How can agency owners leverage financial forecasting and modelling to better inform strategic planning and drive growth? Lean in as we talk to an agency owner whose secret to scaling from seven to eight figures is mastering financial forecasting. You might be at the stage of business where you’re doing this with minimal support, or you might have a fractional or even full-time Chief Financial Officer. Either way, this episode will get your gears turning on how to improve decision-making and allo...
May 31, 2023•24 min•Season 1Ep. 65
Are you scaling chaos in your service-based business? If you started your business as a marketer, consultant or creative and have grown from a solopreneur to having a team, you may have some solopreneur habits holding you back. And if you've been following my journey, you already know that structure, roles, and processes are the secret sauce for keeping chaos at bay. But here's the twist: that's just one side of the story. As you transition from solopreneur to CEO, you need a whol...
May 17, 2023•8 min•Season 1Ep. 64
What's the hidden cost of not building your team in your business? It's easy to fall into the trap of thinking that doing everything yourself is the best option, but the truth is, it can lead to burnout and regret down the line. As a coach and consultant, I've seen firsthand how entrepreneurs can take on a lot, but we all have a breaking point. So, what can you do to avoid falling into over-commitment and over the cliff of burnout? Invest in getting client delivery off your plate....
May 03, 2023•9 min•Season 1Ep. 63
Have you hit a wall in your business, struggling to grow from solopreneur to a lean team that can give you back more time? You’re not alone; it's a common struggle. Building a team for your service business goes beyond hiring people; it's about creating an effective organizational structure, developing processes, improving communication, and stepping into leadership. Today we’re exploring a challenge that shows up at many different stages of business growth. It's the challenge of ...
Apr 19, 2023•26 min•Season 1Ep. 62
Are you ready to take your business to the next level but feeling held back by fears and doubts? Join us for an inspiring episode where we explore the topic of cultivating courage as an entrepreneur. Hint: courage isn’t always about doing more; it can be about doing less. We discuss the not-so-obvious blocks that can hinder your growth and provide insights to overcome them. Discover the power of breaking free from generational conditioning and family expectations, evolving your identity, and rec...
Apr 05, 2023•27 min•Season 1Ep. 61
Attention all creatives, consultants, and marketers! Is the agency model the best path for scaling your service business? In this episode of the Small But Mighty Agency Podcast, I tackle this question and share my insights on the agency model drawing from nine years of hands-on experience building and coaching multiple six and seven-figure agency owners. I discuss the right time to consider the agency model, the difference between being self-employed and a business owner, and the self-employment...
Mar 22, 2023•14 min•Season 1Ep. 60
Do your clients see you as a partner or a vendor? What is the difference, and why does it matter? My guests today reached their first annual $500K in revenue by prioritizing setting themselves up as a partner to their clients and establishing a strategic relationship that is long term. If you’re in a vendor relationship, it's transactional, and your clients contact you when a transaction is needed. In a partner relationship, you have a deeper connection, including insights into the organiza...
Mar 08, 2023•28 min•Season 1Ep. 59
How to double your revenue and increase client retention in your business? It takes more than just getting more clients. Consider how the business can be sustainable when you want to double your revenue. You need to build internal capacity in your business. Nobody wants a rollercoaster service business when the churn rate is high, one month, you’re feasting, and the following month you’re fasting. While marketing and sales are essential, sustainability and scalability require strategic considera...
Feb 22, 2023•27 min•Season 1Ep. 58
Is now the right time to change, pivot or develop a new offer in your business? As business owners, we can’t be tone death to what's happening in the market and the economy – both are different than just two years ago. What might have been working two years ago in your niche is rapidly changing, requiring you to make potentially big decisions. Today, we have a timely discussion from an entrepreneur of 18 years who has been named Best Female Marketing and PR CEO of the Year (USA) by Global 1...
Feb 08, 2023•28 min•Season 1Ep. 57
What’s one of the best ways to grow faster and avoid painful mistakes? That’s an easy one for me: getting a mentor. As a business owner, having mentors helped me gain experiences not shared in books found on bookshelves; I’ve benefited from a better understanding of their wins and mistakes. But mentorship isn’t just for a business owner; it's also for your team and helping them reach their highest potential. Today, we’re talking about diversity, equity and inclusion in marketing and marketi...
