How a fast-growing agency can grow even faster 🚅

Alright, story time:

We recently became a minority partner in a rapidly-growing agency. 

This agency has added over $1M in annual recurring revenue within the first six months of the year. 

Rapid growth.

This is the founder’s second agency, but this is the first time he’s managed a business this large.

So understandably, as we started to get a lay of the land, we began noticing some common missteps.

I figured, what better way to give our newsletter readers a front row seat to our process than to walk you through exactly how we’re going to take this agency to the next level.

Identifying an ICP

For those not familiar, ICP stands for ideal customer profile. It’s the specific type of client you want to work with. 

Up until now, this agency has said yes to every type of client that will pay them.

While this has helped them grow very fast, it also leads to a ton of operational issues.

You see, if your team works with all different types of clients, all with their different set of needs and services, it is very difficult to get economies of scale.

• Each client has different issues and fires that needs to be addressed (especially when you’re newer) 

• Your team members need to learn how to handle each different client

• Your business requires trainings & SOPs on how to work with each ICP

With each variable that you add to the equation, it becomes that much more complex it becomes to run and operate your business. 

So, our first objective with this business is to identify 1-2 ICP’s we can narrow in on.

Anyone outside of that ICP? We refer them out.

It may sound counterintuitive, but, by doing this, we can actually grow even faster.

Weekly Business Reviews

When you’re growing fast, it’s difficult to be intentional about where to focus and improve.

You’re drinking through a firehose, and it may feel like you only have the mental space to knock out the tasks right in front of you.

There’s a big opportunity cost here:

All that effort is often spent on the wrong task/project.

This may not seem like a big deal, but I promise it is.

 When we actually work on the biggest needle movers, we reap disproportionate returns. 

So, to get our new partner on track, we’re implementing a weekly business review (WBR). 

During the WBR, we intentionally review the previous/upcoming weeks:

• Data/performance 📈

• Issues/bottlenecks ⛔

• Goals/items accomplished ✅

At the end of the meeting, everyone is on the same page about where we can improve and where we should be focusing for the week ahead.

Trust me on this one, I got this straight from Jeff Bezos and the processes he built at Amazon. 

Management & Reporting 

Another gap we noticed: talent development.

Up to this point, this founder has managed primarily based on his own intuition.

He has very cloudy visibility into how his team is performing, and, as a result, there’s very little accountability.

At scale, this simply does not work.

It leads to stress. It leads to missed targets. It leads to client churn.

So, this is our third priority - building better data management and reporting systems.

When we’re done, team members will have VERY clear goals & action items to accomplish weekly. 

We’re establishing:

• Weekly project management tasks per department, per client, and per team

• Reporting on capacity, client fulfillment, and client results

• And clear benchmarks & targets we either hit or miss

With these responsibilities defined, the team is left to simply report on their daily progress.

As a result, we now have accountability and a clear understanding of what is required from each team member.

All of that energy that previously went into correcting mistakes or checking in on individuals? It can now all go into thoughtful development and training for team members.

Forecasting (and Patience)

If you’re running an ecom business, you want to set a monthly sales target and aim to hit it without overshooting it. 

If you oversell, you go out of stock. That causes big issues.

In a rapidly growing agency, I recommend doing the same thing.

It is in your best interest to grow slower, uncovering the issues as they arise in a more manageable context, than to rapidly scale.

The only way you're going to hit 8 figures is by building an elite operation. 

If your growth is rapid but uncontrolled, you’re going to suffer tons of setbacks just from the additional time and effort it takes to put out fires and solve mistakes in real time.

And that’s exactly what we told our new partners:

Be patient. 

Define a modest monthly target for net-new clients, and build a wait list for any surplus opportunities.

Now, if you made it this far, I’d guess there’s a high chance that your agency is suffering from one or more of the above challenges.

Maybe you’re even aware of areas that you can improve, but haven’t had the time to build solutions.

The good news is that you’re not alone.

We’ve worked with partners that are doing $20m/year and still dealing with some of these issues!

At 8-Figure Agency, our process is to:

• Identify the factors that are holding your agency back

• Roll our sleeves up and actually implement the systems that will take you to the next level

• And act as your partner during every stage of scaling 

Want to learn more about where our team might be able to help YOUR agency?

👉 Schedule a strategy call with our team here 👈

We'll help identify your biggest constraints, and start mapping out a plan for explosive growth.