Scaling, Selling, and Mastering Agencies with Jason Swenk

Justin Levinson (00:00)‍

Hey everybody. Welcome to the Agency Side podcast. I'm your host Justin Levinson, and I'm joined here today with Jason Swank, a former agency owner who scaled and sold his multi-million dollar shop and has now helped over 10,000 agencies in 23 countries grow faster and reduce stress through his Agency Mastery 360 framework. He's also the host of the Smart Agency Master Class podcast for more than 11 years. He's interviewed top digital agency owners about starting, scaling and selling. Jason, welcome to the show today.

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Jason Swenk (00:29)‍

Hey, thanks for having me on Justin.

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Justin Levinson (00:31)‍

Yeah, man. Well, like I said before we were recording, I've been following your content and was really interested in having a conversation with you. Maybe for the folks who aren't familiar with you, you can give us some brief background on yourself and what you do.

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Jason Swenk (00:44)‍

Yeah. So well, thanks again for having me on the show. You know, I've been in the industry game for, I guess, since 1999, I was an accidental agency owner. Like a lot of people probably listening in, I designed a website making fun of in sync. cause one of my friends looked like Justin Timberlake called in shit and it got popular. And so people started asking me to design websites. And so I started.

by accident because I knew how to do something cool and someone offered me money. And so I was really kind of reacting to the market back then. And then, you know, got to a certain point where we were, you know, successful in most people's eyes and we were able to sell that agency when we had a little over a hundred people. And then retired for a little while and got bored and then started the podcast where, you know, I interview, you know,

really cool agency leaders and owners all over the world.

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Justin Levinson (01:40)‍

Yeah. Well, I'd be very interested in hearing about that story and how you initially scaled and what you guys are doing and how, how you sort of built that initial company. How did that kind of look like scaling up to a hundred bodies? Well, maybe what was like the initial hires kind of like, what was that story?

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Jason Swenk (01:56)‍

The first hire was a creative designer. and he was great. know, Timmy was great, but I didn't really need a designer. I needed more of a project manager because like most owners, you know, I didn't need to be talking and managing that client work. I needed to be out selling. I needed to be out networking and really building those key relationships.

And for many years we struggled, right? So the first couple of hires were designers and developers, where my business partner and I would manage the projects. We would sell the projects. And, you know, we got to a point maybe.

Five years down the road, we were a couple million in revenue and I just wanted to Right. Like I was like, this is horrible. Like I've created this giant prison around the agency where, you know, the business was making more money, but I wasn't. And I was working harder and more and got to a point where, you know, I wanted to shut it down. I took a couple of interviews with some companies to go, right. Like I was like, this is horrible. And and one company asked me.

Two questions that were like, what do you love doing every day? What don't you ever want to do again? Couldn't answer it. And when I went home, you know, I was like, well, let's kind of, it's kind of thinkable about that. And when I started thinking about that, it started giving me some clarity and some vision of where we wanted to go, what I wanted to do, what I didn't want to do. And then I was able to hire the right people, put the right systems in place. And then from there, we never looked back and then just started scaling really quick.

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Justin Levinson (03:34)‍

Yeah, man, that's kind of interesting because I actually worked with lot of agency owners. I will get people that will come to me as a recruiter and say, I, they're looking for a new opportunity who have, who have scaled successful agencies. And they're like, I'm thinking about piecing out and trying something new. Do you think I'm employable? That's where I am right now. And that's, so that's fasting. So you were kind of at that place where you almost were like, going to throw in the towel. So you figured out how to systemize and sort of get yourself out of being the bottleneck.

What were some of the steps in doing that?

