When it comes to building strong relationships with clients, you must consider their unique worldviews to fully understand and meet their needs. In this piece I recently contributed to Entrepreneur.com, I discuss three steps you can take to forge a stronger alignment with your clients.
Every industry has its annual patterns, and the agency world is no exception. Luckily, trends from the second quarter of 2022 look promising. There are some challenges to be aware of, but many marketing agencies are sorting through a wealth of opportunities. In this piece I recently contributed to ModernMarketingToday.com, I discuss several reasons why [...]
When I left my last agency job to start my own shop, I was the perfect combination of ignorant and arrogant. I assumed that if my doofus of a boss could run an agency, I could too. I found out many years later that he ran it right into the ground. So perhaps, not the [...]
I'm not that definitive about a specific book as a general rule, so you know this one is special. But if there’s anything I know about 2021 and beyond — the agencies and organizations who consistently deliver big and bold ideas that solve new problems are the ones who are going to win the day. [...]
Creative provides the largest opportunity for marketers today. But with limitless creative decisions... How can you be sure you’re nailing every choice you make? The rules for digital marketing can sometimes feel too fast-paced. Our world is full of ever-changing targeting and privacy restrictions, especially due to the updates ushered in by iOS14 and Google’s [...]
Content creation is hard. It’s a vital part of modern marketing, it feeds SEO, and nearly every customer I talk to—SMB, digital agency, publisher, you name it, they all struggle. For digital agencies especially, multiply “this is hard” by a list of demanding clients and flakey freelancers, and you’ve got a recipe for something not [...]
Agency people are lifelong learners. If you aren’t — odds are you will be “counseled” out of your role if you don’t own the joint and pushed out of the day to day, if you do. We can’t afford to stop learning in our world. It’s simply changing too quickly and to keep up, we [...]
A couple of years ago, when we were able to be out and about and travel the world, I went on a photo safari vacation to South Africa with my daughter. We spent the better part of a week in the bush, coming face to face with prides of lions, serene giraffe, wild dogs right [...]
Let’s be honest — sometimes the biz dev process can leave us feeling like we’ve somehow compromised ourselves to get a seat at the table. Hopefully, we don’t make compromises that actually left us feeling dirty but even with a sweet spot prospect, we can certainly feel like we’ve twisted ourselves into a pretzel or [...]
You have probably said or at least heard the agency-centric expression “new business cures all ills,” and it’s pretty accurate. Will it fix fundamental problems at your agency? Unfortunately, no. Those are still on you to solve. But it does fix a lot of cash flow challenges, too much time on our hands bickering, and [...]
