![\"Digital](\"https:\/\/www.digitalposition.com\/resources\/learn\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Digital-Position-Growth-Chart-2.jpg\")
\nDamn.<\/p>\n
What. A. Mess.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve read many posts like this, where successful agency owners talk about their milestones and the steps they took to get there. Meanwhile, my agency has been booming and I spent many (most) months in the last couple years just trying to find some time to take a nap. Where do these other guys find the time to pop the champagne?!<\/p>\n
Don\u2019t get me wrong, the beginning of this journey has already been nothing short of amazing and our small team is second to none \u2013 they\u2019re like my second family. After all, this type of growth simply does not happen without an unbelievable team coming together and doing whatever it takes to drive results for every client:<\/p>\n
\nDamn.<\/p>\n
But let\u2019s mix it up a bit. These are some of the hard lessons I\u2019ve learned from scaling a digital marketing agency from $8k\/mo to $100k\/mo in 2 years.<\/p>\n
Hear me out, this does not mean we\u2019re not focused on results. During this amazing stretch we\u2019ve had many clients of all sizes where we\u2019ve aggressively scaled and completely transformed their businesses (we drove 54% revenue growth in our portfolio in 2018 while maintaining the same ROI!). But for this first point I want to focus on 2 specific clients:<\/p>\n
I mean, these clients must absolutely LOVE us right?!<\/p>\n
They both fired us.<\/p>\n
Why? They wanted more personal human interaction. In a world of stock marketing agency speak, they wanted more of a relationship with us as people. The most frustrating part of this personally was that our team will stop at nothing to get results for our clients. Our team works their tails off and from experience our results blow most other agencies out of the water. We care, a lot.<\/strong><\/p>\n In fact, the very reason why I started Digital Position in the first place was because I simply could not stand working with other agencies and their corporate buzzwords. I hate that type of speak so much that I once kept track of the ridiculous sayings I heard from another agency I was managing many years ago. Here\u2019s a screenshot of the whiteboard I had behind my desk in 2012:<\/p>\n Clients care about relationships<\/strong>. They want to feel like they\u2019re the only client in your portfolio and that you truly care about their wants and needs. It\u2019s one thing to make someone money, it\u2019s another to spend some time with them and connect as people. If you don\u2019t show your clients the human side of your business, you\u2019re leaving them to assume the worst.<\/p>\n At the end of the day, nobody wants to fire a friend. If you do everything you can to drive results and<\/u><\/strong> you let the client in on that ongoing conversation & seek feedback, they\u2019ll be with you through the good and bad times.<\/p>\n The Solution \/ Results:<\/strong> We rolled out a new communication cadence including a monthly research document to report on specific metrics for the client that can help them in their other marketing efforts. Every client now hears from us at least one time every week<\/u>. Our retention rate was already high (93%), but now it\u2019s 97%.<\/p>\n If I were to start an agency over again (and had money and time to do so), I\u2019d spend 3 months forming every single process before acquiring any clients. The worst, and I mean by FAR the worst part is having this ultimate catch-22. You\u2019re drowning in work that you\u2019re struggling to complete, and every task takes twice as long as it should. Because you\u2019re inefficient, your labor costs are already too high so you can\u2019t just throw more labor at it to solve the problem. As a result, you\u2019re forced to choose between:<\/p>\n I chose option 3. 70 hour work weeks, sacrificing time with my wife and kids, I lost weight, I wasn\u2019t sleeping well, it was a train wreck. Similar to having kids, it\u2019s one of those things that\u2019s hard to understand unless you\u2019ve gone through it. When I see another parent with a fussy baby, I always say to them \u201cI get it, hang in there\u201d. It\u2019s like that.<\/p>\n But to be clear, while others must go through this largely alone as the only owners in their companies (incredible), it wasn\u2019t only me<\/strong>. 2 years ago, I brought on Steve Cozzolongo as my business partner. He went through all this right alongside me, and I still can\u2019t believe how we got through it and came out vastly stronger as partners. I don\u2019t know if I could have done this without Steve, period.<\/p>\n Fix your processes now. Use the \u201cprogress over perfection\u201d rule. Just get the processes in place because you\u2019ll be iterating on them anyway in the future. Iterating on something is far easier than building it from the ground up.<\/p>\n The Solution \/ Results:<\/strong> We overhauled everything. We began using Monday.com as a new task management software. We fixed our IT issues with a remote workforce. We scoped out every step of our process top to bottom and recorded over 100 videos documenting every step for each service for training purposes. We better defined our pricing. We bought HRCloud to handle anything HR related. We improved our business management and hired a tax accountant. We hired lawyers to improve our contracts. You name it, we did it. We transformed the business in Q1 2019 and have recently come out the other side with an unbelievably different business than we had in 2018.<\/p>\n One of the biggest mistakes I\u2019ve made in the past 2 years is that I waited to hire until I had a dire need AND when I was financially \u201cperfectly comfortable\u201d with it. Don\u2019t do this. I repeat, DO NOT DO THIS.