Navigating 2025 Agency Trends with Drew and Danyel McLellan

Drew McLellan [00:00:37]:

Hey, everybody. Drew McClellan here with my partner in crime, Danielle. And we are back with another episode of Build a Better Agency. Once a year, we take a pause and look at the trends that we think are impacting agencies today that we really want to have on your radar screen for the rest of this calendar year. And as you start to think about, I know it’s crazy to think it’s June, but I know some of you are already thinking about 2026. And so we want to make sure we get these trends in front of you. So as always, these are trends that we’ve been tracking. In some cases, they’re continuations of trends we’ve talked about in the past and they’ll sound familiar to you. In other cases, they’re new things that are emerging or things that are shifting a little bit. And I think it’s safe to say that we have seen a lot of shift in 2025, you know, with everything that’s going on politically, economically, not just here in the States, but in the world, you know, we have the good fortune of working with agencies all over the world, and we’re seeing a lot of these trends, not just in North America, but all over. And whether they originate because of what’s happening here in the United States with tariffs and things like that or not, some of them are just universal agency trends and others are things that are sort of triggered by some political or economic situation. We’re going to dig into all of that. So.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:01:50]:

Absolutely. And what’s affecting the clients we serve and how we are responding to them during this time of uncertainty, which is something that is really telling as a mid year, as we’ve talked to a lot of agencies through the springtime to see how those trends have sort of come to life and now mid year, how it’s going to turn out for the rest of 2025.

 

Drew McLellan [00:02:10]:

Right. All right. So let’s actually start by talking a little bit about what’s happening in the world today. So, you know, as we were coming into 2025, agency owners were very optimistic, entrepreneurs were very optimistic, 73% of entrepreneurs were optimistic. About AI 82% believed the market was going to be stronger in 2025. So that was sort of how we started the year. But even then, even early on. So one of the references that we use as we watch for trends, and if you’re a member, you know that we send out a copy of the Edelman Trust Barometer, which has been around for 30 some years, and all they do is measure the sort of the level of trust worldwide. And right now trust is on shaky ground. That really the idea of the word authentic is sort of a trust but verify. Like, okay, I know you say you’re authentic. I know you are behaving in an authentic way. But we’re under a lot more scrutiny to see, to make sure that we are consistently living through that authenticity. And the Edelman Trust Barometer actually refers to 2025. They talk about the fact that we as a world are in a crisis of grievance, which I think is really powerful language. And what they were talking about was that more and more people all over the world feel grieved upon, in other words, that they feel that they have somehow been wronged. One of the more startling statistics in that study was that more than 50% of the respondents and they talked to, I think it was like 30,000. It was a huge number were saying that not only are they in a crisis of grievance, but they believe they’ve been so wronged in some way that violence is an acceptable response. And they define violence a couple ways. One, online violence. So responding in an aggressive way online. Right. Or being attacking online, and then even physical violence, which we have certain seen an uptick of throughout the world.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:04:10]:

And so there’s a lot more clarity as far as our clients, our employees, as far as what they consider right and wrong. So again, when something is wrong or they feel like a business or people are not acting as authentic as they should, there’s absolutely a emotional reaction that goes into that crisis of grievance.

 

Drew McLellan [00:04:31]:

I don’t know if it’s clarity or it’s just polarized opinion. Right. Like they are locked into that effect.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:04:38]:

Individual clarity, and it. And they respond as such. And this affects our business. Not only our world, but our business as well.

 

Drew McLellan [00:04:44]:

Yeah. But also interesting in this study was of all of the types of entities, government, media, NGOs, only businesses were seen as both competent and ethical. So there’s opportunity here for us to really stand out, to be truly authentic, to truly earn their trust and to move forward in that way.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:05:08]:

Right. And so we have to think of not just our work product, but our relationships with our clients and our relationships with our employees and how trust is such an essential part of that and what that looks like across the way.

 

Drew McLellan [00:05:21]:

Yep. So businesses remain the most trusted institution, which we’ve seen for the last couple years. Yep. But some interesting statements. So one of them was to ensure a better future, business is obligated to provide me, the employee with a well paid position and skills for the future.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:05:42]:

Exactly. So a lot of businesses that have pulled back on some of their ongoing professional education and agencies that have, you know, in the uncertain times, decided to pull back. It’s actually not beneficial to our business and not both in short term and long term.

 

Drew McLellan [00:06:00]:

Well, and I think when you’re feeling sort of that some discontent with your employees, some of it is coming from that. Right. That they expect us again, they believe we are obligated to not only pay them well, but to help them sharpen their own saw to get deeper and better skills, partially so they can advance in their career, partially so they can make more money. But they see that as our job as opposed to their responsibility.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:06:24]:

Correct.

 

Drew McLellan [00:06:24]:

Which we’ve seen for the last couple of years. We’ve talked about, you know, at ami, we talk a lot about professional development as a shared responsibility. Sometimes it’s on the agency’s time and dime, sometimes it’s on the employees time and dime. And we have seen, I would say even pre Covid, an attitudinal shift of the employees, that more of that burden should be on us with career pathing and things like that.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:06:47]:

Exactly. But the upside for us as agencies is that that builds trust and engagement and that employee engagement is really a driving force behind agency success, is to have your team engaged in problem solving. So look at it as an investment to your. The future of the company.

 

Drew McLellan [00:07:09]:

Yeah, for sure. So another interesting statement that came out of that study is CEOs are obligated a lot of obligations to address a societal issue if they can have impact and doing so will improve business performance. So I think as. And we saw this after, you know, Black Lives Matters really rose to the sort of forefront. We’ve seen this multiple times where our employees expect us as business owners and leaders to take a stand and to try and do something to make a.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:07:41]:

Societal ill better or having a clarity in what your mission, vision, values are as a company, where your employees can feel invested in that and drawn to that, that you are having a voice as a, as a company and that can be who you decide to work with. As far as your clients go, or vendors. Or vendors. Or also what you do with some of the non billable time and how you invest that into the world as far as your agency goes, is bigger than business for sure.

 

Drew McLellan [00:08:13]:

So another interesting thing is that as you might imagine, the more the respondent felt optimistic about the future and the economic outlook, the lower the grievance level. So again, the more optimistic I am, the more trusted, the more trust I have in the world and business and other entities because I feel like things are going to work out. And the more pessimistic I am, then the more odds are based on this research, the more I feel grieved upon and that I am angrier. We’re seeing a lot of anger in the world today, unfortunately.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:08:48]:

This is true.

