TL;DR

• We launched a new Digital Agency Growth Guide​
• The widening gap between thriving and struggling digital agencies traces back to a misunderstanding of revenue generation.
• A large portion of the industry borrowed SaaS and product go-to-market tactics that don't fit how they win clients, and many misapplied generic best practices.
• ​There's no universal "best practice." Tactics succeed when they fit your agency's operating style and fail when they conflict with it.
• The 78-page Growth Guide is built as a single source of truth, focusing on the highest-leverage growth moves.
• We're weighing future deep dives into programmatic M&A, revgen tactic efficacy, and productizing services, and want your input on which to pursue. Simply reply and let us know what you'd like us to dive into next.
• We're here if you'd like help improving your agency's growth engine.

Our latest research

New Growth Guide We launched a new growth guide specifically for digital agency teams that explores how agencies can successfully build reliable growth engines. Get the Guide

Updated Model Framework A decision-fit framework for digital agencies that shows how strategic choices need to reinforce the agency’s operating style. Get the Framework

The widening divide

In my executive summary for the Growth Guide, I described a widening divide in the industry. This is a growing chasm between successful agencies and those that continue to struggle. The river that cut this chasm, and the one that’s widening it, flows from a lake of misunderstood revgen.

This industry has been built from a strange amalgamation of strategies and tactics, many of which were pulled from SaaS and product GtM motions, that simply aren’t applicable to how digital agencies gain and grow clients. Others are simply “best practices” that are inappropriately applied. We went into detail on how these decisions impact digital agency business models in our Factory-Consultancy Framework analysis.

The short version is that the question of “What’s the best practice for X?” rarely has a universal "correct" answer. They work when they fit the agency’s operating style. They fail when they conflict with it. This absolutely extends to an agency’s growth decisions, and it’s a core driver of the widening divide.

A source of truth

We wrote the growth guide to serve as a single source of truth for how digital agencies grow. Many of the concepts we explore in the guide were surfaced by others years ago, but they weren’t compiled in a way that made it easy for agency teams to use.

Hopefully, this guide improves that.

A focused guide

At 78 pages, it might not seem like we trimmed much, but we left out a sizable number of concepts and research to ensure that what we published would help agency teams understand and implement the major beats.

We focused on the longest levers first and made sure we explained each in detail.

This topic is incredibly broad, and some of the areas are also incredibly deep. People have built entire practices around singular points of agency growth. This is one of the main reasons why we brought in expert contributors. There’s so much more to some of these topics, but we wanted readers to leave with a clear path to a solution.

What’s next?

We’re evaluating several areas where we can dive deeper.

I’ve been interested in inorganic growth through programmatic M&A for a while now, but we’ll need some additional data first.

I’d love to do another deep dive into the efficacy of various revgen tactics.

Hell, even a look at productizing services would be interesting and, I’m sure, enlightening.

If one of those would be useful, or if there’s another aspect of agency growth you think we should explore, send it my way.

I sincerely hope the guide helps you build an agency that reflects your vision. At minimum, it should surface some deeper questions about the right building blocks for your shop. If you do find yourself in a spot where you could use some extra firepower, we’re here to help.

Until next time,

-Nick