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Jason Swenk (04:06)‍

Well, I think, you know, one good exercise that I did was the one I just told you about, but I'll, I'll even break that down even further. So everyone listening can actually do it. So if you get a sheet of paper, right, like eight and a half by 11, put it on a desk, put your fist on that sheet of paper and draw a circle around it, and then spend about 45 minutes to an hour of writing down all the stuff you're doing now that you don't ever want to do again. Right. So it's kind of through a process of elimination. Then once you do that.

then spend about 10, 15 minutes on all the stuff that really gives you energy. Right. And write that inside the circle that will give you a good starting point. The other part you need to know is what, what is your North star? Right. Of what can give your team the ability and the power to make decisions without coming to you for everything. So for many years, I had my team constantly coming to me because I didn't tell them where the boat was going. Right. It's kind of like picture.

or on a boat from New York and, and I didn't tell the team where we're going. And so I drive the boat for 10 hours. And then finally I go team, I'm tired. I'm going to bed, wake me up if the boat changes course. Well, the boat's going to change course every second. Right. So I'm never still getting any sleep. But I've, just said, look, you know, steer the boat and you know, heading zero nine zero. And that's we're going to London. Now they can make that course correction. And so like I'll even kind of.

tell you a little story of that with this business. So when I started agency mastery 12 years ago or 11 years ago, I had a vision for creating a resource I wish I had when I was running the first agency. But I didn't tell my team that for a while, but then when I did, I remember they came to me, we're writing a blog post about the top 10 conferences for agency owners to go to. And two of them were.

companies I didn't like or events I didn't like. I'll tell you why I didn't like him in a second. I won't tell you the names of them. Um, but I, I told my team, said, take those two out and they go, why I got bad conferences. You know, are they bad conferences or you don't like them because they didn't ask you to speak. And I said, because they didn't ask me to speak. So put it back in.

Right. It's a good resource. like when you come up with that North star and you tell your team where to go, now they can make decisions without you. So they're making better decisions for the company rather than better decisions for themselves.

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Justin Levinson (06:36)‍

That's fascinating. How long was your agency together before you began? 12 years. And how did you, did you decide to, that, that you wanted to sell? What was sort of like, and how did that process go?

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Jason Swenk (06:50)‍

Yeah. You know, when I sold, I was just, I was only 35, so I still didn't know anything. Right. Like all the, all the stuff was accident accidental. You know, I had a 50 50 partner, which was a great person, but I felt like the agency outgrew him and. And I was just, I was biting my tongue for years and years, and I felt like that was the only way out. And plus we were really extremely profitable and we had some amazing offers.

So I was like, yeah, I made a decision based on money, which I'll never do again. I also made a decision so I didn't have to have those cart hard conversations with him. Right. We're looking back. should have, if I could do it over again, I probably would have bought him out over time. You know, that again, we were pretty big. So that would have been a pretty big buyout as well when I was doing a lot of the work. And so, you know, that was probably the two decisions, but at the end of the day where I'm at now and you know,

All the, all the lumps you take and all the beat downs and all the successes, you know, they just. Cumulate over a couple of years and I can get you to where you want.

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Justin Levinson (07:58)‍

Yeah. Curious just for some agency owners who are out there that might be listening that are interested in potentially selling, you know, in your case, and you don't have to get into the details if you don't want to, but was it sort of just like people reaching out to you directly with interest or were you sort of marketing? No, they were coming to us. They're coming organically. Yeah.

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Jason Swenk (08:19)‍

Yeah, when you get a certain size, right? And nowadays it's even worse, right? Like, because everyone's trying to do their bullshit roll up strategy where they don't even want to give you cash upfront. And, you know, you just start chatting with these people and they think if you... We've also bought agencies in the past, right? So, and a lot of times when I would buy, you know, before we'd buy an agency, my partners would get mad at me because I would actually talk them out of selling. Because agencies that we would buy were only over a million in EBITDA.

A million in net profit is an easy way to think about it. You don't know what EBITDA is, but, um, like people think 500,000 in EBITDA. And if I joined with another one, I'm over a million. I'm going to get a higher multiple. I'm like, well, you got to integrate. Like buying is easy. Integration is the hard part. And, and so there's all these people reaching out all the time and you should always have those conversations because that will let you know what they're looking for.

Because you should build the business that you can sell even if you don't want to sell, because I want you to have options. Because maybe one day health arises or you don't like it anymore, you know exactly what you want to do. You should have positioned it to sell it because, you know, it'd be more profitable for you.