 

Drew McLellan [00:08:49]:

So let’s look at some money trends.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:08:50]:

All right, let’s do it. So in 2023, average profit was at 12%. In 2024, it was at 16%.

 

Drew McLellan [00:08:59]:

So this is among the several hundred agencies that we see their financials of every year, but also what the industry trends are reporting. So we have, we have both a micro and a macro view into this.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:09:12]:

Absolutely. And 70% of agencies saw growth in 2024 and they expect more in 2025.

 

Drew McLellan [00:09:20]:

I think that expectation has been a little tempered.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:09:23]:

Correct.

 

Drew McLellan [00:09:23]:

Right.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:09:23]:

I think this was originally how they felt going into 2025, that they were getting excited. There was a lot of stalling out in projects in 2023 and 2024. The sales pipeline and sales cycle was taking a lot longer. A lot of clients have pulled back on some of their budgets. But there was a lot of optimism that regardless of what was happening after the election, that there was going to be a new normal. So those expectations of what we’re going into 2025 were with excitement of that there could be a shift with more things moving around.

 

Drew McLellan [00:09:58]:

Well, and I think we’re still seeing that optimism. I just think it’s a little more tempered as we’re halfway through 2025 than it was at the start of the year with some of the economic uncertainty. But we’re still seeing a lot of agencies being very innovative.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:10:11]:

Absolutely.

 

Drew McLellan [00:10:11]:

Landing new clients, building out new products, especially with AI, which we’ll talk about in a little bit. But we are still seeing optimism for sure, right?

 

Danyel McLellan [00:10:20]:

Absolutely. The average owner compensation is at $300,000 all in or higher. Note that Social Security max is at $176,100 for 2025.

 

Drew McLellan [00:10:34]:

Here in the States.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:10:35]:

Here in the States, you are believing you’re going to have Social Security having your W2 income at that Matt, that Social Security max $176,100. There’s actually still more M and A interest than ever before. We’re seeing a little bit of a shift from we were seeing a lot more of the same size companies or a competitor buying out another competitor. This is something that’s been a little bit of a shift. The roll ups are still happening a.

 

Drew McLellan [00:11:05]:

Little less often, but a little less often.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:11:08]:

There’s just, there’s just some. The continued M and A interest in what could. Where’s the next direction of my agency? Is it time to sell or is it time to buy to grow?

 

Drew McLellan [00:11:18]:

At the summit we had a lot of conversations with agency owners who are sort of in that, you know, I would say late 40s, mid-50s range that are looking at the five to seven year mark. For some reason a lot of you want to be done by the time you’re 60. It seems to be sort of a magic number for a lot of people, 60 or 65. And so again we’re seeing a lot more M and A activity in terms of actual sales, a lot of internal sales, a lot of external sales, but we’re seeing an increase of activity and just in terms of the planning of M and A activity as well.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:11:48]:

Right. And I think the understanding of where your agency is now compared to where you want it to be when you sell has had a lot more attention and focus put on it because we want you to be able to have enough time when you go into the growth of your agency. It takes time and effort and investment. So having an understanding of the five to seven year plan, the ten year plan and understanding that there’s a lot to do before some people do want to sell.

 

Drew McLellan [00:12:17]:

Yeah, for sure.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:12:18]:

And there’s continued trend is a lot of agencies are also buying other agencies to fill roles within the agency that they need or service line holes that they might have. So be it. A media company being bought by an agency that doesn’t have a media department, those are more common of what we’re seeing from M and A. Yeah, actually.

 

Drew McLellan [00:12:37]:

That’S been a big uptick, hasn’t it? It’s like we want to offer pr, we want to offer SEO or we can’t find a good front end developer. And so they’re buying little shops really buying it less for the client and more for the team or the skill levels.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:12:53]:

Realizing that the organically growing in that a new department or a new service line can take a lot more time to do that organically so being able to actually have a full department or full company functioning in that role makes a lot of sense for agencies that have a lot of cash that they want to spend, for sure.

 

Drew McLellan [00:13:12]:

All right, so let’s talk about what’s happening on the client front. So no shock here in the United States. There’s a lot of pressure on our clients and agencies around watering down DEI focus and effort and language on websites. A lot of our agencies have had to scramble to help clients change. Website verbiage and things like that is changing hiring practices. But it’s also an opportunity for those of you that have a strong belief in DEI to really differentiate yourselves by perhaps finding different language but still being very bold about your attitude and your value around DEI hiring and partnerships and things like that.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:13:55]:

And this goes back to your agency being authentic and understanding what you believe in, and that other companies that will be aligned with what you believe in and employees that are aligned in what you believe in allows a lot more lift as far as that goes. So some agencies that work with government have had to take a lot of the language that government has now decided is off the table. But that isn’t changing the way that they do business, it’s the way that they talk about how they do business.

 

Drew McLellan [00:14:25]:

Right, Right. So here’s an emerging trend that we don’t actually think is going to impact small to mid sized agencies in 2025. We’re probably going to start to see signs of it in 26 and beyond. So a lot of the large brands, the Coca Colas, the Procter and Gambles, those kind of brands are really gathering together and they are working on something that they’re calling the brand Bill of Rights. So this originated from brands feeling like agencies were not very transparent about markups, commissions and other ways that we make money on the back end of the work we do. And so the brands are coming together and they’re working on this brand Bill of Rights which is going to demand that agencies have zero markups, zero discounts going back to agencies from third parties like trade desks and things like that, zero principal media buying. So zero, if you’re not familiar with that term. Some of the larger agencies will go out and they’ll buy, let’s say, a couple million dollars worth of inventory on ESPN at a huge discount. And then magically, all their clients need to be on espn. And so the brands feel like the agency is upselling inventory that they bought at a discount to make more money. Also, zero hidden fees, zero conflicts of interest. So in other Words the brands are starting to demand that we be much more transparent about how we make money, where we make money and the fact that for a lot of you if you’re not a media planning and buying agency, odds are you’re working with someone else or multiple layers of someone else to get the media buy done. And in many cases you don’t even know what the markups are in all of the transactions. And so these big brands are saying no more of that, that we want full transparency. We’re happy to pay you for your expertise but we feel like we’re getting double dipped. So again they’re just working on this now. It’s going to absolutely impact the holding company sized agencies in 2025.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:16:24]:

We’re also seeing the trickle down of the effect in the mid markets in the small and medium sized agencies are looking at how they communicate in their contracts and how can they proactively. Proactively and looking at how they’re making money and profiting to make sure that they if they’re changing it to be more transparent that they’re not losing some of the what we provide for our clients and be able to charge getting.

