Entrepreneur
I’m Rodney Warner, founder of Connective Web Design, strategist, and creative partner to hundreds of businesses across the U.S. I built a seven-figure agency from scratch, helped scale multiple companies to eight-figure revenues, and before any of that I stood up an agency’s SEO practice from nothing and ran about three million dollars a month in Google Ads.
That’s the vantage point I bring: CMO-level thinking, an owner’s sense of what a decision actually costs, and enough time still in the weeds to know when somebody’s guessing. I work with owners, chief executives and leadership teams who want one more person in the room who has run one of these.
How I can help
Most engagements start with one and widen once we know where the problem actually is. These are the disciplines I get hired for.
Fractional CMO
Senior marketing leadership on a retainer. I set the direction, run the vendors and the numbers, and stay in the room when the decisions get made. View Service
Marketing consultant
A plan that ties what you spend to what the business needs, and a straight read on what to stop doing. View Service
SEO consultant
Where your buyers search now, including the AI answers, and what it would take to be the name they find. View Service
Business consultant
Owner-level thinking on the problems that don't have a department: pricing, hiring, which bets to fund. View Service
AI implementation consultant
How a company actually adopts AI: who builds, what breaks, and what leadership has to decide. Marketing and search included. View Service
Google Ads consultant
Whether your paid search is buying customers or form fills, and what to change before you spend another month. View Service
Social media consultant
One sentence that says what social is for, then the platforms, the face and the measurement that follow from it. View Service
Brand consultant
Positioning you can defend in a sales call, before anyone touches a logo. View Service
Web design consultant
What your website is for now that buyers arrive already decided, and whether the one you have does that job. View Service
Agency hiring advisor
Choosing an agency, briefing it, or deciding to let one go, with evaluation experience and no stake in the outcome. View Service
The three calls people make
The clients I’m most useful to tend to come back at three different moments, and they’re usually the same three. It’s the closest thing I have to a description of the job.
They usually sound like this
- Is this even a good idea? You can see an opportunity and want to bat it around with somebody before you commit money to it. I’m often one of the first calls, and sometimes the answer is no.
- How do we make it real? Once it’s a good idea, the question becomes what it actually takes: what it costs, who builds it, in what order, and what has to be true for it to work.
- Help me figure this out. Something in the company is broken and nobody can name it. I’ve probably been through some version of it, or I’ll think about it hard enough to be useful.
What this looks like when it works
Healthcare IT · since 2025
Focus Solutions
A healthcare IT company that had built something no competitor offered, with no ten-second way to say it.
My role. I led the positioning and guided my team through everything built on it: identity, sales tools, content, video and trade shows, all from one strategy. Today I advise on their go-to-market at board level.
- “The best he’s ever seen.” A leadership advisor who had worked with six other agencies on brand work.
- Repositioned from “another MSP” to a category of one, with a framework their sales team still uses in every prospect conversation.
Food inspection equipment · since 2021
TDI Packsys
An equipment maker competing against industry giants, where more than 90% of sales start on the website.
My role. I set a research-first strategy and guided my team from the rebuilt site into SEO, paid search and content. Four years in, the relationship has grown into strategic advisory.
- 600% growth in qualified organic traffic since 2021, with organic now matching paid in lead volume.
- Listed alongside the industry giants when buyers ask ChatGPT for food inspection companies.
How this works, and what it costs
The shape
A monthly retainer with a small number of companies at a time. The retainer covers the thinking.
What it costs
A full retainer runs $8,000 to $12,000+ a month. Lighter arrangements start around $3,000. Projects are priced on their own, once the scope is clear.
How it runs
It starts with a conversation. If there’s a fit, the first weeks go to finding where my attention has the most leverage. Then it runs on standing meetings, on a cadence we agree on.
Who this is for, and who it isn’t
This works when
- Somebody in the room can actually decide: a founder, a chief executive, or a leadership team.
- Roughly $5M to $100M in revenue.
- You have people who can execute, or the budget to hire them.
- You want to be told when you’re wrong, in a way you can act on this week.
This doesn’t work when
- You want hands only. I decide execution case by case, but if you want a vendor to run campaigns and nothing else, there are better fits.
- You want a deck for the board and nothing has to change.
- The decision is already made and you’re looking for cover.
- You need it cheap. There are good people who cost less, and I’ll name a few.
If the fit is wrong, I’ll tell you early.
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