3 Things I Learned in My First 6 Months of Running a New Agency
It’s all about your network, the numbers, and not getting stuck with people who are all talk and no action
Six months ago, I started an advertising agency called Agency SOS. (These were the five reasons why.)
To say “I’ve learned a lot these past few months” is a major understatement. It’s been terrifying and thrilling, exhausting and rewarding.
Talented people joined the team, we’ve been blessed with great clients, and we’re off to a good start.
In our first half year, we handled 17 different projects for 11 clients. The work is good, our clients are happy, and the company is profitable.
I’ve been posting regular video updates (see below), sharing behind-the-scenes stories as we worked to find our footing and make a go of it.
For our Month Six Wrap Report, I’m sharing the “3 Big Lessons” that I’ve learned so far.
To be fair, none of these are all that ground-breaking. But for those of you who are starting your own business, maybe they’ll be a source of insight and inspiration.
Watch it here (the lessons start at 2:20) or you can read below.
Lesson #1: Your network is EVERYTHING
We live in an era where 13-year-old Instagrammers are millionaire business moguls, so “experience” may not feel like a real benefit these days.
But, bottom line: there’s no way I would have been able to get Agency SOS off the ground if it wasn’t for the professional network that I’ve built over the past 30 years.
ALL of our clients came through that network—many of them people that I’ve worked with before. The others came to us because of a strong referral from somebody that vouched for us.
Same with the talented people who joined the SOS team to actually DO the work. Some were former colleagues. Others were folks who got on our radar because somebody in our network said, “You HAVE to meet so-and-so, she’s great and you’d love working with her.” (P.S. She was right.)
So, yes, I know that there a lot of young entrepreneurs out there who have never had a full-time job and grow their empire from their dorm room. But I’m grateful for three decades of connections and experience—they saved my bacon many, many times this year.
Lesson #2: You MUST have a firm handle on the money and the numbers
I’m a creative director and I like to think of myself as a creative person.
But if you start an agency and think, “Oh, I’ll just find somebody to handle all the money and numbers stuff,” you’re in for a rude awakening.
Starting a business is ALL about money and numbers. (That’s what makes it a business and not a hobby.)
You have to have a grasp of cash flows and your P&L and your balance sheet. You have to understand contracts and SOWs. You have to dig in and understand the financial details if you’re going to build a successful business.
When I was a creative at big agencies, I always got annoyed at the condescending, “Don’t you worry your pretty little creative head about the money…just come up with ideas and the grown-ups will figure out the rest.”
The truth is, nothing we do in advertising is creativity for creativity’s sake. We are a service business and there are budget and time limitations. Understanding those realities helps us be MORE creative within those constraints. I think it makes us a better, more empathetic partner to our clients, as well.
Keen awareness of the numbers helps keep our services affordable for our clients, profitable for our contractors, and financially solid for our partners.
Lesson #3: There are talkers and there are doers
At most agencies, there are a lot of people whose main job seems to be, well, to talk…and a smaller group of people whose job it seems to be to DO.
Agency SOS was founded with the idea that we’d shift the balance and staff our assignments with small teams of do-ers.
It’s not that thinking and talking isn’t valuable; it’s an important part of our business.
But somebody has to “make the doughnuts.” Write the deck. Design the post. Retouch the image. Mix the sound. Finish the edit. Make the ad. Finding people that can DELIVER is critical when building your business.
We have been so lucky to find such great contributors in our first six months: writers, art directors, media planners, strategists, producers, filmmakers, re-touchers, mixers, editors, and more.
Have we gotten burned a few times? Absolutely. But we’ve had great success filling the SOS talent bench. We definitely have a bias toward working with (and rewarding) those people who can get shit done.
Want to REALLY do a deep dive and watch ALL the updates from our first six months? Knock yourself out!
First Month Reports
Month 2 Wrap Report
Month 3 Wrap Report
Month 4 Wrap Report
Month 5 Wrap Report
POSTSCRIPT: Since I originally published this piece, we hit two more milestones! Here are the recaps…
Month 9 Wrap Report
Year One Wrap Report
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
John Kovacevich is a creative director and the founder of Agency SOS. He writes a weekly email highlighting three bits of creative inspiration for modern marketers. You can subscribe, if you’d like.
