245: How to Build a Successful Agency (Without Burning Yourself Out)

Every business has its unique set of growth challenges.

Zach Stuck spent several years working for a digital agency before deciding to go out and start an agency of his own, Homestead Studio.

Now he’s in the process of building his agency business. He’s on the front lines of trying to help clients grow their ecommerce brands.

Today we’re covering a range of topics with Zach. We dive into some specific paid social tactics and what’s working right now for Zach’s clients, and we talk about the onboarding process Zach uses for his clients to ensure both his clients, and his agency, can be successful.

Enjoy!

Episode Highlights

• 5:58 How Zach went from working at an agency to starting his own.
• 8:07 Changes in Zach’s role from agency employee to agency owner.
• 9:52 Resources Zach used to help a client grow from zero to a million in their first year.
• 11:26 Common paid social misconceptions Zach hears from his clients.
• 14:33 What’s working in paid social right now and how to successfully approach dynamic creative testing.
• 17:33 Value-based lookalike audiences and how to easily start using them.
• 19:07 The state of social proof in 2020 - does it really matter?
• 23:37 If you don’t have a large customer audience to run social proofing to, what can you do?
• 24:31 A little known fact about 1% lookalike audiences.
• 27:07 Crucial steps for successfully onboarding new clients and building a strong ongoing relationship.
• 32:00 What’s keeping Zach up at night.
• 34:20 You can’t outsource your growth.
• 37:16 The challenges with growing an agency and how finding clients who are the right fit is key to success.
• 43:20 How Zach’s avoiding the churn and burn that happens so often to agencies.
• 44:57 What Zach’s eating, is he working out, and what his daily life looks like.

Links And Resources

• Homestead Studio.co
  
• @ZachMStuck on Twitter
  
• Book: Essentialism
  
• Book: Deep Work
  
• Episode 240: Launch To Traction: The Scaling Series, Part 2
• Klaviyo
• Coalition
• Profit Summit Intensive
• @a_brawn on Twitter
• @andrewfoxwell on Twitter
• Brand Growth Experts
• Foxwell Digital
• Review or subscribe on iTunes