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Justin Levinson (09:36)‍

Yeah, that's interesting. course, the recruiting agencies are, is what I have most experiences as I own one. Recruiting agencies are interesting because it's, I think there's something that less than 5 % sell in the end because the sort of the model is the rainmaker on top model. And once that rainmaker is not there, the rest of the agency is not capable of doing that skill.

It's a tricky one to, to work your way out of a job. I'm sure with a lot of agencies that you're supporting, do they come to you? I guess, are most of them coming to you trying to work their way out? Are they coming to you trying to sell? Are they coming to you just to systemize and automate and grow? What does that kind of look like when people are approaching your coaching services? Thanks for tuning in folks. This episode is brought to you by Coming Up Creative, a relationship first boutique.

Creative Recruitment Agency. We disrupt the creative ecosystem by running sophisticated multi-channel campaigns with custom video and voice outreach that actually gets responses. We actively market the agencies and brands we represent to help them stand out to today's industry's top talent, all backed by real human connection and AI-powered targeting. If you're ready for a modern recruitment approach, visit www.comingupllc.com and get started today.

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Jason Swenk (10:57)‍

Yeah. So, well, we don't do coaching anymore. Right. So we, we've built a community because what I've realized, it goes back to my North star, right? I wanted to create a resource. wish I had, because at the end of the day, you don't really need coaching. You need to be around other amazing people that are going through it or that have gone through it and can provide advice on a, you know, a very like not non-biased opinion, because I always felt like

When you work with a coach, they're going to give you a great advice, especially in the very beginning, but then they're going to start giving you the wrong advice just to keep you, which is unfortunate. Right. And then, and a lot of coaches haven't done it of what people want, which is, which is, something that irks me a little bit is I'm like, how can you teach something that you've never done?

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Justin Levinson (11:39)‍

Yeah.

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Jason Swenk (11:54)‍

So when people come to us, they're, they're kind of where I was. Wow. As I see this giant bear walking across my street.

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Justin Levinson (12:04)‍

Dude, I saw you in Durango, Colorado. And I was like, not to change the subject, but I will take a quick pivot. That is a very memorable place to me. And you are in Durango, correct? ⁓ Yeah. Because when my wife and I moved to the West coast, that was a place that we, one of the many places we wanted to visit on our trip West. Cause she had some great experiences with her family in Durango. And I, I mean, I grew up in Vermont. I mean, I grew up in, you know, in places that have mountains, but going to Durango, man, I was.

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Jason Swenk (12:14)‍

Yes, I am.

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Justin Levinson (12:34)‍

squeezing that steering wheel in my van.

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Jason Swenk (12:38)‍

Did you drive down the million dollar highway?

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Justin Levinson (12:40)‍

I have must have. Yeah. I mean, I was just going up a mountain on these like little time. I was like, yeah. And, and here's the thing that really I'll never forget is because I wasn't really, I would just said, plugged into GPS. I didn't really care where I was going. I just wanted to eventually get to the destination, but it was a very short, it was a short amount of miles, but the GPS was saying it was going to take me like an hour and a half to get this short amount of miles. I was like,

There's no way it's going to take me this long to drive this short of a distance, it was ended up being that mountain, you know, go going up, had to go like 10 miles an hour or something to get to the top. And I mean, even pulled over to just like catch my breath. And I was like, man, this is, I'm kind of afraid of heights. So was a bit of of a wuss about it.

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Jason Swenk (13:24)‍

Yeah. Yeah. No, it's a, it's the most beautiful place in the world for me. I'm always in the mountains exploring after this podcast. I'm jumping in the Bronco with my dog and we're going to go see what we can see and just drive up those mountains and, and just explore. But the funny thing is I go, I will drive to all these mountains and it's kind of funny. Like that's why I was like,

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Justin Levinson (13:40)‍

It's super pretty.

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Jason Swenk (13:49)‍

I'm I got distracted off the podcast because I look out and I see this great big cinnamon bearer just walking down the meadow. I'm like, wow, there it is.

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Justin Levinson (13:57)‍

That's so funny. Did you grow up in Colorado as well?