Jan 25, 2023•29 min•Season 1Ep. 56
Do you believe in planning for more happiness and joy in your business? If you’re like me, you got your planning done in December, or maybe, January is the month you start planning. I don’t know a business owner who isn’t doing some sort of planning right now. Whether you do it at the end of the year or the beginning of the year, there’s no wrong or right time. But there is one thing many small business owners don’t do when they make strategic plans: you don’t actively plan for more happiness. T...
Jan 11, 2023•23 min•Season 1Ep. 55
Here are the big four lessons I learned this year that helped me make money and grow my business by 30%. Each lesson is a way of thinking and being as we head into 2023, where the trend points towards buying decisions taking longer because people are more careful with spending. Hear why these lessons make me a better business owner with an even greater potential to accelerate growth in the new year: Welcome the fear of doing something new but keep it simple. Nurturing genuine relationships is ma...
Dec 28, 2022•9 min•Season 1Ep. 54
What is a significant advantage of a small agency? It’s the ability to stay in its lane and go deep into a niche. Today, we’re talking to an agency owner about her niche in cultural intelligence. Cultural intelligence is not just a hot topic but a much-needed one. Authentic representation matters because it empowers. I’m speaking from my own experience as an Asian-Canadian who grew up seeing very few, if, at all, Asians represented as business owners (except for the stereotypical laundry mat or ...
Dec 14, 2022•25 min•Season 1Ep. 53
Can I tell you about a scenario I’ve encountered many times? I speak to service-based business owners who get stuck spending 9-5 every day in client meetings, and there’s no space for other things that need to happen. On the one hand, there’s plenty to celebrate because they have a fully booked service business. On the other hand, they are at capacity and the bottleneck in their business. They have a good team, but the challenge is that the team who got them here isn’t going to get them to the n...
Nov 30, 2022•26 min•Season 1Ep. 52
A potential client comes to you with a project, and the scope (a.k.a objectives, requirements and outcomes) is unclear. It happens to all service providers, and it can drain time, money, and your team It can distract you from scaling what works well in your business. The challenge is that unclear scopes can come disguised as opportunities, especially if you’re unclear about your business vision and where you want to spend time and resources. Listen to this episode of the Small But Mighty Agency,...
Nov 16, 2022•10 min•Season 1Ep. 51
Let’s grow a complicated business that feels like a ball and chain. Said NOBODY. I’ve been there. I learned this lesson as the second in command of an agency. I could not turn off my brain and relax because I would worry about what was and wasn’t being done. It wasn’t until I looked at the business from a productized service perspective. It gave us more bandwidth to double the revenue and sell and exit the business. Since then, I’ve been behind the scenes of multiple six and seven-figure service...
Nov 02, 2022•14 min•Season 1Ep. 50
What makes a service business high ticket and sets you up to get paid like an expert? Here’s the thing to know, it’s not about doing more in your business; it's actually about doing less. Hear why productized services and the agency model support you to do less while providing exponential value to your clients and how it gets you out of being the bottleneck in your service business (hint: it has something to do with your intellectual property and how the agency model has changed.) -Episode ...
Oct 19, 2022•9 min•Season 1Ep. 49
Do you want more time to work on the business rather than in it? When Justin reached out to me for help, he was the bottleneck in his business. His service delivery processes lived in his head, so he spent his day-to-day implementing services, managing clients, and providing client strategy. He was doing it all with little time to focus on real business growth. It wasn’t sustainable, and he didn't have the time and freedom he craved. We made changes that supported him to streamline his busi...
Oct 05, 2022•32 min•Season 1Ep. 48
What is the greatest asset for a multiple seven-figure agency? After ten years as the CEO of her agency and another 12 years before that working as a creative director – thats’ 22 years - Jenny Smith knows her team is the greatest asset. In this episode, Jenny shares how transparency about her agency's profit and losses helped her team understand the financial basics and raise the level of trust, ultimately leading to committed and engaged team members. If you want to hear how transparency ...
Sep 21, 2022•26 min•Season 1Ep. 47
If you’re a consultant or marketer who hasn’t hit consistent $10K months yet, this episode demonstrates its possible by keeping it simple. It requires effort, of course, but you don’t need to make it complicated. It's all about being persistent. Why are we talking about consistent $10K months on the podcast today? It’s the launchpad to growing a service business with a team. $10K months unlock more cash flow to do things like getting more support in your business. It opens your mind to make...
