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Are you leveraging your hiring advantage?

Most agencies today are struggling to recruit and retain good talent. If that’s you, you’re not alone. Our industry is experiencing a 30% turnover on average. If you’re not seeing that issue in your shop, my guess is that you have discovered the secret that every agency has but few truly leverage. Culture. Yes, you have to pay them a fair wage (check your salaries against our 2019 salary survey if you’re not sure) and offer decent benefits. But we all know those are just table stakes. Agencies are in a very unique position to create “brag-worthy benefits” that will help you attract and keep strong team members. I recently wrote an article for MediaPost that outlined some of the most important elements of culture.  As always, I’d love your thoughts. But it’s not just about the list of perks and opportunities. It’s also your agency’s spirit. When I walk in the door, is it like a tomb with everyone whispering or not talking at all? Does spontaneous fun break out at least once a week? Do you give your team permission to generate that fun and demonstrate your support by participating? Create a culture that has your employees sharing it on social media and over the dinner table. That sense of belonging and energy is very hard to walk away from and very attractive when someone is looking for a place to call home.

November 4th, 2019|

Giving employees a voice through brand advocacy with Glenn Gaudet

[easy-social-share buttons=”facebook,twitter,google,linkedin,mail” counters=1 counter_pos=”topm” total_counter_pos=”leftbig” style=”icon_hover”] Every business is struggling to be seen and heard. They spend a lion’s share of their budget fighting to find an audience. Sometimes, it doesn’t have to be that hard. They are often overlooking an incredible resource. Their own employees. […]

October 28th, 2019|

AE Bootcamp

AE Bootcamp [On Demand]   Register Here! Account Management BootCamp [On Demand] is a 5 Module online workshop for agency account executives that will teach them both the tactical and strategic sides of working with clients and the agency. This is an “in the trenches” boot camp where your account executives will work hard and be given the opportunity to engage with experts who are eager to pass on their extensive knowledge. Our AE Boot Camp Online course contains 6 training modules Each module covers one aspect of managing their book of business, their clients, their internal relationships and your AGI Each module contains 5-6 videos Individual videos range from 5 to 15 minute presentations The AE Boot Camp online includes a robust participant guide that will walk you through the course and assigned “homework” Course is designed for newbies and seasoned account service vets alike. New AEs will learn a lot. Seasoned AEs will get the structure they need to get serious about growing their client’s budget and their agency’s profit Course pricing is $2600 to $2900 (depending on AMI Network Membership Status) with significant discounts for multiple registrations. Our AE Boot Camp online course carries a 30-day unconditional guarantee. Try it out for a full 30 days. If you don’t love it, for any reason, I’ll give you a refund. You are purchasing a single seat license.  That license is good for one year.  There are discounts for multiple seats.

October 16th, 2019|

Meet Tamsen Webster

As a professional "Idea Whisperer," Tamsen helps people find, build, and tell the stories of their ideas. She combined 20 years in brand and message strategy with four years as a TEDx Executive Producer to create The Red Thread®, a simple way to change how people see...and what they do as a result. (Though as she'll tell you, everything she knows about people, speaking, and change, she learned at Weight Watchers.) Today, Tamsen is a globe-hopping keynote speaker who consults with enterprise companies like Verizon, Johnson & Johnson, and State Street Bank on how to get their big ideas to have the impact they deserve

September 30th, 2019|

Love is damn good business with Steve Farber

[easy-social-share buttons=”facebook,twitter,google,linkedin,mail” counters=1 counter_pos=”topm” total_counter_pos=”leftbig” style=”icon_hover”] I’m a big believer in love. Sure — romantic love or the love you have for your family is awesome but that’s not what I am talking about. I am talking about loving the people on your team and your clients. It’s amazing the level of connectivity you can create when you lead with love. It may seem odd, but I think love is especially important in the workplace. Agencies lead with love towards their employees and clients will likely keep those employees and clients and enjoy the fruits of those relationships for many years. […]

September 30th, 2019|

A privacy primer for agencies with Ruth Carter

[easy-social-share buttons=”facebook,twitter,google,linkedin,mail” counters=1 counter_pos=”topm” total_counter_pos=”leftbig” style=”icon_hover”] Many agency owners are struggling to not only understand laws like the CCPA and GDPR, but more important — determine what your agency has to do to be compliant and avoid liability. What laws apply to your shop and your clients? What does compliant even mean in terms of practical do’s and don’ts? What is the chain of responsibility if clients make bad choices? What are mistakes we should avoid? […]

