Online communities are quickly becoming one of the most powerful biz dev tools out there, but there’s etiquette to starting and maintaining one. It’s not for everyone, but for those who are ready, an online community could be your ticket to selling without ever having to actually sell. This week, we’re continuing the conversation about online communities vs. online audiences, and the vast benefits they can offer to agency owners. Now that we’ve established the differences between an audience and a community, it’s time to ask ourselves deeper questions about why and how we should start one. The ..read more

Everybody has a story they’re trying to tell, and brands play a massive role in people’s stories, whether they realize it or not. Most of the time, the stories consumers associate with a brand aren’t what we think they are. This is where behavioral economics becomes vital to creating an effective marketing strategy.   Behavioral economics is a study that attempts to make sense of people’s behavior around spending. We don’t always make spending decisions in our best interest and often base purchasing decisions on our emotions. In fact, people usually connect and interact with brands the sa ..read more

In-person networking is still a big deal. After a brief Covid hiatus, trade shows, conferences, and workshops are back and bigger than ever. So, if you or your team plan on attending any of these events soon, it’s important to get up to date on the do’s and don’ts of networking at these events. Instead of being stuck with a stack of business cards and struggling to recall conversations with specific individuals from an event, seasoned keynote speaker Dave Delaney shares how to manage and nurture your client and prospect interactions effectively. Not sure how to strike up a conversation with a ..read more

After a tough sales year in 2023, many of you have been looking for the next thing to consistently fill your sales pipeline with new prospects. With sales cycles taking longer than before, it’s essential always to have warm prospects teed up and ready to go. But how?   The answer is in thought leadership combined with lead gen and lead magnets. Positioning yourself and your agency as an authority in your niche (and giving some of it away for free) generates trust in your agency’s expertise before they’ve officially met you. When done right, lead gen can be mostly automated. And having gre ..read more

We’ve all been here before — your agency grows, and your day-to-day is getting a little too chaotic for comfort. Each team member has their own way of doing things, and no one is on the same page about the best approach to doing recurring tasks. As the agency owner, you’re getting pulled into things that you shouldn’t, becoming the organization’s bottleneck.   If that’s you, it’s time to break that cycle with some project management software. With a million choices and a few that have become the industry standard, it’s difficult to pinpoint exactly which is right for your agency. Often, a ..read more

Humans are hardwired to belong, and the desire to be a part of something bigger than ourselves is in our blood. Whether we connect over shared values, a favorite sports team, a hobby, or even just from living near one another, we can find community and belonging all around us. These days, many of us are finding community online through social media and spreading our social nets wider than ever. This leaves a huge opportunity for agency leaders to build their own online communities to help others learn and share their experiences about business leadership, entrepreneurship, or any form of thoug ..read more

Sales cycles are elongated, but that doesn’t mean agencies can’t still win new clients. If we change how we think about and approach prospecting, we can up our client outreach game to really hone in on our right-fit clients without being too sales-y about it.   In this episode, I talk with Dan Englander about how to stand out against the competition in our prospecting and outreach efforts. He shares how personalized client outreach can cut through the noise and win us new business more often if we just take the time to commit and dial in our systems and processes. He also shares some tips ..read more

In a sharp contrast to the earlier pandemic years, many agency owners said that in 2023, they have the best teams they’ve ever had and want to find ways to keep them around. This is great news, and we want to help keep your agency dream team alive and thriving.   To help in that journey, HR expert Barbara Mason joins me to share what agency owners and leaders can do to help make their employees feel like valued team members while staying true to the agency’s mission and values. She is a fountain of knowledge — from interviewing best practices and why HR experts need to be a part of your b ..read more

Video budgets are up in 2024, which means the demand for video content from clients will be high this year. For agencies, it also indicates that we must start utilizing this incredible business development tool for ourselves to know what’s up when our clients ask about it. Not only that, but video content creation is an incredible medium for agencies in prospecting, connecting with current clients, and gaining valuable data and metrics on what content is engaging to your audience. Are prospects clicking off your video in the first 10 seconds? Are they even opening the email? Or are they going ..read more

What exactly makes an insight versus just an observation? What are the different types out there? How the heck do we uncover them? This week, we’re getting insightful about insights and laying out the key characteristics of strong agency insights — like inspiring action and reframing problems.   Chris Kocek will share his favorite techniques for generating insights during brainstorming sessions, like continually asking “why” like a toddler until you reach some real gold. With agencies feeling more and more pressure these days to stay competitive and continuously innovate, it’s important t ..read more