 

Drew McLellan [00:16:49]:

Paid for it differently right through it differently different service fees or things like that, retainers. Again this is on the very early stage of a trend but the brands are pretty adamant about it and I think with the economic sort of uncertainty and upheaval that we are experiencing in North America right now, they’re even more motivated with tariffs and things like that to try and make sure that they’re not getting double dipped. And so and this has been a long practice in agencies to make commissions and markups and things like that. So you know, the brands know it too and they, they just want more transparency about it. It’s not necessarily that you will absolutely have to change every, every aspect of how you bill but not talking about it and not disclosing is going to be the big issue.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:17:31]:

Yep. Because going back to that trust our clients to have. We need to be building trust with our clients. And so having the visibility and understanding what they’re buying and how and what the value is of our contribution to the. The work is important.

 

Drew McLellan [00:17:46]:

Yeah. Clarify and no shock. Clients are freaked out about tariffs, threat of tariffs, tariffs on and off. They’re super anxious. We’re seeing a lot of clients put a hold on projects they’ve already authorized. We are seeing prospects, sort of slow play things. Clients are impacting budgets of future work. Not a surprise. We’ve every time the world has an economic we talk about recession or anytime there’s an economic upheaval, clients get anxious and budgets get tighter. And we’re certainly seeing that, you know. Right. Right now in 2025.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:18:20]:

Right. And I think the important part of that too, is to not be just as reactionary, but know that our clients are dealing with a very. It’s real life very. So we have to look at it ourselves more innovatively and how we communicate our help and our assistance to our clients. So we aren’t the first thing that that’s cut or again, ROI is being able to be exhibited.

 

Drew McLellan [00:18:43]:

Well, I think the reality is this is real for them. I mean, the cost of raw materials and things like that, depending on the client or the sectors that you serve. So again, if we’re really their strategic partners, we have to help them figure out how to manage that. Right. So rather rather than looking in the mirror and sort of being sad or selfish that it’s impacting our budgets for truly their partners, we need to be coming to them with ideas and understanding and compassion around the situation they’re in and help them get even more for their bang for their buck because they have fewer bucks to spend and to.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:19:17]:

Be able to really solidify their market position in this uncertain moment. So we do have a lot to say about what our value is as, as agencies to be able to help them during this time and keeping them in their same market position as best as we can.

 

Drew McLellan [00:19:32]:

Yep. Another really interesting report that we studied as we were putting together the, the trends, Forrester came out with something called the Buyer’s Journey Survey that came out at the very end of 2024. And fascinating if you haven’t seen it. But one of the big things that we, we need to be thinking about is that 30% of the respondents and these were buyer B2B buyers under 40, which for a lot of us are our clients. 30% of those B2B buyers under 40 said that they seek out the opinion of 10 or more people outside their organization before they make a purchase decision. So in other words, they’re in essence yelping us. Right. They want to hear from other people before they hire an agency what the experience has been from those people outside of their organization. Sure, they’re still consulting with people inside their organization, but they want more validation from outsiders. So they said that they’re finding these people to get that validation or to hear that maybe it’s not a great choice to hire the agency from online communities, industry conferences, and other places where people that look and sound like Them in terms of their profession, sort of gather as professionals.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:20:49]:

Right. And I think it’s exciting, actually to hear that they need social proof. And so much of how we grow our business is referrals. And so if we think about how we get empower, we can empower our referral network in a way that can help. Help actually validate where we’re at and be in that space. It’s someplace that we can really dig into.

 

Drew McLellan [00:21:10]:

So for those of you that are a little behind the curve in terms of getting client testimonials, video testimonials, case studies, those may very well substitute for actually talking to somebody at a conference or they see somebody on a testimonial and they can follow up with them on LinkedIn to get more information. But we have to provide that social proof. The interesting thing is Forrester predicted that this level of external involvement for these buyers will go from 30% to over 50% this year in 2025. So this trend, this trend is growing. It’s not going away. We have to be able to demonstrate more social proof. And, you know, Susan and I just last week recorded the podcast on the agency Edge Research. And one of the things that came out in the agency Edge Research is that clients differentiate if the world says we’re an expert versus if we say we’re an expert. So if other people say, boy, that agency is an expert, that has a lot more credibility than the agency saying they’re an expert. So again, that lines right up with this Forester Buyer’s Journey survey.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:22:18]:

Right. And also the Edelman Trust barometer. Again, the trust that they expect to. They need to have that sort of validation to begin to trust us because again, hearing from us that they should trust us is much less emotionally valid to them. Right. We’re going to talk a little bit more about business development now. Agencies were getting more at bats and WINS already in 2025. Early 2025, most agencies were reporting a very bus, which, generally speaking for most agencies, first quarter tends to be a little soft for most. So it was very exciting for quite a few agencies that they were feeling very optimistic about how 2025 was going to shake out.

 

Drew McLellan [00:22:59]:

Well, in fact, a lot of agencies had the best first quarter this year than they’ve ever had. And it started kind of in December, which is normally a really dormant new business time. So I think that was part of the optimism we talked about earlier was born from late November, all of December, January being hot.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:23:18]:

Right?

 

Drew McLellan [00:23:19]:

Business.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:23:19]:

Exactly, exactly. So it was a really exciting trend to start feeling but then as tariff talk started to come into play, there was a market shift in February for most agencies because so much of their again our clients have to think what’s going to happen to our business. So we, they put stop gaps on everything with financials for the year of 2025 so we could see how things shook out. Obviously this trickled down to the agencies. So some projects were stalled, put on hold, canceled, canceled, some were canceled. The in house shift seems to have stabilized and most clients are still outsourcing over 50% of their marketing budgets. However, they are looking at it a little bit differently and they are waiting to hear from their CEOs of what to do next because they’ve been a little bit stopped which trickles down to us.

