Agency Health Podcast – Details, episodes & analysis

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Agency Health Podcast

Arlen Byrd

Business

Frequency: 1 episode/44d. Total Eps: 7

Welcome to the Agency Health Podcast, where we dig deeper into key topics for digital agencies – the what, why, and how – mining actionable insights to help build a better firm.

And what is a healthy agency? A healthy agency is a firm that creates great value for its clients, team, and owners in a sustainable way.

Hosted by Arlen Byrd, principal at Agency Partners.

Subscribe to our newsletter: https://agency.partners/newsletter

Follow Arlen on LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/arlenbyrd

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🇨🇦 Canada - management
17/09/2025
#76
🇨🇦 Canada - management
05/01/2025
#77

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https://lancehrobbins.com
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https://www.comptondurham.com
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https://www.barrel-holdings.com/
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Score global : 62%

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How being exit ready helps your agency thrive now

Season 1 · Episode 2

Wednesday, January 1, 2025 • Duration 36:32

This is episode 1/4 in a mini-series on beginning with the end in mind. As we’ll find, building for your exit from the start helps create a thriving agency that delivers great value for you, your team, and your clients.

In this episode I’m talking to Jonathan Baker of Punctuation about exit preparedness. Only a small percentage of firms are successfully sold. But you can better the odds, as Jonathan will share.

His journey includes business school, marketing strategy for Fortune 500 CPGs, and co-founding and growing a craft brewery into one of the nation’s largest. Now, Jonathan leads the M&A practice at Punctuation, bringing his experience from dozens of deals inside and outside the industry.

Key Insights:

Building a buyer-friendly firm builds a thriving firm for you too (2:10)
Focus on fundamentals long before an intended exit: profitability, healthy client concentration, using accrual accounting, etc … addressing fundamentals can’t be done overnight when you want to exit (3:27)
The best habit to be well-prepared for an exit is a monthly review of your financials, not as primarily a CFO presentation, but with your leaders coming prepared to raise and discuss any issues, present solutions, and then take action (8:40).
Many of our preconceived ideas about selling an agency can be wrong: how much effort and time it takes, how hard it is to find a buyer, the size we have to be to sell, what we need to do to be ready. It’s worth talking to an expert and getting ahead of something so important (12:22).
If your fundamentals are strong, expect the selling process to take 3-4 years to produce the best outcomes for you: a year to sell and 2-3 years continuing to work with the new owners to maximize your earnout (12:45).
Some of the most important factors to work on to minimize difficulty selling and maximize valuation:
- Profit (EBITA)
- Client concentration
- Recurring revenue (good, but not essential)
- Tight positioning (vertical or horizontal can work)
- A repeatable business development process, not too owner reliant
- A strong leadership team

Episode Resources:

Book: Selling Your Professional Service Firm (By David C. Baker), also available on Amazon and Audible
Passive Sellers List by Punctuation
Valuation Service by Punctuation

Coming up in this series on beginning with the end in mind are:

An agency founder 25 years in
An agency coach and founder with 2 successful exits
A co-founder of multiple agencies and an agency holding company

If you have questions or comments about this episode, a topic you’d like covered, or an agency owner or relevant expert we should invite as a guest, we’d like to hear from you! Email podcast@agency.partners

Subscribe to our newsletter to stay in touch or follow Arlen on LinkedIn.

Thank you for listening!

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The Agency Health Podcast: Origin Story

Season 1 · Episode 1

Tuesday, December 17, 2024 • Duration 30:10

On this pilot episode, Arlen is joined by Lance Robbins, an HR leader and advisor, remote work expert, keynote speaker and podcast host.

We share the backstory for Agency Partners and the Agency Health Podcast:

How Arlen got into the agency world
The experience and values that led to Agency Partners
What is a healthy agency?
The complexities of assessing and improving agency health
The approach we take to growing agency health
What to expect from the podcast going forward and who it's for
The vision Arlen has for agencies in the future

Up next is a 4-episode mini-series on exit strategy: how to begin with the end in mind. Guests include:

An agency M&A expert
A cofounder of an agency holding company
An agency coach and founder with 2 exits
A career agency founder 25 years in

To stay in touch, subscribe to our newsletter or follow Arlen on LinkedIn.