<\/p>\n Hire before you need it. Provided your business isn\u2019t broke (that\u2019s a whole separate discussion if it is), who cares if your labor cost is higher than you\u2019d like for a couple months? You can\u2019t run a business in a state of fear by thinking \u201cwell what if I lose X client\u201d? If you provide a good service, and you have a good acquisition strategy you\u2019ll be fine. Plus, that\u2019s the nature of ownership \u2013 it comes with regular measures of risk.<\/p>\n The worst part is that company morale plummets if everyone feels extremely stressed every day. I needed to break this cycle because a good company morale means higher quality work with better results for us and our clients.<\/p>\n The Solution \/ Results:<\/strong> We developed a financial model that helps us determine when we should hire, but it\u2019s not an end all be all. We\u2019re comfortable being a little uncomfortable if it means our employees can enjoy a less stressful work environment and everyone isn\u2019t running around like chickens with our heads cut off.<\/p>\n Forming efficient processes opens up the ability to delegate. Through the first year of scaling, Steve & I found ourselves in a constant dilemma.<\/p>\n Let\u2019s say it takes us 30 minutes to accomplish a specific task. It takes us 2 hours to explain that task in detail to a Specialist and walk them through it so that they could do it. The problem was, just showing something to someone one time without a process in place to reference means they have a harder time retaining it.<\/p>\n We explained the same thing over and over and over and as we hired more employees this problem got worse and worse. So instead, we went through a period where we just felt the need to do everything ourselves and feeling like our new hires (mainly entry level) weren\u2019t providing value. But the problem wasn\u2019t with them, it was us. We didn\u2019t know how to delegate and our processes weren\u2019t consistent enough to even know how to delegate.<\/p>\n In comes Melissa:<\/p>\n Melissa is my sister. I called her up one day almost in tears, asked her to quit her stable job and come work for this dumpster fire (at the time). I still don\u2019t know why she decided to do this, but she did.<\/p>\n Melissa came in and transformed the way I manage the business. She streamlined payroll, she fixed our accounting, helped us understand cash flow, how to handle HR stuff, who to bring in for taxes, how to fix our contracts, etc., etc.<\/p>\n I had a very interesting moment because of her one day. Because she took some business management work off my plate, I was able to attend a client call that I normally wouldn\u2019t have been able to attend.<\/p>\n On that half hour phone call, I looked at the PPC metrics and saw that they were leaving significant growth on the table by not understanding the difference between maximizing the ROI and maximizing profit dollars to the business. After just a half hour discussion, we discussed a new path forward for a larger investment.<\/p>\n The client bought in and went from ~$300k in revenue to $550k+ of monthly revenue in 5 months. Their products have flown off the shelves so much they were having inventory issues!<\/p>\n This was a surreal moment for me because I realized through this experience that I drive far more value to both our clients and Digital Position by being involved in these tasks. Why am I trying to figure out our taxes (which I\u2019m terrible at and would probably be in prison by accident if I was still doing them) when I can have such a major impact like this in a half hour<\/strong>?<\/p>\n The Solution \/ Results:<\/strong> As soon as you\u2019re able, focus on what you\u2019re good at and delegate what you\u2019re not good at. Find team members that don\u2019t share the same traits (see #5), but that are good at things that you aren\u2019t. Steve is very social and great at forming new relationships and client acquisition but is disorganized and not the most efficient guy. I\u2019m extremely efficient and organized, but I\u2019m awkward on the phone and in person and sometimes way too straight forward that I may offend some. I\u2019m just generally an introvert and he\u2019s not. I focus on managing the company processes and Steve focuses on acquisition and relationships, it\u2019s perfect!<\/p>\n I\u2019ve always said that on the most simplistic level there appears to be two ways to manage a business \u2013 with a culture of fear or a culture of positivity & comradery.<\/p>\n Look, you can make money by making your employees fear you. It plays to the human survival instinct; nobody wants to get fired or feel like a failure. I know agencies that have grown to $100mm\/year using a culture like this. Good for you guys.<\/p>\n That\u2019s just not what I believe in (*gasp*). Business IS personal. Hell, your employees spend gigantic portions of their lives working for you. If you\u2019re not having some fun along the way and building a team that enjoys working with one another, what\u2019s the point? Plus, as an owner I don\u2019t want to be mad every day. I\u2019m a pretty happy guy!<\/p>\n This doesn\u2019t mean I don\u2019t believe in accountability. It\u2019s not like we\u2019re over here playing ping pong every day (although I AM pretty good at ping pong if I do say so myself and wouldn\u2019t turn down a challenge). We just like to try to keep it fairly light and get our work done while working together to accomplish goals. Everyone has a \u201cwell what could I have done differently\u201d attitude FIRST before blaming another, and we break down ego barriers and always look to continuously improve.