 

Drew McLellan [00:24:16]:

So you know, we’ve, we always watch the in house trend and it’s such a pendulum, it swings back and forth and oftentimes when, when things are good, clients build up their in house department, they’ve got extra resources, they look at agencies as an outside expense. And then when things get tight or tough, their internal marketing department is one of the first things that we see sort of start to collapse. It’s an expense they reduce, then they feel like they can use an agency kind of in an ad hoc way when they need it. And so the good news, this is a great trend for us that the in house shift, the pendulum has swung, it’s heading back towards the middle again, which is good news for agencies.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:24:57]:

Right. One thing I think that we’ve also seen is that because of the uncertainty, a lot of our clients are looking to reduce their contracts or the time of the contracts. So what they used to say is like a 12 month contract, they only want to commit to maybe 6 months or 3 months. So project by project by project. So that’s a shift in a lot of people’s projections in their financials where it’s hard to know when we only have projects and three month contracts, how things are going to shake out. However, it is the reality. So some agencies are choosing to say no, we’re not taking certain work if it’s not the 12 months. But most agencies are learning how to. We need to be adaptable in this time for our clients.

 

Drew McLellan [00:25:39]:

And that’s in some ways, I mean the agency of record trend has been declining for probably a decade, but we do see it impacted even more. So when the economy gets tight.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:25:50]:

Yep, as always, referrals land the fastest. They’re the lowest hanging fruit with inbound based on expertise coming in at number.

 

Drew McLellan [00:25:59]:

Two, which is a great shift and a new shift. So we have been promoting the. You need to be an expert, you need to be a subject matter expert, you need to be an authority for a long time. You need to have a niche. All of the things that you, that you all hear from us every day. But now we’re starting to see that that’s paying off.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:26:14]:

Right? Exactly. And honestly, the looking at your new business pipeline and seeing how many different inroads of new business and being more proactive about it has been successful for agencies. So looking at that, referrals are the lowest hanging fruit. So how do we optimize our new business referral plan versus our inbound versus what we do from an agency partnership? There’s a lot of ways that agencies are putting processes in that are more robust around referrals and inbound to help with the new business pauses.

 

Drew McLellan [00:26:48]:

And again, this goes back to that Forrester’s Buyer’s journey study. Right. So when the world says an agency is an expert and assigns them that position of authority, then referrals come faster, inbound come faster. And the buyers need that reinforcement to be to have the confidence to buy. So these two trends sort of dovetail together.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:27:09]:

Absolutely. Absolutely. Agencies are responding to fewer RFPs. They’re being choosier making sure that they’re actually really the right fit. But the ones that they are committing to, they’re doubling down. Our clients really need us to show up in our RFPs as strong as possible to keep us in the lead to win those accounts. So don’t do more and think and just do. If you do less with more.

 

Drew McLellan [00:27:38]:

So go. Go deeper.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:27:40]:

Go deeper. Exactly. But that seems to be the trend that we’re seeing.

 

Drew McLellan [00:27:43]:

And, and our friends at Mercer Island Group often will say, if you’re gonna go, you gotta go all in, right? Yep.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:27:49]:

Go all in.

 

Drew McLellan [00:27:50]:

So it looks like agencies are starting to listen to that.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:27:53]:

Absolutely. And they’re also utilizing AI and some of their responses in a much better way where they’re out looking at it from a research perspective, getting better data to be able to respond. And it goes to where we they want to feel like you understand their business. That used to be the trend where agencies really are trying to productize what they do. There’s a disconnect, however, in the sense that when we use the word productize, the clients do not feel that it is a custom solution to them. They don’t want cookie cutter. They think that they are absolutely the most unique. So really aligning strategy and your new business strategy to what’s really going on in their business and their industry is allowing agencies to have more wins in that regard.

 

Drew McLellan [00:28:38]:

Well, and we know that agencies are trying to productize for efficiency. And so we’re not saying don’t do that. What we’re saying is be careful about your language around it. So if you’re saying, well, you know, we have a silver, gold and platinum package that freaks the clients out because they want you to customize something for them so you can still have the silver, gold and platinum. It’s just how you talk about it.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:29:00]:

Really? Absolutely, absolutely. Making sure that they feel like they’re really understood and they’re just not another company A on your roster.

 

Drew McLellan [00:29:07]:

Yeah. Right. Let’s take a quick break and then we’ll come back and we’ll talk about some trends that are impacting owners.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:29:12]:

Sounds good.

 

Drew McLellan [00:29:13]:

Hey everybody, thanks for listening today. Before I get back to the interview, I just want to remind you that we are always offering some really amazing workshops and you can see the whole [email protected] on the navigation head to how we help. Scroll down and you’ll see workshops and you can see the whole list there with descriptions of each workshop. They are all in Denver and we’ve got them throughout the year for agency owners, account Execs, agency leaders, CFOs. We have a little something for everybody. No matter what it is that you’re struggling with, people, new business, money, all of those things we’ve got covered. So check them out and come join us. All right, let’s get back to the show. All right, we are back and so let’s talk about some of the trends we’re seeing on the owner front. So for many of you, as Danielle had said earlier, 23 was brutal, 24 was better, but not as awesome as you want it to be. So the last couple years have been challenging and so a lot of you came into 2025 really needing this year to be the bounce back year. And boy, the first quarter it all looks so great and you were all really enthusiast and optimistic and then tariff talks started and all of that. But one of the things I love about agency owners is, no offense, you can take this however you want, but you’re so stubborn, you’re just so tenacious and you are just unwilling to give in and so you just always find a new way. And so while February, March, April, a lot of you are sort of struggling with the shift in budgets and things like that, you’ve come out of the spring and heading into summer With a lot of energy, with a lot of new ideas, upping your game in terms of prospecting, content creation, stepping into that position of authority so that you make sure that 2025 is a good year for you. So it’s fun to watch how resilient you are and how you are just unwilling to wave the white flag. But many of you are feeling like 2025 really needs to be a strong year for you, right?

