Episodes

We sat down with Dan Gent, who ran his product design agency, Lighthouse London, for 15 years before walking away in 2023 and now writes his own newsletter, Dear Agency Founder. Dan details how Lighthouse reached 20 people and roughly $2 million in revenue before market conditions forced a closure rather than a traditional exit. He explains the dangerous "dip" where profit margins drop as you hire non-billable managers and ops staff to scale. This conversation is a blunt look at the reality tha...

[Cold open [Jake’s $700 Caviar Mistake] ends at 13:45.] Technology is moving fast, but that doesn’t mean agency owners need to chase every new tool that shows up in their feed. In this episode, we talk about the pressure agencies feel to keep up with AI, automation, new ad platforms, and all the other tools everyone is suddenly yelling about. Some of it matters. A lot of it is just noise. The real question is not “what tool should we sell next?” It’s “what problem are we actually trying to so...

[Cold open [A listener feeds Cody’s Panda Express addiction] ends at 9:02.] Giving clients total transparency into their leads sounds like a good idea until they start seeing the garbage that comes with the gold. When you open the black box of lead generation, clients often fixate on the junk instead of the lower lead costs. Moving up the funnel with services like LSAs naturally increases the volume of "trash" leads your agency has to manage. If a client isn't prepared for that reality, they w...

Cesar is back on the podcast this week to break down the unsexy reality of acquiring clients for his agency through organic social media. His current lead flow relies heavily on TikTok and high-intent searches from ChatGPT. Building this pipeline wasn't a quick win, as he spent around three years posting content before landing his first real lead. Instead of overproducing videos, he notes daily agency observations in Asana and films his thoughts directly on his phone. We also talk about dealin...

[Cold open (People don't own fly swatters anymore) ends at 12:31.] This week, AJ Doppke joins us to talk about the unsexy reality of scaling an agency and why growing too fast can break your operations. AJ grew his gross profit by 70% in a single year. He openly admits it was a terrible experience. His operations struggled to keep pace with sales, forcing his small team to work uncomfortable overtime. Now, his agency focuses on forecasting revenue and building capacity before chasing new busi...

Josh Kimmes is back on the podcast to talk about the boring, unsexy work of getting inbound leads without relying on an exhausting outbound sales machine. We break down exactly how his agency gets a steady flow of qualified prospects through highly specific industry service pages. Josh also walks us through his automated referral engine that triggers physical gifts and account credits when clients sign on. It is not about magic tricks, but building out systems that actually reward your clients ...

[Cold open (Jake's wife was gifted an at-home lobotomy kit) ends at 03:43.] This week, we sat down with Sharon Toerek, a legal expert who actually understands the agency world because she's been in it for decades. Sharon broke down the "three legs of the stool" for agency protection: intellectual property, solid contracts, and regulatory compliance. We dug into the messy reality of AI risk management, specifically how your team's casual prompts could be breaching client confidentiality or crea...

[Cold open (Jake Puts the McDonald's CEO to Shame) ends at 08:17.] Starting a marketing agency seems to be the cool thing to do these days. Everyone is doing it, and there is so much noise. How do you cut through it and stand out? We've noticed a trend of people trying to flex an inauthentic, crass personality as their tactic, but cutting through that noise and standing out is much easier, and you don't have to be a clown while you do it. ----- RESOURCES: Want the tools and resources we re...

[Cold open (Jake spills coffee on his keyboard and debates the utility of tablets) ends at 07:49.] Most agency advice treats every client relationship the same, but the reality is that a family-owned local shop and a VC-backed firm require entirely different "languages" to survive. In this episode, we break down how to navigate the power struggles and decision-making hierarchies of different business models. We discuss why "authenticity" can sometimes be a trap, how to manage the friction of n...

[Cold open ends at 07:13.] There has been a lot of buzz lately with people mentioning and starting "AI Automation Agencies", yet they have no idea how to sell or position the service. They're all operating under some expectation that businesses just inherently need or want these services, which is absolutely not the case. But that doesn't mean you can't sell it and that there isn't value for it. It all comes down to positioning. ----- MENTIONS IN THE EPISODE: r/agencynewbies threads: [Is...

In our pursuit of having an episode for every niche out there, we ran across Dante Montovano, who owns Seven Circle Media, a restaurant marketing agency. We knew restaurant marketing was unique, but we didn't realize how much we didn't actually know about the industry and what actually makes fast food places, QSRs, and fast-casual restaurants the most amount of money. Dante broke down exactly what it takes to be successful in the restaurant industry as a marketing agency and how knowing the in...

[Cold open (Cody is back from Hawaii) ends at 05:37.] Most agencies you talk to, as well as the entire internet, will tell you that clients should own their own ad accounts, and you should work inside them. But what if we told you this is the wrong way to do it? What if we told you that you are opening yourself up to potentially huge insurance and legal issues doing it this way? Listen to this episode and find out the correct way to protect yourself and your relationships with your clients. ...

