TL;DR Most firms don't have a business development problem. They have an activity problem wearing business development's clothes. Activity isn't the same as progress. And that's the problem. Hope is not an effective agency business development strategy. When you only chase leads because the pipeline got scary, urgency narrows your ...
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Business development is one of the most complex jobs in an agency. Period. It’s high-pressure, filled with rejection, and misunderstood by the very people who hire for it. How tough is it? The average tenure of an agency business development (BD) person is just under two years (RSW/US). Let that ...
In 100% of the agency business development engagements I work on, this is almost always one of the first statements I make. And you may think that’s a harsh thing to tell an agency, but according to this year’s 2026 Agency Core Report, the agency owner probably already knows it. ...
TL;DR If your messaging sounds like every other agency’s, the danger isn’t that you’re boring. It’s that you’ve made yourself impossible to choose on anything but price. “Full-service and results-driven” describes no one, because it describes everyone. Claims every competitor can also make do zero work for you. When wwebsites ...
TL;DR Running on referrals isn’t a flaw. It’s a sign your work is good. The problem is that it feels like a strategy when it’s actually a dependency. Referral dependence feels safe because it’s worked for a long time. That safety is an illusion, because you don’t control the one ...
TL;DR Losing a pitch you should have won usually isn’t a presentation failure. It’s a PREsentation one. “They went cheaper” is the explanation you tell yourself and usually the wrong one. Price becomes the deciding factor only when nothing else separates you. Research shows most buyers form a preference before ...
TL;DR Referrals rarely stop because your work got worse. They stop because the people who used to send them can no longer explain, in a sentence, what makes you different. Referral volume is the first thing to fade when your agency becomes interchangeable, because a referral depends on a referrer ...
TL;DR A positioning problem hides behind symptoms that look like other problems, from slow leads to relentless price pressure. The trick is reading the symptoms correctly. Slow pipelines get blamed on the economy or marketing far more often than they should. The cause is frequently distinction, not demand. There are ...
TL;DR "Should we niche or stay generalist?" is the wrong question. It frames the decision around what you offer instead of how clearly prospects can choose you. The better question is whether you're the obvious choice for anyone. You can be a generalist and distinct, or a niche player and ...
TL;DR Constant price pushback is rarely about your price. It's about a missing reason to pay it. A price objection is usually a distinction objection in disguise. When buyers can't see a difference, cost becomes the only thing left to negotiate. Pricing power doesn't come from your rate card. It ...
If I had a nickel for every conversation I've had with an agency owner in the last 90 days where they asked me, "Do you think AI will kill marketing agencies?" I could retire and open a taco truck that serves my world-famous TT's salsa, fish tacos, and margaritas. AI ...
TL;DR When new business slows, the instinct is to buy a fix, a new tool or a fresh campaign. Buying before diagnosing is how owners waste money. Agency new business breaks in one of three places: positioning, process, or propinquity. Each looks similar from the outside but each requires a ...