 

Danyel McLellan [00:31:21]:

And I so being able to have a sense of realism but optimism as we’re leading our teams, it can feel like a heavy lift. And so coming out of the Baba Summit, there’s been a lot of new energy with agencies to say like, okay, this is a new moment in time. This is the time that we can’t be grieving for what we’ve lost before, but it’s time to actually embrace the uncertainty and get to the roots of sort of our innovation and why we got into this business to start with and figuring out what that looks like moving forward.

 

Drew McLellan [00:31:56]:

So a lot of owners I think are still sort of struggling with the. I wish it was still the way it used to be. Whether that’s that we worked in an office together five days a week or there was agency of record opportunities. And so we’re seeing a kind of a shift and we’ve talked about this shift for the last couple years. So for some of you, you’re sort of stuck. And I wrote about this at the start of 2025 and in a newsletter that, that I think we have to acknowledge that we are grieving a loss, that the business has changed, teams have changed. We’ll talk later about sort of the structure of teams and how that’s changing. Clients are a little different, how we get new business is different. We’re not, you know, it’s not so much buy somebody a drink and chat em up at the bunker and all of a sudden they’re a client. You know that personal networking is part of it, but it’s really now about am I a subject matter expert, am I findable for that subject matter expertise? So the owners that are stepping away from that grief, that acknowledging that they felt it and maybe still feel it, but really approaching the new normal, as you said, with sort of an optimism and a kind of a hunger to reinvent and with curiosity. We’re seeing a lot of interesting curiosity, yes, around AI, but other things as well. But owners are really allowing themselves to reinvent everything. The team, the what you sell, how you do it, the offerings, how you use AI, and those owners are coming at the world with an enthusiasm and an optimism and tend to be the agencies that are, that are really thriving.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:33:25]:

Right. And it’s a natural human behavior to want to batten down the hatches. And if there’s uncertainty, we need to just pause and stop and see how things are going to shake out. That isn’t the position that we’re in right now. This is a time where being able to open up and just look at more opportunities with less fear and apprehension and with more of a experimental almost approach where we are going to try to serve our market better, we’re going to try to change how we do things and have a little bit of fear and apprehension about that is completely natural. But also having excitement, excitement about things that are working. We have agencies that are trying new technologies, new ways of doing business and it’s helping light new marketplaces and underneath of their teams and with their clients. And that is just speeding the good energy of, okay, we can, we can try something else new. Now that we started this, we can maybe, maybe we can do this. And the iterative being, having a process that is continually getting better and feeling dynamic is part of this process.

 

Drew McLellan [00:34:34]:

Yeah. So my next solo cast is all going to be about that. So we’ll, we’ll dive really deep into that next month. But one of the things we’re also seeing owners do is recognizing that they can’t do it all by themselves. And so we’re seeing more and more, and this is a trend we’ve reported on for the last couple years, but just growing. More and more agency owners are hiring a coo, a director of ops, whatever title it is, to help shoulder the load. So many of, many of you are looking in the mirror and going, you know what? I’m good at these five things. I’m not as great at these other five things. I need a senior level person that I can shift some of the things on my plate off so I can focus on the things I’m good at. Being the visionary new business, mentoring the team, whatever that may be, whatever that skill set is. I need an operational person to help me shoulder the load. So that’s, that’s been a big shift. And then we’re also seeing agencies, owners sort of recognize that there is opportunity. We saw a ton of this at the summit. There’s huge opportunity to partner with other agencies to kind of round out your offerings. And it’s more than just the white labeling of services. In some cases, in some cases you’re pitching business together. In some cases, we have have two agencies that actually formed a separate entity.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:35:52]:

Right.

 

Drew McLellan [00:35:52]:

That they co own together, that they’re going after business together. So we’re seeing more and more of that. The other thing that I think is really healthy is that a lot of you are recognizing that you need to level up your leadership team. They need to be better equipped to help you actually run the agency. Which, by the way, when we get back to, when we talk about M and A, is one of the critical things that a buyer wants to know is that you have a leadership team that can run your business in your absence because you’re not sticking around.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:36:20]:

Right, right. I think that the couple of the key things when we were talking about hiring a CEO or partnering with other agencies, but thinking about that, it isn’t just about the tasks or leadership team, about what they need to do. It’s about solving problems together with you and having more empowerment within your agency to get the things done that you need to get done. So the one thing that’s really exciting, I think, about the partnership with other agencies is that it also is a lead in, in to some mergers and acquisitions where it’s an opportunity for agencies to work together and date before they get married. Which has been an interesting shift that a lot of agencies weren’t unwilling or were unwilling to do. But we have to think about, we have to look at how we do business differently. And talking about other inroads of new business, having those agency partnerships is pretty fantastic. It’s another inroad for you.

 

Drew McLellan [00:37:11]:

Well, the work that we do just gets more technologically advanced, more sophisticated, and also much deeper and varied. And it’s really hard for any agency to be good at all of it.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:37:23]:

Absolutely.

 

Drew McLellan [00:37:23]:

So again, it’s about finding new ways to deliver more value to the client, even in some unusual partnerships.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:37:30]:

Exactly, exactly. And going into the unusual partnerships, a good segue to talk about employees because they are our biggest asset. And agencies are looking for different ways to optimize their teams, either between having them be more cross trained with each other, so there’s a little bit more of wearing more hats, or if they have specialists that only wear one hat, that they’re able to optimize their time more efficiently with letting them work with other agencies to help build out their billable hours. So going back to employees, something that we heard loud and clear is the quote being, I trust my employer to do what’s right. And that’s from the Edelman Trust survey. It’s down three points to 75%.

 

Drew McLellan [00:38:18]:

And it’s been Declining for the last several years. Right.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:38:21]:

That’s a lot of trust that they put into us about.

 

Drew McLellan [00:38:24]:

Right. You know, three fourths of your employees absolutely trust you to do what’s right. So you can look at the down part or you can say, I’m doing a pretty good job. Yes, there’s room for improvement. But most of my employees do believe in me, do believe I’m going to do what’s right.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:38:38]:

And. But it’s important to align what you’re saying with your actions. Our employees are watching us in a way that is a lot different than it has been in years past. Mental health issues are on the rise. They still are on the rise. Our employees want a greater sense of purpose. So this goes back to the trust and your company’s values. You want to be able to attract employees that are inspired and excited about what you do, and they want to feel that they’re a part of it. They don’t want to just be checking a box and doing a task. They want to feel like they’re actually adding value to this greater sense of purpose and it creates this engagement.