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Jason Swenk (14:01)‍

No, I, I, I originally was, I lived in New York half my life and then moved to Florida, like all New Yorkers. And then I grew my agency in Atlanta and then I moved out here maybe five years ago.

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Justin Levinson (14:14)‍

Nice. Was having an agency in Atlanta, was that great? It was awesome.

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Jason Swenk (14:19)‍

You're right.

Well, you know, we worked with all the biggest brands in the world. Not at first, we had to build up to that, but there were so many great brands in Atlanta from, you know, Aflac, know, Lotus cars, Home Depot, right? Like they were all there. And back then it, it meant it was easier to win business in your backyard than, you know, all over the country.

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Justin Levinson (14:44)‍

Yeah. How did you typically go about winning business in general? Did you have like sort of an approach?

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Jason Swenk (14:50)‍

yeah. So I looked at it in kind of like a, a stool with three pillars, right? Most people, and this is how we started, right? It was all on word of mouth and referrals, but that will only get you so far. Right. And that's just not scalable. So we started developing an outbound channel, an inbound channel and strategic partnership channel. So at any point, if one or two of them went down, we still could be building that pipeline.

Because I find a lot of times agencies struggle with, you know, their pipeline and, know, they can't hire the right amount of talent because they don't have a good pipeline. If they can't hire the right amount of people, they're working more and more, right? Like they're not charging enough. And so this cycle constantly just, you know, you know, rolls and you can't really ever stop it.

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Justin Levinson (15:44)‍

Yeah. you, are there any tools that you recommend for your clients to use that are sort of helping systemize, and scale? there any sort of secret sauce that you can share with anyone?

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Jason Swenk (15:55)‍

Look, man, the only silver bullet out there is the silver that you'll mine from all these little things. And what I've learned by, you know, running my agency and growing this business and putting everyone together in the mastermind is there's a thousand different ways to do it. And you have to make it work for yourself. But at the end of the day, there are like eight systems that you kind of need to like psychologically go through with your agency. And they're this.

The first one I've kind of explained, you got to get clarity. You got to know where you're going. The second one, you need to know how to position your agency so you don't look like a meet to agency and you look different. Right. Whether it be picking a niche, whether it be a vertical or horizontal and really drill down into it. So, you know, their biggest challenges, what they want, what do they aspire to? So you can actually chat in their own language. The next is around offering system three, right?

You have to figure out not just selling retainer right off the bat, but how do you make it an easy decision for someone to come in? What does my pricing need to be? What is my pricing structure? Do I need to be a retainer or performance or fixed or hourly or whatever it is? So you have to get these systems in order. And that's kind of, those three systems are really kind of the foundation. Then the fourth is around prospecting, right?

And going over those three channels I just talked about the next is sales and having a sales system where you can get out of sales as an owner. Because like you just said, most companies are the rainmaker or the owners of the rainmaker. Well, that's not a sellable asset a lot of times if you're doing all this. And the next is around delivery. Like how do I avoid scope creep? You know, how do I.

Get rid of the profit leaks. How do I increase my profit margins? How do I deliver an onboard where my clients stay with me and I grow those accounts? And then the last two is around operations where the owner's out of operations and you have systems for all these things. And then the last one is around leadership. And that's really kind of when an owner transforms from an owner to a CEO.

And there's really kind of four or five roles when you do this. One, set the vision, communicate it to the team often. Number two, be the face of the organization. Third, build the strategic relationships and the, you know, the, things that you're building and then understand the financials and then coach and mentor your leadership team. That's really it. Right? Like if you look at it, if you guys write all those down and then you just start taking little bits of little things from everyone, you'll be good.

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Justin Levinson (18:40)‍

Yeah. One thing that caught my interest in one of your posts was about attracting a level talent. and you had mentioned in that post that the clients that you were working with, had, maybe I'm not saying this right, but you encouraged them to really promote why it's great to work for them. and you had mentioned like in their, like in their website, that they just made it like really like, you know, it made them look like a great marketing, how great they were.