<\/p>\n That said, you can\u2019t just have a bunch of fun and expect to make a bunch of money. You need to identify the right talent and fits for your culture. Do not rush your hiring process. Identify what traits you\u2019re looking for and make sure you have all the questions you want to ask prepared, do multiple interviews, we even do a short personality test to see how they would fit with our culture (since the personality tests don\u2019t have right or wrong answers they have no reason to lie!).<\/p>\n Digital Position had issues with the \u201ctoo many chefs in the kitchen\u201d problem. I\u2019m an aggressive growth-seeking person, sometimes too straight forward for my own good. So naturally I hired some more aggressive growth seekers. However, at first, we found a bunch of us were butting heads a lot. We could have a meeting and debate for 2 hours 100 different ideas and everyone would be frustrated and at the end of the day we\u2019d accomplish nothing and waste an unbelievable amount of time.<\/p>\n Managing different personality types (and yes, people are EXTREMELY different) is one of the most unexpected things I\u2019ve encountered managing more and more team members. I could say something to one person and they\u2019d thank me for it. Say that exact same thing to someone else and they\u2019d be frustrated with me. I have many ways that I\u2019m still trying to improve as an owner and a manager, but this is one of the main ones. You\u2019ve got to understand what resonates with each person and find ways to work to their strengths.<\/p>\n The Solution \/ Results: <\/strong>We expanded upon our hiring process to ensure we\u2019re finding the right fits for our culture. We shifted almost everyone\u2019s roles around internally to where they can provide more value and do things that they enjoy doing. The company is running like a fine oiled machine and we have processes to prioritize tasks and filter the best ideas to the top of the project list!<\/p>\n <\/p>\n If you made it this far, it\u2019s obvious scaling any business is incredibly difficult and I\u2019m only at the beginning of this adventure. There\u2019s far more work to be done, lessons to learn, risks to take, and people to meet. Don\u2019t take my words as gospel here, there are many ways to grow a successful business. I just hope my insights help a couple people scale their businesses more effectively!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" What. A. Mess. I\u2019ve read many posts like this, where successful agency owners talk about their milestones and the steps they took to get there. Meanwhile, my agency has been booming and I spent many (most) months in the last couple years just trying to find some time to take a nap. Where do these…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1376,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,2,3],"tags":[],"thumbnail_src":"https:\/\/www.digitalposition.com\/resources\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/DPBlogPost-5LessonsLearnedScalinganAgency1-2-300x168.jpg","thumbnail_medium_src":"https:\/\/www.digitalposition.com\/resources\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/DPBlogPost-5LessonsLearnedScalinganAgency1-2.jpg","featured_image_src":"https:\/\/www.digitalposition.com\/resources\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/DPBlogPost-5LessonsLearnedScalinganAgency1-2.jpg","author_avatar_src":"https:\/\/www.digitalposition.com\/resources\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/roger2.jpg","author_name":"Roger Parent","category_labels":["CMO","PPC","SEO"],"tag_labels":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.digitalposition.com\/resources\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/596"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.digitalposition.com\/resources\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.digitalposition.com\/resources\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.digitalposition.com\/resources\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.digitalposition.com\/resources\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=596"}],"version-history":[{"count":31,"href":"https:\/\/www.digitalposition.com\/resources\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/596\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1377,"href":"https:\/\/www.digitalposition.com\/resources\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/596\/revisions\/1377"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.digitalposition.com\/resources\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1376"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.digitalposition.com\/resources\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=596"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.digitalposition.com\/resources\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=596"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.digitalposition.com\/resources\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=596"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Whiteboard](\"https:\/\/www.digitalposition.com\/resources\/learn\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Whiteboard.jpg\")
My personal favorite is \u201cit certainly gets a bit screwy\u201d. Come on man!<\/p>\n2.) Process, Process, Process<\/h2>\n
\n
![\"Steve](\"https:\/\/www.digitalposition.com\/resources\/learn\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Steve-Cozzolongo.jpg\")
This is Steve lifting heavy weights. Steve is a lot stronger than me.<\/p>\n3.) Waiting to Hire<\/h2>\n
4.) Delegating<\/h2>\n
![\"Melissa](\"https:\/\/www.digitalposition.com\/resources\/learn\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Melissa-Spitz.jpg\")
Or as we like to call her, Team Mom!<\/p>\n5.) Building a Culture & Managing Personality Types<\/h2>\n
![\"Digital](\"https:\/\/www.digitalposition.com\/resources\/learn\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Digital-Position-Team.jpg\")
We\u2019re a bunch of nerds making people money and having fun doing it<\/p>\n