Agencies are built on the expertise and knowledge of their teams, but what if there was a way to turn that expertise into a source of passive income?  In an industry where economic ups and downs are inevitable, having a steady stream of revenue from intellectual property can be a game changer. Today, we have the pleasure of speaking with Gini Dietrich, the author of the Spin Sucks book, blog, and podcast. Gini is here to share her insights on how agencies can leverage their intellectual...

Competing with big national agencies is tough, especially when you’re a small or regional player. But what if the secret to success lies in engaging with clients early and offering specialized services? That's exactly what our guests today have mastered. Joining us are Bob Case and Tim Trull from LAVIDGE, an agency that’s made waves by turning small beginnings into big wins. Bob, the Chief Creative Officer and Co-President has been with LAVIDGE since 2000 and was named the first 'Creative...

In a world where many agencies rely on a standard framework or playbook for every client, it’s refreshing to find a consultancy that starts from scratch, building bespoke strategies that truly meet the unique needs of their clients. How do they achieve this level of customization, and why does it matter? Today, we are joined by Zontee Hou, a leading marketing consultant and head of Convince & Convert. Zontee’s consultancy is renowned for creating impactful, tailor-made strategies that...

What happens when your agency hits a rough patch and complacency sets in? How do you even know if you or your team is being complacent in how they approach or grow the business? It's a situation many leaders dread, yet it’s a potential turning point for innovation and growth. Today, we’re diving into a transformative story where tough times spurred dramatic changes and led to a culture of innovation. Our guest is Grant McKinstrie, the Digital Position. At the beginning of the year, his...

Are you stuck in the never-ending cycle of trying to do everything yourself in your agency? It's a common trap for many entrepreneurs, especially when scaling up. But how do you move from being a one-person show to building a dream team that can take your agency to new heights? Today, we are thrilled to have Kateryna Quinn, a Forbes-featured entrepreneur and the founder of aStash Web Design & Marketing, join us. Kateryna has faced and conquered the challenges of expanding her team,...

Have you ever felt the urge to break free from the corporate grind and start your own venture? The leap from a secure corporate job to the uncertain world of entrepreneurship is daunting, filled with risks and unknowns. Joe Nyahay did just that, leaving behind a stable corporate career to build his own agency—a move that could have gone either way, but in just six months, it proved to be a resounding success. Today, Joe, the founder of LFG Business Group, joins us to unpack the lessons he...

Are you feeling the relentless pressure of scaling your agency while striving to maintain a semblance of work-life balance? I mean, when was the last time you took a vacation day? It’s a challenge that many entrepreneurs face, and often, the pursuit of growth can come at the expense of personal well-being. But what if maintaining self-care could be a strategic advantage in achieving sustainable growth? In today’s episode, we’re joined by Kayla Fotta, an expert in digital marketing and the...

Are you frustrated with the rollercoaster results of your digital marketing efforts? One month you’re soaring, the next you’re scrambling to explain the downturn. Achieving consistent results can seem like an elusive goal, compounded by factors outside your control. But is there a science to sustaining steady success in digital marketing? Today, we’re unpacking that very puzzle with Juntae DeLane, a digital marketing strategist and founder of Digital DeLane. Juntae has engineered a formula...

Are you finding it increasingly difficult to stand out in your agency’s niche? Despite all your efforts, does it feel like you're just one among many, struggling to get noticed and capture that crucial market share? It's a common predicament many in the sector face, where stellar services alone don't cut through the noise. Why do some seem to effortlessly command attention and pull ahead in the race, while others falter? What do they know that you might be missing? Today, we're going to...

When an agency owner wants to make an important decision on behalf of the agency, such as what services to offer, or even whether to sell the business, it’s their decision to make. But if you have one or more partners, now you have to reach a consensus. And if you don’t have alignment among all partners, coming to agreement on anything will be hard, and potentially detrimental to the success of the agency and the partners themselves. How can you identify these kinds of issues before they...

Whenever we talk with our marketing agency clients and audience, they share that their number one challenge is growing and scaling their agency. Not only is the task itself hard - figuring out what services to offer and market, how to adjust pricing to grow and attract new clients, and how to increase headcount accordingly - there are so many variables that affect agencies such as leadership, regionality, geography and more, ensuring that your solution to growing your agency has to be...

One of the topics we talked about on Social Pulse Podcast: Hospitality Edition, with Tyler Anderson, was how the pandemic completely disrupted the hospitality industry, and how his agency adapted. But what about retail and e-commerce? What impact did a total, global lockdown have on those industries, and how have agencies adapted since?  That’s what Kristina Kleymenova and Myriam Kader are here to help us with. These brilliant ladies have launched their own creative marketing boutique,...

