Many people say one will grow up to be just like one’s father, that one will act the same way and do the same things. But senior Will Huebner, owner and founder of Growth Driven (GD) Digital Marketing, has different ideas.

Huebner does not want to grow up and be like his father, who works from 9-5 every day and hates his job.

“I don’t want to be doing something under someone else,” Huebner said. “I want to be able to make my own decisions.”

As a result, with the help of his friend Simon Rutter, a junior at HHS and co-founder of GD Digital Marketing, Huebner created his own marketing business, which allows him to be in charge and make his own decisions.

Being in marketing is beneficial because it is a necessity in the business world.

“Marketing right now is huge,” Huebner said. “And a lot of small businesses don’t know how to do it.”

Within the first five years, 89 percent of small businesses fail, so Huebner is on a mission to help save some from falling.

“I’ve always wanted to be an entrepreneur,” he said, so helping small businesses thrive and succeed was an idea that Huebner really wanted to grow on.

Huebner and Rutter founded their business, GD Digital Marketing, almost a year and half ago in August of 2017.

“I just saw an opening and a niche,” Huebner said. So he took advantage and started his own company.
The company’s main goal is to market and advertise for small businesses through the use of social media. Huebner’s most popular social media platform to advertise from is Facebook, where he has posted a bunch of ads to market for his clients.

GD Digital Marketing is an officially filed as a Limited Liability Company (LLC). Huebner is proud of the fact that he is a professional entrepreneur, and he’s only 17. He tends to have clients from local businesses around the area, like Skincare Studio, based right in Hopkinton. He has also had some business in other places around the country too, like marketing for his uncle, who is a lawyer in Texas, and marketing for a soccer trainer in Florida.

The education that allows Huebner to succeed in this field all stems from his initiative to go out and learn on his own. Huebner could not learn these marketing and advertising skills in school, so he took online courses outside of school to develop the necessary knowledge.

Online courses from websites like HubSpot and Infinite Prosperity were where Huebner attained all his entrepreneurial information.

“Things are a lot easier in life if you know what you’re doing,” he said, and taking action to learn on his own is what helps him run his business so smoothly.

The company’s success also stems from the great chemistry that Huebner and Rutter have together. Rutter described how him and Huebner have very complimentary specialties.

While Huebner is the master at making the Facebook ads, Rutter excels in project management. When working together, these two create a dominant marketing team, and that is why they both believe they can continue to succeed in the future.

Even when they have contrasting ideas, Rutter mentioned that they always find a way to come to an agreement because of their overlapping interests.

“He’s got a lot of ideas. He’s super creative,” Rutter said, and this is why he likes to work with Huebner so much.

He said that for Huebner, “It’s less about the money and more about developing relationships,” and that he always likes to focus on growing the business.

Although the relationships are more important for Huebner, the men both agreed that making money as a high schooler was definitely a big enjoyment for them.

However, Rutter said that one thing he does not enjoy is when they need to work with other people to help advertise for a business. He described how involving more people can create more work and also leaves larger room for error.

In order to limit the amount of times this problem occurs, Huebner and Rutter are not looking to expand their business too much. Instead of having a lot clients that may not give them constant business, they want to focus their attention on a smaller amount of clients that will provide them with a consistent income.

This strategy will create a situation that rewards them with a solid profit while limiting expenses and work time.

Using this approach, Huebner plans to continue this business after high school and through college. He even plans to use his profits to pay for college.

After graduating high school however, Huebner intends to take a gap year.

In 2019, he is going to travel to China for four weeks to study Chinese, and then to Tanzania for another four weeks to do some community service. He is targeting college for the year 2020, and as of now, his top choice is Babson College.

Babson has the best entrepreneurship program in the country, so he sees it as a perfect match for him. Huebner feels very confident with his company and its future plans.

“I think that I could do well in the long-term because of the business model,” he said. “It’s not a high-risk business model.”

The last idea that he mentioned was that his most important goal is to bring value to his clients.

“If you can’t bring value to your clients, then they don’t really need you, and they have no reason to be paying you for anything,” he said. “So the more value I can bring, the more successful I can be with my business.”

Huebner works to achieve this goal with every client, and that is why Huebner and GD Digital Marketing are going to be very successful in the future.