Agency Tips

It’s time to be bold

At this moment, there's a lot of pause, and there's a lot of fear that has caused everybody to freeze. What we're hearing from agencies all across the world, but particularly here in the United States, is that the pipeline has just dried up, that clients and prospects don't want to talk about more budget or a new budget. They're frozen in place as they wait for things to settle down, for the tariff talks to change, for some certainty to come into this great uncertainty. We're also seeing that same behavior showing up in agencies and agency owners that you, too, have paused. You're not initiating big new programs. You are not creating new things for prospects, clients, and team members. I want to challenge you in this: right now, while the world is watching and waiting, we don't have to watch and wait. We have all this control over our own business. We can't control what the economy is doing, our worldview, or what's happening politically, but we can control how we show up in our own businesses. Watch »

Knowledge Sharing

One of the conversations we're having with many agency owners these days is how to take the knowledge that one person or one department has inside the agency and infuse it through the entire organization. Knowledge sharing around clients, around the industries you serve, is becoming more and more critical as we look to grow our existing client base, as we look to serve our clients better, to be more valuable to them, to increase their spending with us year over year, it requires us to have a depth of knowledge around their specific business, around the industry they serve, around the work we do, and of course, the work that we do on their behalf, the marketing work. But in many cases, that information is siloed inside of the account service department or some of your production people. Or it might even be siloed with you, the agency owner or an agency leader. We have to build infrastructure inside our agencies for internal education programs. One of the things I want you to think about for 2025 is how to ensure that knowledge is not isolated in a person or department. Watch »

What’s missing from your job descriptions?

We're working on a set of job description templates for members. One of the things that we're realizing is that one of the elements that most job descriptions are missing, which I think is actually one of the most critical elements of a job description, is KPIs. Measurable, attainable, objective ways for you and your employees to measure their performance. It shouldn't be a huge, long list. It doesn't need to be 10 or 15 KPIs, but 5 to 6 KPIs that are very specific to their job that will be a way for you and them to keep score. One of the things we know about today's employees is that they're very anxious to sort of have a checklist of what doing a good job means. What it looks like and your job description is your first opportunity to give them that sort of template or checklist of how to show up as a great AE or a great copywriter or whatever their role is. But 95% of the job descriptions we see coming from all of you don't have specific KPIs. It may have vague language around listing their responsibilities, but it doesn't say how you will measure their performance. And for you and the employee, one of the realizations is that today's employees want specifics, and then they will work very hard to hit those specifics. Watch »

Take Back Your Time

I am rereading a book by Dan Martel called “Buy Back Your Time." Many of you have probably read it; if you have read it once, I highly recommend you reread it. The whole premise of the book is that we spend a lot of our time doing things that are of low value because we haven't either decided that they don't need to be done at all or that someone else could do them as well if not better than we do, and that we are literally robbing ourselves of the time we need to do the things where we add the most value to our business, to our family, whatever it may be. And you know, the truth is, I think everybody feels like if I just had a few more hours in the day, if I had a little more wiggle room, we're not going to get that. So we really have to use that resource of our time better if we're going to get a different result. Watch »

Decide

What would it be if you could wave a magic wand and something would be different? Would it be possible for you to get more new business? Would it be a different relationship with your clients? Would it be a shift in the culture of your agency? Would it be something about profitability? Would it be something about you having clarity around your succession plan? Whatever it is, there's actually a straightforward solution. We overcomplicate things all the time. We create these big, elaborate Gantt charts and reasons why something is or isn't the way it is. This is the reality for most of us, and Danyel and I see this weekly as we coach agency owners and leaders. The reality is that when you are very clear about what you want and you're very clear about what you have to do to get it, the answer is actually straightforward. You have to decide. You have to determine that it's no longer acceptable for it to be how it is. Whatever it may be, you must decide it is no longer acceptable. And that the work you have to do to change it is no longer optional. The solution is simple. Executing the solution is hard. If somebody wants to lose 50 pounds, the solution is simple. Exercise more. Eat different. Be thoughtful about how much you sleep. All the things that we know. But doing it is hard. Solution – simple. Execution – hard. So I want you to think about the one barrier, burden, obstacle, goal, whatever it is that you want to be different in 2025. I want you to look yourself in the mirror and ask yourself, am I willing to decide to change this? Am I willing to do what it takes to have this no longer be a problem? And then actually decide. Watch »

Words are like burrs

When I was a kid growing up in Minnesota, there were many places to hike and be in the woods. And one of the things that I still distinctly remember was what we called stickers or prickers or burrs. You would walk through the woods and they would stick to your clothes. Right? They were these thorny parts of a plant. I don't even know where they came from, but they would get all along your pant legs and your sweaters or your shirts. They were sharp and sticky, and they stuck around. Sometimes, you would find them for days. I can remember going out in the woods with the dogs, and you would find the burrs under their bellies days after you had been out of the woods. Our words are like those stickers long after we have delivered a message. So often, we think that we are being directive or prescriptive, especially if we're frustrated with a team member or a client. Or we're angry, and we say something, and we have been building it up. We've been planning it in our head. We've been practicing it. Or maybe just in a moment of anger, it comes out, and we feel better. We feel better because we've expelled that emotion. But we forget that long after we feel better, long after the conversation is done, and long after we think we've delivered the message and moved on, the recipient hasn't moved on. That sticker, that burr is still on their pant or under their belly, and they can't take it off. They can't shake it. They can't forget it. And that leaves a mark. And it leaves a mark that sometimes is permanent. And even if it's not permanent, it lingers much longer than we think. Watch »

AI is not optional for agencies

Any agency that shuns all AI and stays completely old school, whatever that means today, is an agency that most clients will feel is out of touch. They'll believe their agency is not bringing them all the resources they can and feels dated. It would be best to decide what AI means for your agency and how you use it to serve clients. How do you use it internally for systems and processes? How do you use it to crunch data, gather facts, and research? It can do many things; you don't have to do all of them in your agency. But not understanding AI, not experimenting with AI, not having a policy inside your organization about internal use, and not having a client-facing policy about how your views about AI will translate to your clients and prospects down the road means that you are out of touch. Watch »

Autumnal Truths

Are there things in the fall season of their life cycle in our agency? Maybe it's how we work, maybe it's where we work, maybe it's the kind of clients we serve. Maybe it's an employee or two who have been amazing, but maybe it's their autumn season, and we need to help them figure out how to have a good last chapter through the winter of their career. Maybe it is the way we do billing; maybe it's the way we do new business. But I want you to challenge yourself as agency owners. It's so easy because there's so much chaos always going on around us. We want some stability, I get it. We want something that stays the same. But I think sometimes we cling to the past or things that we feel are evergreen, and maybe they're not. Watch »

Ask more questions

Don't be afraid to ask questions. I've always thought that the smartest people in the rooms are the people who are asking great questions. One of the greatest compliments I think we can get as agency people is when a client or a prospect says to us, “Huh. Nobody's ever asked me that before. That's a fascinating question.” So don't be afraid to ask questions, whether publicly, so everyone can see your question and the answer, or privately, to either the prospect or the search firm. Do not be shy about asking questions. Questions don't make you look stupid. When you have thoughtful, deep questions, they actually make you look pretty smart. Watch »