 

Drew McLellan [00:39:16]:

I want to go back to the mental health issue for a minute because I don’t want to gloss over that. So a lot of you have trusted relationships with your employees and you know that they’re struggling. That’s both good news, that they’re being candid and open with you, but it’s also challenging from an employment law point of view. And so you do want to be really clear about understanding how to. How to document job performance and things like that, so that if you do have to make a course correction with an employee who also happens to be struggling with some mental health issues, which honestly is probably the majority of employees today are struggling with something. Right. You want to make sure you have your honest. Yeah, well, we’re not going to fire ourselves.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:39:57]:

Absolutely.

 

Drew McLellan [00:39:58]:

You want to make sure that you’ve documented really well performance issues. So one on ones are critical. Performance reviews are critical. Pips are really critical so that you’re not in murky water if it happens to be an employee who’s on an antidepressant or has had to take a lot of mental health days or whatever. So that’s one side of it. The other side of it is one of the important things for us as agencies is employee retention. If you’ve got a great employee, it is so hard to replace that person who’s really adding great value. And so we do want to be thoughtful about how we show up as compassionate human beings. And recognize that a lot of people are freaking out about what’s happening in the world today. They’re trying to explain it to their kids. They’re struggling with financial issues as the recession and cost of living goes up and all of that. So finding a balance of yes, I want them to show up every day, I want them to work hard, I want them to be focused and also just being a kind and caring human being. You got to find the balance there.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:40:59]:

And also understanding what support you can give as a company for mental health issues. So I think being very clear, when you onboard new employees and for existing employees, what mental health resources do you have available through your health insurance? What process and path to do your employees have when they’re going through mental health issues and making sure that you have a good documentation and a process around that. So you’re not feeling that you don’t have the assets to be able to help your team. You just want to provide a lot of clarity so they know how to navigate your business with you when they’re having mental health issues. And talk to an HR specialist too to understand what you can actually.

 

Drew McLellan [00:41:47]:

Well, a lot of your health insurance have that or you might have an employee assistance program. But I think the other side of that pendulum is we also pay them a salary to do their job. And so you also cannot feel guilty about expecting your employees to show up and do good work on time and on budget. And so again, it’s just a balancing act for you as agency owners and leaders that we want to acknowledge is getting more complicated as the world gets more complicated.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:42:14]:

Right, Right. There just has been a lot of innovation around job sharing and optimizing our teams based on knowing that they’re our greatest asset, but also understanding how the world in our work is changing at such a great pace. So having job sharing opportunities, either having your team members be able to work as contracted other agencies so you can keep them longer, being able to have varied hats within your agency. The trend is going back to being able to wear more hats and be able to understand other roles within the agency and not just your own. To be able to be more nimble and to be able to address the work the best way we can with the people that we have.

 

Drew McLellan [00:43:00]:

We’re also seeing agencies actually having fewer FTEs, doing more work, having higher AGI, but fewer FTEs because they’re being more innovative in terms of how they are. Everybody doesn’t have to be a full time employee.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:43:15]:

Correct?

 

Drew McLellan [00:43:16]:

Right. So that’s great. On a mental health point of View. Maybe people don’t work, work three hours a week which gives them more breathing room. Or you’re like, you know what, we only need this subject matter expert or this skill set three days a week. And so, you know, you’re. It’s just been a really interesting shift to watch agencies figure this out.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:43:35]:

It has been. I think that going from 2023, a lot of agencies who had lost team members decided not to rehire those same positions. So it almost started then, but then people are breaking out of the box of thinking that there’s one way a 40 hour work week, you know, each employee has to be billable this amount of time for this. There’s a wider variety of employment models that are allowing agencies to have fewer FTEs but still keep the quality higher. There’s much more contract work going on. There’s existing employees part time work. We’ve had an overwhelmingly positive response when agency owners have offered different amounts of work hours and things to certain employees to help with their finances. And it can be even for summertime hours to again be able to control our employment, our employee costs in a different way than we have before. Also there’s a lot more offshore hiring for full time hires.

 

Drew McLellan [00:44:36]:

We’ve seen offshore work for years and years. However, this is a new trend where it’s like now you’re hiring somebody who happens to live in another part of the world, but you’re still hiring them full time. In many cases it’s a cost savings savings for the agency. They’re still getting highly skilled people.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:44:52]:

Absolutely.

 

Drew McLellan [00:44:52]:

But it’s in general, I would say agency owners are getting much more flexible.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:44:57]:

Right.

 

Drew McLellan [00:44:58]:

About how they think about employment, which has been great for the agency in terms of culture, in terms of finance, but it’s also been great for the employees because everybody, not everybody, wants to work full time.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:45:10]:

Right, Right, right. Or again, it could be summer hours. That helps for your bottom line and for it to help with cost control. But it actually is benefiting the employees as well. So remember to be open to those different options. It’s not how it used to be. There’s also a lot of agencies are looking to work in more co working spaces instead of getting into their which we’ve seen this trend happen for a little bit. But the importance even for agencies that are all remote is to have some more access to co working spaces.

 

Drew McLellan [00:45:43]:

Well, what we’re seeing is a lot of you gave up your leases or your buildings when Covid hits and some of you have been completely remote since then. A lot of you Are feeling the need to bring teams back together in one way, shape or form. And you know, we’re, we are seeing a mix of sort of what that looks like in terms of three days in, two days out, all of that. But a lot of you are hoping to have create some culture around a gathered gathering space.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:46:10]:

Yep, absolutely.

 

Drew McLellan [00:46:11]:

But to your point, more co working space than long term leases or buying buildings.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:46:16]:

Absolutely, yeah. There’s new roles that are really emerging for agencies right now to help address what’s happening in the world, but also allowing us to do our work differently. There’s a few different roles that have been on the rise. One is a creative technologist. I love this role because it really marries a lot of what’s happening in the technology world, including AI, with the strategic creative strategy that goes along with that. Also with platform integrations. Understanding how all of the different parts and pieces work together and be able to lead the team to have better, more impactful work. That’s been a very big trend when you’re thinking about new role like a creative technologist or even a data scientist. There are more layoffs from big box agencies in 2025. So there’s a bigger pool of great candidates for our independent agencies right now.

