01 / 07 2016
The First $40
A business began with two beats.
I’m David Sinclair-Black, founder of BuiltDiffernt. Before outbound, agencies or software, I was sixteen, making music in my mum’s basement with my stepdad’s old equipment.
In September 2016, just before sixth form, I started taking it seriously. One night I sold two beats for $40 and texted my dad. It was a small sale, but it made something real: I could make something, find someone who valued it and build from there.
That feeling has stayed with me. I love the moment an idea becomes a business, and the work that comes after it. Someone has taken a risk on what they believe they can contribute. Helping them find their customers is work I care about.
02 / 07 At 18
A Move to London
Creativity opened the first doors.
At eighteen, I moved to London and signed a management deal. Music took me from a room at home into a world of artists, collaborators and people building careers around their craft.
My music career included placements with Ayo & Teo and Lexy Panterra, coverage in Complex and Pitchfork, and an interview with Grant Cardone. Those were milestones in that chapter of my life, before BuiltDiffernt.
The creative work mattered, but so did everything around it: finding an audience, starting conversations and making something people wanted to be part of. That experience was the beginning of my interest in marketing. It also gave me a lasting respect for people whose business starts with a skill they have spent years developing.
03 / 07 2019
Starting Again
A different direction, with the same drive.
In 2019, I stepped away from music and moved home. The next business did not begin with a perfect plan. It began with what I already understood: artists had good work, and they needed help getting it heard.
I started moving from making music to helping people market it. I knew the audience and the challenges because I had been on the other side of them. That made the work personal. I wanted the campaigns to help someone move forward, not just produce a report.
Starting again changed how I thought about progress. A previous chapter can be valuable without being the thing you do forever. The useful question became what I could carry forward, what I needed to learn and how I could turn both into something that served other people.
04 / 07 2020–23
Learning to Run an Agency
From doing the work to building a team.
Through Sinclair Media Group, I worked with more than fifty music marketing clients around the world. I hired my first employee and took my first office. For the first time, building a business meant being responsible for other people as well as myself.
A lot of that growth came from very hands-on outreach. I would record personalised music-review videos for artists, show that I had listened and explain where I thought we could help. Understanding someone’s work before asking for their time made the conversation different.
The lesson still shapes BuiltDiffernt: relevance takes effort. Tools can help you research and deliver at scale, but they do not replace a reason for the right person to care. And winning a customer is only the start. You then have to organise the work, support the team and deliver what you promised.
05 / 07 2023
The Move Into B2B
The same problem, in a new market.
In 2023, I signed my first B2B cold-email clients and went on to build The ProspectAgency. The businesses were different from the artists I had worked with, but I recognised the problem: a valuable offer does not automatically reach the people who need it.
My work became finding the right companies and people, understanding why an offer mattered to them and starting useful sales conversations. It brought together the creative side of marketing with the discipline of research, delivery and measurement.
That is still the work at the centre of BuiltDiffernt. We help businesses reach prospective buyers through cold email, LinkedIn and calling, then qualify and book conversations. The client’s sales team brings its expertise to discovery, follow-up and closing. Clear responsibilities matter on both sides.
06 / 07 The Lesson
Growth Is Only Part of the Story
I learned from what went wrong, too.
The previous agency grew to an eleven-person team. In eight months, it reached roughly $630,000 in annualised recurring revenue: a monthly recurring revenue run rate multiplied by twelve. That was the growth of that agency, not revenue collected by BuiltDiffernt.
The agency also closed. Shareholder problems, changes of direction and financial decisions made under pressure were part of that experience. Fast growth did not remove the need for clear ownership, sound decisions and control of the numbers.
I carry both parts of that story with me. I have seen what a focused team can build, and I have learned that ambition needs foundations. With BuiltDiffernt, I want financial visibility, honest reporting, clear processes and a business that can keep its promises as it grows. Those are responsibilities I need to practise, not claims I can make once and forget.
07 / 07 BuiltDiffernt
Building With More Intention
Creative ambition. Stronger foundations.
I’m now building BuiltDiffernt independently. The purpose is straightforward: help businesses grow and prosper, because I love seeing people build something worthwhile and helping them move it forward.
A large part of my time currently goes into documenting our processes and automating repetitive work. I’m also hiring our first GTM engineer to help strengthen the way we deliver. The aim is to give people clear ownership and useful systems, so the business does not depend on everything living in my head.
There is plenty still to build. The standard I want to be held to is whether the work matches the purpose: serving customers well, being truthful about progress, looking after the people involved and making decisions with the discipline to keep going. BuiltDiffernt is where I am putting those lessons into practice.
BuiltDiffernt