September 23rd, 2019|

Research 2019

2019: How Clients in the US and Abroad Choose their Agencies Hear what over 1,000 clients (business owners, CMOs, VP of marketing etc.) from the US, UK, Canada and Australia had to say about what they’re looking for when they seek an agency partner and how decisions to hire and fire agencies are made. We repeated some of the questions from our 2014 study to see how things had changed. We also explored how clients feel about working with multiple agencies, specialists versus generalists, if location was a factor and how/when they want to see the agency owner show up. We think you’re going to be surprised at some of what we learned. Fill out the form to download the 16-page executive summary. We will be doing a deep dive (90 minutes) webinar where we examine each question/response in depth on November 12th at noon CST. You are welcome to join us. This statistically valid study is brought to you by Download Free Report Enter your email address to get this free report. Email * Get Your Report! Your information will never be shared or sold to a 3rd party.

September 19th, 2019|

What are you leaving on the table?

Here's what you need to gather to use the AMI Billing Utilization Calculator: # of full-time equivalents you have on staff The average number of hours you expect them to work in a week (billable and non-billable) How many work weeks there are in your agency's year (subtract holidays and vacation) What is your goal in terms of percentage of work hours that are billable. This needs to include ALL employees, whether you deem them to be billable or not* Your hourly rate (most of you use a blended rate, but if you need to -- use a weighted average) Your annual gross billings for 2018 and 2019 year to date Just plug those numbers into the spreadsheet (in the 2018 and 2019 columns) and see how much you've left on the table.  If you're unhappy with the results (as most of you will be) there are several reasons why you may not be billing as many hours as you'd like.   That's the topic for future videos, blog posts and certainly one of the things we discuss in the Money Matters workshop and on demand course. *Remember the AMI rules of thumb here. You may not know them or even live by them yet... but keep them in mind when you view your results.  If you violate either of these rules, it puts you at risk in terms of being profitable: No more than one non-billable (50% non-billable or more) for every 5 employees/FTEs Your entire agency (billable and non-billable) should be a minimum of 60% billable   Download the AMI Billing Utilization Calculator here.

August 27th, 2019|

Sample travel policies for agencies

It’s a rare agency that does not incur any travel for either themselves or their clients. Because travel norms are very different for everyone, it’s important that the agency have a written travel policy that clearly spells out the processes, boundaries and expectations that come along side that employee’s travel on behalf of the company. In our work with 250+ agencies a year and our annual salary and benefits survey that is answered by almost 1,000 agency leaders – we were able to pull together what seems to be the “norm” for most US based agencies. Each agency owner will want to review and modify these policies to fit their own culture, budget, expectations and unique circumstances. In some cases, I’ve just listed what seems to be the common policy and in other cases, I’ve given you some commentary like 30% of agencies do this or that. My goal is not to give you an off the shelf set of policies but rather a framework from which you can build your own travel policy for your agency. AGENCY TRAVEL POLICIES (modify for your own shop) Allowable Expenses  Most agencies will pay or reimburse the employee for all reasonable business expenses incurred while traveling on behalf of the agency. Agencies will typically not pay for upgrades i(n rental car classes, hotel rooms, flight classes) without prior approval. The exception to this is international travel. Most agencies will pay for business class plane tickets for travel of 6+ hours. If an employee chooses to live in a different country, the agency does not pay for their travel back to the agency’s home country for meetings (internal or client-facing). Meals and client entertainment are typically on a daily [...]

August 26th, 2019|

Are you offering “the trail blazing benefit”?

In an AMI network meeting last week, the big topic was employee recruitment and retention. If your agency isn’t struggling with this issue, consider yourself one of the lucky few. Agencies (and it seems all businesses) are fighting tooth and nail to find and keep productive, committed employees. Many of you are looking for so long that you end up compromising just to get someone in place. And we all know how well that usually works. Overall, agency owners are incredibly generous with benefits and flexibility. But there’s a new benefit that I want to make sure you’ve got on your radar screen because it may be worth considering as a recruiting tool. One of the things we talk about in our Managing Millennials workshop is that all employees (but particularly millennials) love to have “brag-worthy” benefits and this one is definitely brag-worthy. The benefit is student loan repayment. You can read more about it in this Forbes article and see some examples of how it is being positioned and packaged. Employee recruiting and retention will be a major discussion at our owner’s workshop (Best Management Practices of Agency Owners) this coming March in Chicago. Registration is open if you’d like to hear how other agency owners are reducing their workweek, actually getting to their family events and putting more profit on the bottom line.

August 19th, 2019|

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