Think back to when you first started your agency. You’d discovered in yourself a real passion and talent for helping other businesses with their marketing and found success with client after client. But then you also discovered the realities of running a business: team meetings, net terms, hiring and firing, and managing employees. Suddenly you’re questioning whether to back to being a solo consultant, right? If your training and education was in anything other than business, how do you...

Whether you’ve intended to build a fully remote agency, or that’s your goal, managing remote employees has it’s own challenges and opportunities. To say nothing of being remote yourself as an agency owner. How do you line up clients? How do you ensure communication within your team? How do you even juggle time and time zones? That’s what Anne Popolizio is here to help us with. Anne is the owner of the digital marketing agency Social Squib, a fully remote digital marketing agency. Her goal was...

Does this sound familiar? You, and perhaps a partner, started your agency years ago because you discovered you had a real talent and passion for helping your business clients with certain aspects of their marketing. You brought on one client, then another, and before you knew it you had a full-blown agency up and running. But as you’ve hired more staff and brought on more clients, your workload has only increased. And you’re just as involved in the day-to-day of your operations as you were on...

Every agency runs into periods of time that are a struggle. Revenue is down. Customers are churning. Pipeline has all but dried up. Owners faced with these situations have three options: keep going, quit, or change direction. The challenge is knowing which option is the best for you. Staying the course or charting a new path can each bring it’s own successes and challenges, so it’s a good idea to talk to folks who have been there. That’s what Selim Maalouf is here to help us with. Selim hosts...

If you’re thinking about taking your marketing agency and consulting services from part-time to full-time, or have done just that in the past few years, there are many challenges. Maintaining cash flow. Building a team for the first time. Acquiring new clients. Balancing new team members, clients, and tech… to say nothing of trying to maintain work-life balance. How are we supposed to manage it all? That’s what Rachael Mattice is here to help us with. Rachael is the founder of RM Creative...

One of the reasons so many agencies close within 3 years is that the owners simply burn out from the incredibly overwhelming workload. Late nights trying to hit deadlines. Long meetings in the morning with clients who are “always” right. And a constant churn of clients who weren’t a good fit. What if there was a different way… maybe even a better way, to structure your agency and approach working with clients? If the traditional agency model is broken, how should we approach doing great...

We all know that when we were just starting and had a single client for our new agency, that was a perilous position. And even later, when we added more clients, many of us still found ourselves with just one or two clients who were bringing in the majority of the revenue. If ever they left, our agency would be in a world of hurt. Along the same lines, having just a single source of revenue keeps our income and our livelihood at risk. Offering different kinds of services or establishing other...

AI is sweeping the world, interjecting generative questions and large language doubt into the future of our businesses and marketing agencies. There’s no doubt that there’s opportunity: AI will contribute  $15.7 trillion to the global economy by 2030. Yet at the same time, nearly 82% of digital marketers think content writers’ jobs are at risk because of AI. How should we use AI? How should we talk about it with clients? How different will our agencies look in the years to come? That’s what...

When was the last time you took a vacation? If you’re trying to recall what year that was, there’s a problem. Too many agency owners today are so embroiled in the day-to-day operations of their business that they can’t take time off, can’t focus on providing the necessary direction for the business, and aren’t even paying themselves what they deserve. How do we make changes to ourselves and to our agencies to solve this? That’s what Karl Sakas is here to help us with. Karl helps digital...

Gone are the days of Mad Men advertising agencies - and the attitudes that went along with them. Today, marketing agencies have and continue to evolve in how they’re structured, how they operate, and how they communicate. Brands are looking for disrupters, anti-agencies, bold thinkers with new ways of conducting business and providing value. What are these new approaches? And if we’re leading a more traditional agency, how and what should we be considering changing? That’s what Troy Sandidge...

It’s not uncommon for business owners to routinely have to grapple with their demons… challenges like impostor syndrome which sit between us and our better angels. That’s never more true than with people like influencers and marketing agency owners who live and work in circles where their colleagues and counterparts are highly visible. How do we truly know our own worth, both as a person and as an agency? How do we deal with impostor syndrome in an industry filled with larger than life...

As a marketing agency owner, I’m not telling you anything you don’t already know when I say that growing and scaling an agency is hard. Honestly, it’s harder than you think for many. The top three cited challenges reported by agency owners were, number one, acquiring new customers, followed by time constraints and cash flow. And as any business in any industry will tell you, if you’re struggling to bring in new clients and keep a positive cash flow, you simply cannot grow and scale your...