When I was early in my career, I measured my work environment on the people, parties and play.  Did we have a pop a shot? Darts tournaments were a plus and of course, the beer fridge.  But now, looking back on the agencies that employed me and even my own, my measuring stick is a little different. How much access to my boss did I have? Was there someone to kick ideas around with that didn’t squelch the creative process? Did I think my boss had a vision for where I would be in a year or five years? And was she or he open to talking with me about the possibilities? Agency owners, with a few noted exceptions, are some of the most generous, people first people I know.  They truly want to create amazing work environments where people can make a professional home for themselves.  They are proud when their team members grow and succeed. They have a very authentic affection for everyone in their shop.  But.  (You knew there was one coming, right?) But, I think all too often, agency owners see their employees as a collective they need to satisfy. While there is some truth to that, unfortunately I think some leaders stop there.  If the team is happy, all is good.  But inside that team are individuals who are hungry for you to go deeper and focus on just them.   When we surveyed almost 1,000 agency employees in our Agency Edge research series, the top two reasons why an employee would stay at their current agency were: I am given opportunities to keep learning/growing in my skills I have a career path that clearly outlines where I am going and [...]

Although it might seem counterintuitive, doubling down on what you specialize in will open up growth opportunities for your agency. People seek out specialists because they trust their abilities and thought leadership. You can niche your agency by following these three steps. In this piece I recently contributed to SalesandMarketing.com, I discuss how to lean into your niche to allow you to spend more time doing what you do best for the clients who most value your offerings.

No one who achieves massive business success does it alone. In fact, success in any field is usually the product of collaborative effort. In this piece I recently contributed to SpinSucks.com I discuss how if you’re a business owner, entrepreneur, or aspiring professional in any field, a mastermind group can help you reach your goals.

Our previous article in this series outlined the three ways agencies can add programmatic advertising services within their organization to increase revenue: by in-housing, outsourcing to an ad tech vendor, or partnering with an agency that specializes in programmatic advertising services. Each option has its own unique benefits and drawbacks for agencies to consider, but as we concluded, we recommend partnering with an agency that specializes in programmatic to get your service offering up and running as quickly as possible without having to add headcount.  After finding the right programmatic advertising partner, how should an agency go about getting their new programmatic advertising services up and running for their clients? And what exactly does that process entail? While it varies from agency to agency depending on an organization’s size, number of clients, turnaround time on sign-offs, and complexity of ad campaigns to be executed, we provide our partners with the following guidelines—noting that when there’s a high level of engagement from both teams, things can also move faster. Below, we outline everything you need to know about adding programmatic advertising to your agency’s service list, including a programmatic onboarding timeline, pricing options, and the different ways you can choose to handle client relationships with a partner. Working With a Programmatic Partner The onboarding process with your programmatic service provider will look a little different depending on whether you plan to manage the client relationship yourself or refer your clients directly to your partner. For those who choose to manage the relationship, they can either let their clients know about the programmatic partner or keep that partner “behind the curtain.” Benefits of the latter include consistency for your clients, ability to manage your agency’s relationship with that [...]

Get to the point where you can readily reject clients that don't fit within your company's ethos, thereby allowing more time to focus on the brand itself. In this piece I recently contributed to Entrepreneur.com, I discuss how to dive into business development  to improve client services.

Accurate prospective client intel, in the hands of a skilled business development team virtually guarantees a successful outcome. But clients today prefer to remain invisible, talking to Google instead of your agency directly. That's why successful agencies are leveraging the power of Content Marketing, Marketing Automation/Website Tracking Software and 2nd-Click Content to focus their business development efforts on truly qualified leads. Finding Today's Invisible Clients Requires A New Business Development Approach Once upon a time, agencies treated information about their approach to marketing as sacred. After all, information was power — it differentiated them from the competition. That’s why so many agencies created “proprietary” approaches and some went so far as to name and even trademark them.  Agencies believed that if they could force prospects to call and talk to a member of the agency team one on one, the agency could control the prospecting experience by carefully disseminating information in a way that would convince the prospective client to ultimately hire the agency or at least invite them to a pitch.  But, agencies, we have to abandon that point of view to stay competitive in the modern age of The Invisible Pitch. That systematic hoarding of information made sense once upon a time, but it’s totally obsolete in the search engine age, self-educating client age. Research shows that over 70% of these clients turn to Google or another search engine to begin their next agency search and they are more than 50% of the way through their hiring decision before they ever make contact with any agency.  But all is not lost. This new DIY agency search approach is actually a huge opportunity for smart agencies looking to replace their RFP habit with a [...]

I’m a huge baseball fan and one of the more interesting aspects of the game for me is watching how teams manage their roster.  They only have 32 spots- 20 position players and 12 pitchers.  They have to play over 160 games with that small set of players on the team.  They can’t afford for any of them to be in a slump for too long. If a player isn’t helping the team, they don’t stay on the roster for too long. They have to win with the team they have, so they can’t really tolerate a player who isn’t contributing in a significant way.  They can’t just add more people to make up for someone’s deficiency, so they’re forced to deal with sub par performances in short order. Unfortunately, our agencies don’t have a player cap.  Which means we often tolerate too many games where someone on the team isn’t holding up their end of the bargain and the team suffers a loss as a result.  I am working with a couple agencies right now who are dealing with the toughest thing I think an agency owner can face.  Wrong people in the wrong seats.  If you’re a small to mid-sized agency, you have no wiggle room when it comes to your team.  Everyone has to be an A or at worst, a B player if you are going to survive, let alone thrive. In this instance, I am not talking about having to lay people off (which also sucks) but I’m talking about coming to the painful realization that you hired someone to do a job they are not capable of doing.  Odds are you and the team have been working around this [...]

COVID-19 challenged businesses across the globe. Teams were stretched thin, and leaders tried to help where they could. As the pandemic comes to a close, it’s time for leaders to refocus their energy on what matters most. In this piece I recently contributed to CEOWorld.biz, I discuss how you can be a better leader in the post-pandemic world.

While you might be used to chasing down the perfect clients to work with, it's possible to flip the script. In this piece I recently contributed to Forbes.com I discuss how a mindset shift will allow you to pull in the right clients without needing to chase them down.

I was working with an agency this week, coaching them through rehearsals for a final meeting of an important new business pitch. At times my feedback had to do with weighty stuff like pitch strategy and meeting flow, but I was also struck by how many of my comments pertained to smaller gestures that are no less consequential. Why does the small stuff matter? When you bring two humans together in a high-stakes situation like a new business pitch–or interactions leading up to or following the pitch–both want something and neither is sure if the other can provide it. Agencies want among other things the revenue, the morale-boost of a new client, the prestige if it’s a high-profile client. If revenue or morale is particularly low at the agency, the stakes are even higher. In worst cases, they translate into a sense of desperation on the part of the agency. In the way dogs smell fear, marketers smell desperation and they tend not to respond well to it. Plus, marketers have their own wants and needs. They’ve got myriad problems they're expected to solve. They may welcome good solutions but is this agency enthusiastically clicking through its credentials slides going to provide those solutions? Or is it an unwelcome, irrelevant distraction that prolongs their having to deal with the problem? Even the most receptive marketers are likely to have their guard up just a little bit. It’s simply our primal instinct to protect ourselves from unpleasant and difficult situations. And they’re probably  not going to give the agency the benefit of the doubt either–until it proves it can make it worth their while. But, until you get the meeting, or an exploratory call, or an [...]