[Cold Open (Professional paintball & 2-star reviews) ends at 16:31] In this episode, we talk about scaling with simple services. We break down why the things that actually grow an agency are often the least exciting to sell, how chasing trendy or “innovative” offers can create complexity instead of leverage, and what has actually worked for us as we’ve grown. We also discuss AI automation, local service ads, retention, and why repeatability matters more than sophistication. This episode is ab...

[Cold Open (Jake's Migraine) ends at 6:07] What if the best PR strategy for your agency has nothing to do with your own website? This week, we talk about how to build massive authority and get clients by leveraging established platforms that already have your target audience. We explain why building an audience from scratch is the slow way around. We share our lessons on using niche publications to build instant credibility and why we often prioritize these external sites over our own blog. W...

[Cold open (Cody's in Hawaii and why he's there ) ends at 14:28.] For the 4th year in a row, it's that time of year when we cover our annual finances for our agency. Where we grew, what we're spending more money on, and what challenges we're starting to see at our new stages of growth. ----- RESOURCES: Want the tools and resources we recommend for agencies? Check them out here: https://www.agencygrowthpod.com/tools ----- NEWSLETTER Want the show in your inbox? Sign up for the newsletter!...

[Cold open (Busy Days, Zapier Debates, and Community Growing Pains) ends at 17:15.] In this episode, we talk through our goals for 2026. We break down what we want to focus on with the agency and the podcast, what’s changed in how we think about growth, and why being selective matters more now than ever. We also touch on audience expectations, visibility, and the trade-offs that come with putting opinions out publicly. This episode is about being intentional. What we are committing to, what w...

[Cold open [Jakes barber shop is obsessed with Peaky Blinders] ends at 08:16.] The Agency Growth Podcast officially has a new website! And it's built on Wix Studio. We kept our promise after our initial conversation with Kobi Gamliel, Head of Wix Studio, 2 years ago in episode 112. We dove in and put our first site on Wix Studio and so far, like it a lot. But... there are still some issues. There are some things that are no-brainers for agencies to want to use Wix Studio, but there are also...

[Cold open [Best gift cards // Is ad blocker piracy?] ends at 12:52.] Cesar is back by popular demand for the 3rd time because we need updates! Last we spoke, everything was on fire at his agency. He was stressed and dealing with over 100 clients with a small team. Employees weren't working out, clients were churning, and to make matters more complicated, he had a baby on the way. Something had to change. On this episode, Cesar gives us an update on how the agency is doing and what direction...

We are big fans of the productized service model and equate our rate to a set hourly limitation and internal billable rate. This isn't a secret. We've had multiple episodes on why knowing your internal hourly rate is crucial. Then we received an email from Jonathan Stark's team wanting to tell us why hourly billing and fixation on hourly tracking is "nuts". For an hour and a half, Jonathan steps into the ring with us to challenge the idea of hourly billing and time tracking with his value-base...

Every big agency has a CFO but what does a CFO really do? When do you need one? We sit down with Jody Grunden, a virtual CFO for creative and marketing agencies to explain in detail. Jody has been a fractional CFO for business and agencies for over 20 years. We sit down and talk to him to learn why an agency might want a CFO and the difference between a fractional one versus an internal one. Jody talks about the "messy" range between $1.5m and $5m where operations and finances start breaking ...

Jason has the story almost every agency owner is after. He grew his first agency to $5m and sold it. Then started a second one and within 5 years, he was at $5m in revenue again. After another 5 years, his agency was at $20m. Jason sold his $20m law firm agency to a private equity firm and took a seat on the board yet still continues to lead his own agency. Some crazy facts about the legal space: law firms are spending $100k per month in SEO retainers. These same law firms are spending $2m pe...

If you're in the SEO industry, you know Darren Shaw and his company, Whitespark. If you're not... well you're still in for a good episode as we barely even talk about SEO! We go deep into how Darren is able to run a 7-figure agency and equally sized SaaS that is well recognized in the SEO industry. On top of that, we talk about he's still able to find the time to remain a subject matter expert in the SEO field, make all these YouTube videos, build winning teams, vibe code new SaaS products, an...

**Cold Open (Cloudflare Down Again and AI Stuff)** **Skip the Cold Open at 8:45** 6 Months ago we decided to dive into the world of email marketing. The problem was that we couldn't find a Email Service Provider (ESP) that catered to agencies. We needed subaccounts and a pricing structure that didn't absolutely drain our bank accounts. That's where we met Gyula from BlueFox. Gyula has designed an email platform specifically for agencies and it's unlike anything we've seen. It really is agen...

**Cold Open (Cody's Too Sexy for His Shirts)** **Skip the Cold Open at 6:41** As we've been diving into integrating AI into our agency, we've realized that everyone on the internet seems to be lying about how they're using AI. When we ask about specific operational applications outside of spamming prospects or scraping lists, we're met with a mix of content production applications and crickets. We don't think AI is nearly where people are pretending it is on LinkedIn but we do talk a bit abo...