Yeah. And I found that great because that's actually a piece of advice that I have given to a lot of my clients. If they want to attract A players, they've got to be promoting like, you know, why, what makes us great? you know, are you, we an employee-owned agency? Do we do, you know, do we work, you know, fully remote? We've got this great culture or like, there's got to be something that is promotable that's going to separate them between their competitors.

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Jason Swenk (19:32)‍

Exactly. Well, yeah, it goes back to you have to define what are your values. Right. Like, once I started figuring that out of like, what, what do I believe in? I believe in being resourceful. I believe in having fun. believe in sharing, you know, failures and celebrating success. You know, I want to have fun. You know, I'm, I'm not corporate. Right.

I'm not going to dress in a suit. You'll never see me in a suit and tie. All right. And so I started there. Now the people I hire are not my twins. They actually compliment me, but they all have the same beliefs. It's kind of like, you know, when you marry your spouse, they're probably your complete opposite, but you have the same values that. know, right. That that's the only way to make it work because.

Over time I've been married for 20 years and you'll change over time. Right. But we still have the same values, even though I do really stupid stuff and right. Like, and she does it and she gets me back on earth and that kind of stuff. And it's the same thing with your team. When you can kind of communicate that. Then you can, you don't have to work as hard.

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Justin Levinson (20:43)‍

Yeah, yeah, it seems simple, but it's, you know, it's really true. Like you all have to be on the same page. Sorry, I cut you off.

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Jason Swenk (20:51)‍

No, I was, I was going to say everything people think in order to scale an agency, it's very hard. At the end of the day, when I look back, it wasn't because now I went through a lot of hard times, right? Times I wanted to quit times. I didn't know what I was going to do, but at the end of the day, it's kind of like the basics, right? Like I broke down those systems. It's where do I want to go? What do I want to do? Who do I not want to do it with? Who do I not want to work for?

And then just do the right thing and put the right people I want to hang out with on the same boat and give them the power to make decisions.

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Justin Levinson (21:30)‍

Yeah. Yeah, that's awesome. I'm curious to learn more about your events that you put on. Is that something you're, you're still been doing?

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Jason Swenk (21:39)‍

yeah. Yeah. I mean, when you can bring really cool people together in a singular spot and talk about things that are important to them and share what's work, what's not, it's pretty cool. Like I have one coming up where, we're renting out a huge ranch in Aspen, Colorado. And so everyone's flying in. We'll go, we'll mastermind in the morning and then we'll go fly fishing in the afternoon. And then the next day we'll ride, ride horses up mountains.

Right. And then campfire and everyone's together, you know, like when we do an event, it's, very different than like being in a boardroom all day and cooped up and just having speaker after speaker after speaker. that, that stuff drives me nuts.

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Justin Levinson (22:21)‍

Yeah. And if someone's interested in attending event, how do you, you know, how can they get into it?

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Jason Swenk (22:28)‍

go to agencymastery.io and there's a, in the navigation just says events and we'll list out the events that are coming up that they can go check out. We also have one in Phoenix in March after the one in the fall. So we always do two a year.

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Justin Levinson (22:42)‍

And are you seeing people that are outside of just digital marketing agencies? Are there other types of creative agencies or different spots?

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Jason Swenk (22:50)‍

Yeah. Digital agencies, creative agencies, development agencies, performance agencies. Yeah.

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Justin Levinson (22:56)‍

Very cool. And from all around the world, was noticing people are kind of... crazy.

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Jason Swenk (22:59)‍

Very easy, You know, we'll have members come in from, you know, Germany, Saudi Arabia, Dubai, Australia. Like it's, uh, it's pretty cool.

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Justin Levinson (23:12)‍

Yeah, that is fascinating. Yeah. It sounds like a really great event for people to, to learn more. And, yeah, that's, that's really cool. Maybe you can tell me a little bit about what you do outside of work too. Any, personal, hobbies besides fishing, I'm sure and being in nature.

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Jason Swenk (23:28)‍

Yeah. Um, I started flying a couple of years ago, so I'm a pilot and, uh, fly around the mountains and go to cool places. Hiking, mountain biking, snowboarding, know, rock crawling, you know, redneck style.