 

Drew McLellan [00:47:14]:

Yeah, the holding companies have really taken it in the short structure.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:47:17]:

Absolutely. Which is really allowed more realistic compensation models than we had seen in previous years. And also more talent is out there that is ready to work and also possibly work in a different way. And again, to address what you need for your agency. The DEI focus has waned for some agencies and changed their hiring practices. This is an opportunity to be bold. This is again based on the values of your agency and what you believe in. So be very clear because your team is watching and they want to see how you’re going to react to dei. Return to office is heating up. There’s a lot of talk about moving to four days in, one day out. Sometimes our clients, our client set is influencing this. Also. People who have been remote or continue to be remote, yes, they’re finding places to collect and collaborate and understand the importance of that time together and that creative time. But they’re also leaning into staying fully remote. And this goes back to being true to who your company is and your company values and what makes the most sense for your agency.

 

Drew McLellan [00:48:27]:

What I love about this trend is that when we came out of COVID a lot of you were very afraid to ask your employees to come back into an office setting. I cannot tell you how many times we heard the everyone will quit Sentence. And what’s happening now is whether you’re four days in, one day out, you’re fully remote or somewhere in between, a lot of you are back in the office five days a week. Whatever it is, you now have the courage to do what’s right for your business. And so the real trend underneath the how many days in and days out is that agency owners are finally figuring out for their mix of work, work for their mix of clients, for them as business owners, what they want, what makes sense for them. And they are now saying, this is how my business runs. And if that doesn’t work with you, that’s okay because there are candidates out there that want this, whatever this is. So that’s actually, I think the most exciting part of the trend is that you’re not afraid anymore to run your business the way you want to run your business.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:49:27]:

One thing that I think is exciting about this trend is, is that there’s more certainty for agency owners of what is right for their business, regardless of how many days in or how many days out. We have some agencies that are experimenting with a four day work week based on data that goes from some employees that stops burnout if they work 40 hours and four days as opposed to. And have a bigger break as opposed to five days with the same amount of hours. The goal, again, is that everybody is looking at what really works for their business and is allowing that to be the norm for their business.

 

Drew McLellan [00:50:03]:

Yeah. Without. Without being afraid.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:50:05]:

Correct.

 

Drew McLellan [00:50:06]:

Yeah. Yeah. All right, so let’s look at some of the things that are working. Where are agencies making money? Where can you lean into? So interestingly, retro is way back in. So we. If, if you are watching television in any way, shape or form where you still see commercials, you’re seeing a lot of older commercials coming back. We saw it around the Super Bowl. We are seeing a lot of leaning into as the buying get more nostalgic for the past, which always happens during times of challenge in the world. We long for the simpler we have. What is that? The Rosie retrospection principle? Right. That we think of the past as being better than it was. So retro’s back in. One of the things a lot of agencies are really struggling with and trying to talk to clients about is how do we preserve and protect creativity? And what is creativity? Is it really strategic creativity? Is it really true creative creativity? And do clients really care about that anymore? Do clients really value that? That. Another thing we’re seeing a lot more of is this idea of creator marketing. So again, letting our clients, customers Create marketing clients are getting a lot more comfortable kind of handing the mic to their customers and letting them speak about the products or services. So agencies are sort of figuring out how to capture that and how to encourage that in a way that creates some boundaries around it so that it is still obviously to the client’s advantage. But it feels again, more authentic. It’s much more the. When the common Joe says something is true, I believe it. So creator marketing is not going anywhere. Another trend which we’ve been talking about for a long time, which continues to grow, is influencer marketing. So kind of adjacent to creator marketing. And the interesting thing, the trend about influencer marketing now in 2025, is that the influencers are actually getting more influential. And so what’s happening is agencies and clients, in the beginning, when influencer marketing was a thing, we would decide what the influencer should do, we would hand them the assets and then they would use it in their channels to kind of get it out to the world. What’s happening now is that agencies and brands are inviting those influencers to the strategy.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:52:16]:

Right. To be able to collaborate on what that looks like.

 

Drew McLellan [00:52:19]:

Like, you know that audience better than we do. What kind of strategy, what kind of messaging should we re employ again, still through you and your channels. But so they’re coming into the process a lot earlier, which means they’re more powerful, they’re more integrated, and we have to have a better relationship with them because they have more influence over our clients.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:52:39]:

And influencers have evolved over the past few years to be in that position where again, they are, they are much more strategic about their audiences. And so that collaboration has been very fruitful.

 

Drew McLellan [00:52:50]:

Yeah.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:52:50]:

Yep.

 

Drew McLellan [00:52:51]:

And no big surprise to you, short form video is officially the channel. So when we ask, when clients are asked where they’re going to spend more money, where they’re going to invest more effort, short form video is the winner there. So we have to be mindful of that. So last year in the Trend Report, if you remember, we talked a lot about if you wanted a big audience from a media perspective, you really needed to turn to live sports. And if you remember, we said politics, because it was an election year here in the United States. Politics. We were including that in live Sports. So in 2025, what we’re saying is live sports is still the place to be, but interestingly, it’s shrunk to women’s sports. So with the breakout of Caitlin Clark and some of the other female athletes and female sports that have happened worldwide, now they are drawing a huge audience and they’re. There’s ample opportunity still. It’s a breakout year for sponsorships, endorsements, media buys, because it’s not saturated. So if you’re looking for a big audience, this 2025 is the year to look to women’s sports.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:54:03]:

Absolutely.

 

Drew McLellan [00:54:05]:

So this, I’m going to read you a sentence because I think it’s really a critical way for us, a lens for us to see what our clients expect us to be able to do. Whether you can do it or not. This is the expectation marketers will use a combination of customer data, for example, browsing history, location, purchase behavior, external data, economic trends, weather, local events, and advanced algorithms to forecast when a customer is likely to make a purchase, what products they’re most interested in, and even what kind of message will resonate best with them at a particular moment. That’s how sophisticated our work has gotten and that is how high our clients expectations are for our ability to do the kind of work we do. And so if you are not talking to your client about customer data, again, that first party data, if you’re not talking about how to gather external data and bring that strategy into the discussion around economic trends and things like that, that. And if you are not to your point earlier, using the data and using advanced algorithms to really know where the puck is headed next.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:55:20]:

Right.

