Nine habits for building an agency that lasts

Nine habits to practice consistently

Building an agency that lasts is simple but not easy:

1. Know your gross margins. My rule is to be religious about never dipping below 60%.
2. Fire clients that cost more to serve than they're worth.
3. Build a growth system that doesn't depend on you personally knowing someone.
4. Find a niche that's narrow enough to dominate, but wide enough to warrant outside expertise.
5. Respond to inbound leads the same day.
6. Operationalize delivery before the founder becomes the QA layer.
7. Track churn monthly and know why clients are leaving.
8. Make sure your entire team is obsessed with client service.
9. Invest in your people. As Richard Branson puts it, "train people well enough so they can leave, treat them well enough so they don't want to."

The hard part is consistency

None of this is complicated.

The hard part is doing all of it consistently, especially once the agency gets busy and there are a hundred more interesting things competing for your attention.