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Justin Levinson (23:46)‍

That's awesome. That's cool. Do you, do you attend any other events yourself outside of the ones that you put on? Do you like to get out and see other things as well?

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Jason Swenk (23:55)‍

Sometimes when I'm speaking at other events, I'll go. Really only if I'm speaking, honestly. You know, I don't like to leave Durango, honestly.

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Justin Levinson (24:05)‍

Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, I'm in Vermont right now. I got two little kids and yeah, I always have a list of things I'd like to go to, but it's quite the compromise to be able to just fly out and not be a parent for a week. Yeah.

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Jason Swenk (24:20)‍

Well, enjoy it. I'm taking my oldest to college Sunday. So it fast. enjoy it.

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Justin Levinson (24:27)‍

Yeah, what's cool? If you don't mind me asking. Cool. That's sweet. So not too, too far away, but maybe kind of far away enough.

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Jason Swenk (24:29)‍

University of Colorado.

I could fly a seaman in an hour. Yeah.

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Justin Levinson (24:39)‍

That's cool. Yeah, I have a three year old and a six and a half year old. So I'm a little bit away from that.

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Jason Swenk (24:47)‍

are perfect ages. They still like you.

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Justin Levinson (24:50)‍

Yeah, they still think I'm cool for the most part, even though my oldest has been calling me a nerd lately, which I'm like, excuse me. I mean, I know I'm not the coolest guys and I got the glasses and the nasal voice, but I'm cooler than a lot of dads that I see in the school. least I think I'm. Exactly right. Nerds. Yeah, I know. It's pretty crazy. How about, are there any books that you found that have been inspiring that sort of, you can see the wood burning a little bit?

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Jason Swenk (25:05)‍

Nerds the world.

of them that I think you'd like, and it relates to what you do is a Joey Coleman is a great author. He wrote two books, one how to never lose a client again, but how to never. And then the other one is how to never lose an employee again. And it's really good framework. would check out also too. I'd have to shamelessly plug the book that I wrote accelerating your agency. You can get it on Amazon, but,

How to say I don't read too many books. The other one too that I've listened to is a giftology.

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Justin Levinson (25:50)‍

Yeah, I haven't read that one, but I've heard good things about that. Yeah, so.

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Jason Swenk (25:53)‍

I would, I would check out those three books. Obviously mine is a shameless plug, but.

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Justin Levinson (25:58)‍

No, that's, that's pretty amazing. Maybe you can, what year did you write that book?

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Jason Swenk (26:02)‍

I think in 17 and it goes, it goes in depth into the eight systems that I just talked about.

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Justin Levinson (26:09)‍

Very cool. So viewers can go and purchase that on Amazon. Cool. Yeah, man, that's super cool. And I would love to attend an event sometime, potentially. That could be a fun thing.

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Jason Swenk (26:20)‍

Yes, definitely. You should check out the one in Phoenix.

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Justin Levinson (26:24)‍

And yeah, I prefer going to warmer events. So that sounds good. Yeah. So what's the date on that one again in Phoenix?

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Jason Swenk (26:28)‍

during this

if you go to elevate my agency.com it's the beginning of April, I think, I don't know. My team knows the dates. I should know the dates, but.

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Justin Levinson (26:45)‍

But recruiting creative recruiting agency owners are welcome. Awesome, man. Cool. Well, I'm so stoked that you hopped on and chatted with me today. I was kind of on a, on a whim. was following your content, fanning out a little bit and thought, man, maybe this guy would be interested in, in speaking with us.

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Jason Swenk (26:49)

‍Most definitely.

Glad you did. Sorry, distracted us with the bear that walked across. I was like, that's cool. I've been looking for you all week. I have, and now you have to do it when I'm on a podcast.

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Justin Levinson (27:08)‍

No, no, that's like a

It's all good, man. I appreciate all the value you've added and the conversation. I hope you have a wonderful rest of your week. All right, cheers.

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Jason Swenk (27:21)‍

You too, man. Thanks.