 

Drew McLellan [00:55:21]:

Then our clients feel like we are not as sophisticated as we need to be. So that’s the expectation.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:55:26]:

Absolutely. And I think a lot of agencies are saying, well, we might do part of that or a little bit of that or not as well and we’re expected to be innovative in this space. And that’s, I think, I think one of the biggest takeaways is looking at that and saying how is my agency responding to that absolute need? And that leads right into AI.

 

Drew McLellan [00:55:47]:

Right.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:55:48]:

We have all been talking about AI and the time is now, the future is here. How can we use AI to enhance our connections, connect our client services, analyzing data, putting together work for pitches, utilizing it, and not just to be more efficient, but also to be smarter. And how do we as humans work with AI? Because it’s not really about AI taking our jobs, it’s about us being able to utilize AI for the best parts of our work.

 

Drew McLellan [00:56:20]:

Well, you know, in the agency edge research, one of the things that we saw is that while most clients are saying they’re using AI, they’ve barely scratched the surface of the tools. So this is a huge opportunity for us. There are so many sophisticated tools that do very specific things around research or predictive modeling or data crunching or ideation. Our clients are not at that level yet. But we need to, yeah, we need.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:56:49]:

To understand how the automations work, how we really have to reinvent who we are as agencies and how we do the work. And it isn’t going to happen in one snap. But yeah, if you still have a AI task force and that’s all you’re doing and maybe a couple people using a couple different, different platforms, that isn’t going to be enough. So it is time to really look at innovation and AI together. But the innovation piece cannot be without AI being a part of it.

 

Drew McLellan [00:57:21]:

Well, and again, if you listen to last week’s episode with Susan Byer and we were talking through the agency edge, perhaps the biggest trend of all is the opportunity for new revenue by really being the master of AI. Our clients have said loud and clear we know AI has to be a part of the mix. We expect our agencies to be the leaders and the experts in it, not just with marketing, but in all aspects of my business. And I have resources to spend if the agency can come in and be my guide and teacher and help us figure out what AI tools we can use for what benefit. So as we sort of wrap up this episode, if you haven’t listened to last week’s episode, I’d go back and listen to that because it may be the biggest trend of all, which is there is huge opportunity for us to be the leaders when it comes to bringing AI into not only our own organizations, but to be the leaders and the teachers to bring it into our clients organizations.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:58:22]:

Right. And I think one of the most important parts of that is understanding not just how AI helps us do what our services better or how it impacts our services, but how we can use AI to solve our clients problems. So if they have blank spots where we don’t see certain sort of data like how can we use AI for that? So focus on the problems that you’re solving and how AI can help solve that problem as opposed to just looking at how we can do things cooler or more efficiently within the work that we already do.

 

Drew McLellan [00:58:55]:

Well and in fact the research shows that it’s not really about faster, cheaper, right. What clients want from us is deeper.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:59:02]:

Deeper, deeper insights and deeper insights.

 

Drew McLellan [00:59:06]:

At the end of the day that’s, you know, sort of the overarching trend is that while we get commoditized every day when we just make the stuff, the one place where we can own a seat at the C suite table is with strategy. Whether it’s AI driven, whether it’s human driven, whether it’s that combination of the two, which is what we know clients want. There’s a lot of good news in that study, and I think that really does talk about the future of where agencies are headed.

 

Danyel McLellan [00:59:33]:

Right, exactly. And really understanding that the desire for more depth and more insight starts before you go into the new business realm. Like, you need to be thinking right off the bat, not just when they actually have clients in the agency, but from the very beginning, you need to be showing that sort of depth and insight to attract those clients in the first place.

 

Drew McLellan [00:59:56]:

Well, most of us got into the business because we are creators and we love the ideation and the strategy. And so the good news is maybe one of the key takeaways from today’s podcast is the trend is heading to that, that our clients need us to be more strategic, smarter, more insightful, more of an expert. And that plays right into our strength. Because that’s, I think, why all of you got into the business so.

 

Danyel McLellan [01:00:20]:

Right. I think that that one thing too to take away is that this is exciting. This is the moment where we can get excited about our work in a new way. So change can be scary, but it also could be really invigorating. And thinking about new ways to solve old problems is a chance for you to really jumpstart the heart of your business. So hopefully there can be taken as overwhelming. But I hope that you, we hope that you feel excited by this.

 

Drew McLellan [01:00:50]:

All right, that wraps up this episode. Hopefully. This was super helpful and insightful for you. A huge shout out, as always, to our friends at White Label iq.

 

Danyel McLellan [01:00:59]:

Thank you. White Label.

 

Drew McLellan [01:01:01]:

They have been the presenting sponsor for many years, and we are so grateful that they come alongside us both on the podcast and at the Build a Better Agency site summit as the presenting sponsor. As you know by now, if you’re a regular listener, they are born out of an agency. Their agency was trying to solve a problem and White Label IQ was the birth child of that solution. Right. So today they partner with agencies all over the world who are looking for a partner that can help them with Design Dev and ppc. They will White Label however you want. They can be completely behind the scenes. They can talk to your clients as part of your team. Again, we were talking about sort of innovative agency partnerships. A lot of agencies are working with them in a variety of ways and they’re super flexible about that. But they understand how you need to partner with your collaborators because they understand that you still need to make money, you still need to make the clients elated. Not just happy, but elated. And they work really hard to make sure that happens. So head over to whitelabeliq.com to learn more about how they partner with agencies just like yours every day. So huge shout out and thank you to them. And as always, we’re super grateful that you come back every week and that we get to have these conversations. And we hope that this is an episode that highly recommend that you sit around the table with your entire team or your leadership team. Hand out the transcript in advance if you want to, or listen to it together. But there’s opportunity all throughout this episode for your agency to level up, to make some tiny little tweaks that will make big shifts in your revenue, in your AGI, in your profitability. So do not, do not let this just be an episode that’s like, oh yeah, that was interesting. But this is an action packed episode. Wait lots of places for you to lean in and make some changes or amplify what you’re already doing to your client’s advantage and your agency’s advantage.

 

Danyel McLellan [01:03:00]:

So what are you going to do with these trends?

 

Drew McLellan [01:03:03]:

That’s right. So thanks for listening. We’ll be back next week. Have a great week.