Are you great at creating but seem to fail with execution? Do you have a hard time delegating tasks and get lost in the day-to-day of working in your agency instead of on it? Then it’s time your agency makes a marketing plan for your agency! When you get your team on board and delegate to a lead in charge of the execution, you are freed up to create the longterm vision. Learn how to step away from being the Agency Owner and become the Agency CEO.

In this episode, we’ll cover:

• Simple lessons to grow and scale a business.
• 3 easy mindset shifts to grow your agency.
• How to stay consistent and treat your agency like a client.
• 3 buckets to have in your agency’s marketing plan.
• The importance of implementing your agency’s core values.

Today I got to chat with Derek Champagne, founder and CEO of the full-service marketing agency, The Artist Evolution and author of Don’t Buy A Duck: Stop Wasting Money & Only Do Marketing That Works!. With a mantra of “without fail,” a vision and some failures in his pocket, Derek built his current agency to a 30+ employee business. Today he shares with us the importance of having a vision and marketing plan for your agency. In order to grow and scale you need to make sure you’re treating your agency with the same consistency and level of attention you give your clients.

Simple Lessons to Grow & Scale a Business

Derek says some of his failures have taught him some great (yet, simple) lessons about business growth and scaling. These are key to transitioning from Agency Owner to Agency CEO:

1. You need to have the right people around you to grow effectively and get the advice you need.
2. You don’t need to hold your cards so close. Collaborating with other agencies can bring great success.
3. You need to have a longterm focus and vision for your agency.

3 Easy Mindset Shifts To Grow Your Agency

1. Have a vision and set goals to achieve it. Don’t get lost in the weeds of the day-to-day grind.
2. Let your agency team understand your clear vision:
   • How can a team get behind you if they don’t know the plan or where the agency is going?
   • Communicate your agency marketing plan and vision.
   • Empower your agency employees to make decisions that help achieve your vision.
3. Know what you’re good at and where/when you need to delegate.
   • Get out of your own way and don’t be the smartest person in the room.

How To Stay Consistent & Treat Your Agency Like a Client

Much like your clients, your agency’s growth is also dependent upon having a marketing plan. If you haven’t niched down yet, it’s time to do that. Know who you are, who you target and what you’re best at – then go after it.

If your marketing isn’t going according to plan… maybe you don’t really have a “plan” after all?!

Having a marketing plan is crucial. Map it out. Not just you, bring in your agency team. Whiteboard it out. Hold a strategy session and answer “what does our marketing plan look like and why.” The “why” is important – your team needs to know and understand why you’re doing what you’re doing. Don’t just do it because you think you should, knowing the why makes it much more effective.

3 Buckets To Have In Your Agency’s Marketing Plan

A marketing plan isn’t just for clients…. it is critical to have an agency marketing plan, too.

1. Customer Acquisition
   • How is your agency gaining new clients?
   • How are marketing dollars spent?
2. Client Retention
   • What is your agency doing to retain existing customers?
   • What are you doing to cross-pollinate services and build partnerships?
3. Agency Reputation
   • What is your agency doing to stay top of mind and tip of tongue?
   • How are you present and interacting with those in your community and client base?

Also… assign, don’t assume! Along with a marketing plan your agency needs to also know who is doing what. Be sure that every marketing plan has a point person who is responsible for the execution and results.

Being able to present a solid marketing plan to your agency clients will help build trust.

Creativity and strategy are great, however they sit on the cutting room floor if you don’t have implementation and execution figured out!

Implementing Your Core Values

Go back and take a look at your agency’s core values. Are you implementing them consistently?

If you’re doing core values right, you should be able to focus on building the team, holding the vision and gaining resources towards that vision. When you make these things a priority for your agency, then the client-side will come together. Your focus should be on finding and keeping a solid team. You can always get more clients, but it will cost you more to rebuild a quality team.

Ready to Discover the Best Agency Strategies Working Today?

Most agency owners struggle to scale. We’ve developed an amazing mastermind to guide you through the journey of implementing the right systems so you can scale your agency — instead of feeling overwhelmed by it.

We do this by bringing together successful agency leaders to share strategies, offer advice, and reveal what’s working (and what’s not working) in their agency. The truth is, whatever you want to accomplish in life, nothing will help you go further, faster than getting the right adviser in the context of motivated peers. If you want to GROW fast and smart, Digital Agency Elite mastermind will help.

Want More Advice?

If your five year plan includes selling your digital agency or you want to grow your agency to the next level, you may come across challenges and knowing how to adapt will make you a better agency owner. I cover all topics from how to drive traffic to your agency website to who you should hire to grow your agency team and more. I hope you found this helpful and can put it into action.

Have other topics you want advice on? You can check out all my tips, tricks and insights in my blog covering a wide variety of topics as well as answering your questions in more from my Ask Swenk series.

Are videos more your thing?  You can check out my Ask Swenk series and more of my videos on my Youtube channel for advice from myself and other agency experts.