, unbilled work and equipment are restated at realisable amounts, and an agency holding a real book of retainers will be valued comfortably above that sum.
This is the step where valuations of the same agency drift apart, so the report lists every adjustment with its reason. The ones that recur in Gold Coast agencies are:
The coast's agencies are spread along its length rather than packed into one district. Southport and Bundall hold digital, search and performance agencies serving professional firms, health providers and the council's supplier base. Surfers Paradise and Broadbeach carry agencies close to the developers, hotels and event operators they market. Burleigh Heads, Miami and Palm Beach are home to small design, video and content studios, many working for surf, fitness and lifestyle brands. Robina and Varsity Lakes host a mix of both, close to Bond University and its graduates.
The client base shapes almost every agency valuation here. Tourism and accommodation operators spend with the seasons and the events calendar, and property developers spend heavily around off-the-plan launches and then go quiet, so a studio with a full year of developer campaigns can look more profitable than its recurring income supports. Many client lists are also short: an agency with three large accounts may report strong profit yet carry a heavier risk loading than one earning the same amount from twenty smaller clients. Senior account staff are hard to replace, so restraint clauses and tenure are reviewed. Campaign work linked to the 2032 Games is judged on its contract terms, not on expectation.
The pool of possible clients keeps widening. Queensland finished 2025 to 2026 with a net 19,244 more actively trading businesses, and across Australia the number of information media and telecommunications businesses grew 4.0 per cent and professional, scientific and technical services businesses 3.6 per cent (Source: ABS, Counts of Australian Businesses, July 2022 to June 2026, released 18 August 2026). Those are state and national counts, but every new business needs a name, a website and customers, which in time also widens the field of buyers for an agency.
The report opens by stating its purpose, the standard of value, the valuation date and the records relied on, along with any gaps in them. It then covers each approach considered and the method applied within it, sets out every normalisation adjustment and why it was made, and reconciles the results into a range with the weighting explained in plain terms.
Agency valuations most often reach a courtroom when founders fall out. An oppression claim in the Supreme Court of Queensland, or a property settlement before the Federal Circuit and Family Court, places the report in front of an opposing expert who will want to know how net revenue was measured, how the rate was put together and why the comparable range lands where it does. In the Supreme Court, expert evidence is governed by the Uniform Civil Procedure Rules 1999 (Qld). Our reports follow APESB, APES 225 Valuation Services, and the certified valuer who signs each one will take you through every step in person.
Where is the weakest judgement in your analysis, and how would you defend it? A loose answer tends to come with a loose report.
An Indicative valuation gives a founder an evidence-based figure to set against a holding group's term sheet, or to price a stake offered to key staff. It is for internal decision-making and is not written for third party reliance. A Summary report fits a sale, the merger of two agencies or an employee equity plan. A Detailed report is the level for a family law matter, a dispute between shareholders, or any setting where another expert will test each assumption.
Start with who will rely on the figure. A court, the ATO, a lender or a second expert each expects to see more of the working, and the report has to be written for that reader.
For internal decision-making. Useful for testing an offer, setting an expectation before a negotiation, or deciding whether to go to market. It is not written for third party reliance.
Sets out the approaches applied, the normalisation adjustments made and the reasoning behind the conclusion. The usual choice for a sale, an ownership change or a finance application.
Applies and reconciles all relevant approaches in full. The level required where a court, the ATO, a lender or another expert will review the opinion.
Talk your situation through with a certified valuer before you commit to anything, at no cost.