Maddy Avery at work in the Birdcage studio
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About · Est. 2015

We know business because we've actually been in it.

Birdcage is a small studio making big things happen for businesses.

We work across strategy, websites, marketing and software. More importantly, we understand what it is like to actually run the business behind them.

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HQ in Mackay, Queensland, working with brands globally.

Not generalists

We've lived in the businesses we work with.

These aren't industries we picked from a dropdown menu. They're environments we've grown up around, worked inside, built for and, in some cases, run ourselves.

  • Trades

    We grew up in a trade family.

    Maddy's parents ran a Sydney painting business for 40 years. She watched the missed calls, the quotes that needed chasing and the days where being on the tools meant the business stopped. Her mum, Conny, still keeps the Birdcage books.

  • Mining and industry

    We work from the mining heartland.

    Birdcage is based in Mackay, Queensland, surrounded by the operators, contractors and businesses that keep the region moving. It's not a market we had to learn from a pitch deck.

  • Hair, health and beauty

    There's a salon in our studio.

    A working salon operates inside Birdcage Studios. The empty Tuesday. The no-show. The chair that needs filling. We used to see it every week, until we connected the dots for them.

  • Professional services

    We build the systems, too.

    Birdcage doesn't just market professional businesses. We build the software they run on, from CRMs to custom platforms like Propa. We understand that when your reputation is the product, everything has to hold up.

  • Travel and hospitality

    Luxury travel is in the family.

    Maddy previously owned a yacht charter company, holds a German passport, and her grandfather led one of Switzerland's major resort chains. We understand premium customers, direct bookings and brands that need to feel as good online as they do in person.

  • Ecommerce

    We sell our own products.

    So we know the reality. Abandoned carts. Ad spend that has to pay for itself. Email lists that need to sell while you sleep. It's different when your own money is behind the numbers.

By people who know the work

Strategy isn't theory here.

Maddy Avery has spent sixteen years in marketing, across agency, in-house and independent work.

Maddy Avery speaking at a marketing conference
16 years
in marketing
1,000s
of brands built
Millions
of marketers trained
Global
brands, platforms and businesses

Maddy has taught marketing at James Cook University at undergraduate and MBA level, and trained the Queensland Government communications department in Meta advertising. Through Looped she is training business owners to support themselves in marketing.

The founder

A builder with an eye for the bigger picture.

Maddy Avery founded Birdcage to bring strategy, creativity and technology into the same room.

Working through a client's plan on paper
Building a strategy against the studio wall
Reading a client's numbers back at the desk

She's spent sixteen years in marketing, created methods that have accelerated thousands of businesses, taught at universities, and worked across businesses ranging from local operators to global brands.

But Birdcage was never meant to become a giant agency.

Small is deliberate.

The people who write the strategy are the people who build the website.

The people who build the website are still there when the campaigns go live.

And the person reading the numbers is close enough to change what happens next.

More about Maddy

The team

Who you actually work with.

Five rules

Good work doesn't need to be complicated.

  1. One machine, not four tools.

    Software, website, marketing and brand are one system. Build them together, or at least make sure they agree with each other.

  2. Foundations before tactics.

    Get clear on who you're for, what you do and the feeling you create. Then choose the tactics.

  3. Capability over dependency.

    Your business should become more capable, not more dependent on us. Your data is yours. Your domain is yours. You should know how the thing works.

  4. Plain English. Real numbers.

    No jargon. No mystery metrics. No hiding behind a report. The numbers should tell you what happened and what happens next.

  5. AI is the accelerant.

    AI can make good people faster. It doesn't replace the thinking.

Thirty minutes. No pitch deck.

Tell us what's not working.

Bring whatever you've got. Numbers. Screenshots. A half-finished website. A problem you can't quite put your finger on.

We'll tell you straight whether we're the right people to fix it.

Book a call Two ways in: The Growth Studio if you want it done for you, Looped if you want to run it yourself.