Sep 07, 2022•21 min•Season 1Ep. 46
So what’s stopping you from getting more help? You might be thinking it seems like a risk to make another hire. What comes first? Is it getting the new hire or the new clients? It’s the age-old chicken or egg question. While every scenario has different considerations on who to hire and in what capacity, one thing holds, don’t wait till you’re overwhelmed to hire. If your business is not growing consistently, it might be that you’re still too much day-to-day, working in the business, rather than...
Aug 31, 2022•25 min•Season 1Ep. 45
You’ve reached capacity, now what? Building your business requires different priorities, decisions and leadership at different stages of growth. When you hit capacity, you need to put the brakes on and focus on building internal capacity. Internal capacity is processes and team members who can help you serve your clients and grow your business. Ignore internal capacity building for too long, and you can break your business. Hear how this agency owner focused on marketing and sales to get to $500...
Aug 17, 2022•24 min•Season 1Ep. 44
How can you inspire your team to greater heights? The short answer is to be a more effective leader who knows how to inspire the best in people. But what motivates one person doesn’t always inspire the next. That’s why personality assessments can help inform better leadership. We explore how personality assessments help you hire better, become a better leader and support you to reach your business goals faster. In this episode of the Small but Mighty Agency Podcast: When to use personality asses...
Aug 03, 2022•26 min•Season 1Ep. 43
Do you know an opportunity when you see one, and more importantly, are you willing to take that risk? Saying ‘yes’ led this service-based business owner from a 9 - 5 job to a seven-figure business. There’s a saying in entrepreneurship: “you’ve got to jump off the cliff and build your wings on the way down.” Today’s guest did precisely that – with no experience in marketing, he quit his job to launch a marketing agency. His journey to a seven-figure business isn’t an overnight success story; most...
Jul 21, 2022•33 min•Season 1Ep. 42
What inspires someone to buy an existing marketing business? Meet Diane. After selling her successful first business, she decided to return to work by purchasing a marketing agency. Diane shares her decision-making process and what she would do differently if she were to do it again. Plus, hear the strategies she uses to become the go-to agency in her county and the marketing activities to get more clients. Tune into this episode to explore: What motivated her to buy an established agency? How d...
Jul 07, 2022•24 min•Season 1Ep. 41
What pivots do you need to make in a business as it grows? All businesses will at some point make a pivot - it's a strategic move that you take to ensure that your business remains viable and profitable. In this episode of the Small But Mighty Agency podcast, meet Nanci, she is an entrepreneur of 25 years; she’s owned and operated an agency and has gone through multiple pivots, including her most recent one, where she pivoted her niche. Tune in to hear how she made the strategic decision to...
Jun 23, 2022•22 min•Season 1Ep. 40
When you think of a niche for your business, you might naturally consider a specific industry or market. But a niche isn’t always an industry; it can be a service you offer. Case in point, meet Allie LeFevere, the co-owner of Obedient Agency. Their niche is humor, and they help grow brands that make people laugh. In this episode, we explore the creative process to generate humour-driven marketing and how this agency owner protects the greatest asset of creativity while on the path to building a ...
Jun 09, 2022•27 min•Season 1Ep. 39
If there’s one constant in owning a business, it’s getting comfortable with change. As business owners, we need resilience in the face of change, whether changing business models, shifting marketing strategies, or building a team. Change isn’t just about us, “the business owner”; it affects the people in our business. Leaders effectively managing their teams in an ever-changing environment is vital to business success. Today on the podcast, we explore best practices for change management and cha...
May 26, 2022•20 min•Season 1Ep. 38
Is it easier to start an agency when you’ve worked for agencies most of your career? The answer isn’t a straightforward yes or no. Running an agency requires more than just doing the work of servicing clients; it requires building a profitable and sustainable business. Taralyn and her partner went from solopreneur to an agency owner in 10 months with 23 clients and quickly grew to a team of six people. In this episode, we explore the different thinking required to go from working in the business...
May 12, 2022•19 min•Season 1Ep. 37
What is the fastest way to $500K in a service-based business? Today’s guest shares how she and her business partner scaled to $500K in sales in their first year without using complicated marketing strategies or being on every platform to market their business. Growth for this agency owner has also meant steadily growing a team and leaning into processes that have helped them grow to multiple seven figures Join me to hear how this agency owner earned half a million in her first year and how she a...
Apr 27, 2022•37 min•Season 1Ep. 36
