When I started my own agency is 1995 I was about 30 and the perfect combination of arrogant and ignorant. “How hard could running an agency be? If you knocked it out of the park for your clients and delivered results, everything fell into place, right?” As you might imagine, that blissfully ignorant attitude got [...]
I totally get it. You’re busy putting out fires, delivering high-level strategy for your clients and trying to mentor and grow your team. Who has time for new business? This is one of those head versus heart things in agency ownership. You know you need to devote more time to new business but somehow something [...]
While print advertising will likely never die and niche magazines continue to make a comeback, the reality is that most of today’s agencies lean heavily on some aspect of digital marketing. Whether you’re a digital native who now manages a digital agency or, like me, you’ve run a traditional agency for 25 years, your organization [...]
There’s a talent shortage in the agency business. I can’t remember a time in recent years when agencies were hiring as much as they are today and having as much trouble finding the right fit employees. You’ve heard the adages about the costs of a bad hire and, if anything, they underreport the costs. But [...]
You’ve built a successful agency with great people and award-winning work. Your awesome clients love you and have been loyal for years. You’ve received "best place to work" awards every year. You’ve got a team of superstars who keep the agency running and the clients happy. Great work. Great people. Great results. Why isn’t that [...]
Economists predict that a new recession will strike by 2021. Marketing agencies and departments suffer greatly during tough times, and if this next recession is anything like the last, marketers could be in for a rough couple of years. Fortunately, marketing leaders have plenty of time to prepare themselves—and their teams. As the possibility of [...]
When an agency shows a profit, one of the first inclinations of the agency owner is to pay a bonus to the staff. I applaud that instinct. But I don’t think you should do it simply because you have a little extra money. I believe you should have a bonus program that serves your agency [...]
In the marketing services industry, CMOs struggle to cross the marketing talent gap and, as a result, turn to performance-driven agency partners. But those partners are struggling to meet the needs of the market. Agencies are expected to be immersed in marketing technology and well-versed in core disciplines like content marketing, SEO, paid search, social [...]
One of the biggest threats to your agency’s profitability and long-term existence is giving away the farm by over servicing clients, bad estimates, not issuing change orders and allowing clients to change the rules mid-game without any penalty or cost. Don’t get me wrong - I think it’s okay and smart to over-service certain clients [...]
Imagine an organization with a name recognized in every country in the world, whose every move was watched by hundreds of millions of people, and whose successes fulfilled the dreams of a nation and inspired awe and admiration around the world. This was NASA in the 1960s. I was five years old when Neil Armstrong [...]