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Why New Business – Mastering New Business Series ep1

Season 1 · Episode 7

Wednesday, September 10, 2025 • Duration 27:34

Welcome to the Agency Health Podcast, where we dig deeper into key agency topics – the what, why, and how – mining actionable insights to help build a better firm.

And what is a healthy agency? A healthy agency is one that creates great value for its clients, people, and owners in a sustainable way.

In this episode Arlen and Piotr kick off a new series on agency new business and talk about why it’s hard, what success actually looks like, and how to replace heroics with a system you can operate consistently.

Key Insights:

Nailing new business is a core part of agency health. It drives better client fit, pricing power, delivery quality, and more.
Know your destination. A systematic, sustainable, approach to creating new client relationships. Not too dependent on any one person. Not too dependent on a single tactic or channel.
Intermittent focus creates feast-or-famine. Even short pauses in new business efforts can create pipeline gaps later.
Reduce key-person risk. Move from hero-dependent marketing and selling to a system that is easier for anyone to run.
Pattern-match to improve outcomes. Better new business → increased repetition of work → better strategy, planning, margins, and value per hour.
Diversify intelligently. Don’t rely on one person or one channel; do a few things exceptionally well.
Improve your inputs. Appropriate focus, quality, consistency, and quantity of effort are all critical to building a strong new business muscle.
The market’s shifting fast (global + AI). It’s a challenging time, but it’s also an opportunity for focused, specialized agencies to thrive.

Coming up in this series Arlen will be talking to agency marketing leaders on the front lines, seasoned new business advisors, and growth marketing experts to surface valuable perspective and actionable insight on new business.

Are you facing a challenge with new business in your agency or would you like a sounding board for an aspect of your new business strategy? with me to talk about it. I’d be happy to be a thinking partner.

Inside Scoop: meet cofounder Piotr Delawski

Season 1 · Episode 6

Thursday, February 27, 2025 • Duration 36:58

Welcome to the Agency Health Podcast, where we dig deeper into key agency topics – the what, why, and how – mining actionable insights to help build a better firm.

And what is a healthy agency? A healthy agency is one that creates great value for its clients, people, and owners in a sustainable way.

On this episode, I’m delighted to be joined by Piotr Delawski, my cofounder at Agency Partners. Piotr has been building for the web for 2 decades and has spent much of that time in the agency world. He hails from Poland.

In our conversation, we talk about:

How we met and our time at global agency XWP
What brought Piotr to Agency Partners and what motivates him
The problem space we're focused on
Our vision for the future and what we're working on now

Now and then we'll have additional Inside Scoop episodes giving you a look behind the scenes at the work we're doing on Agency Insight and what we're learning in our collaboration with clients.

Coming up next is a new mini-series on agency marketing, after a break.

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Optionality: maximizing long-term value

Season 1 · Episode 5

Wednesday, February 12, 2025 • Duration 42:48

Welcome to the Agency Health Podcast, where we dig deeper into key agency topics – the what, why, and how – mining actionable insights to help build a better firm.

This episode is part of a mini-series on beginning with the end in mind. As we’ll find, building for your exit from the start helps create a thriving agency that delivers great value for you, your team, and your clients.

On this episode, I’m talking to Peter Kang of Barrel Holdings about optionality and the lessons from his experience building multiple agencies and now a holding company.

The agency he and his co-founder started in 2006 has grown into a holding company actively incubating, acquiring, and growing agencies. Peter has written extensively about his agency journey for years, sharing a wealth of in-the-trenches insight and perspective.

Key Insights:

Starting an agency holding company gives you a chance to put your agency experience to work, developing other leaders, with more skin in the game than consulting or coaching (4:00)
Independent agencies (vs. divisions) can help leaders move faster and adapt decisions and priorities more fully to the unique needs of that group and its strategy (9:00)
Select leaders for proactivity, speed, and ability to organize, then empower and trust them (9:55)
Align your leaders’ compensation directly with the mid-term goals for the agency. (15:17)
Not all companies can achieve a life changing exit; you may still be able to make a healthy amount and reinvest your earnings in other places while continuing to run your firm (16:00)
A holding company enables you to help others reach their full potential and pursue their goals, co-creating the future with your agency leaders. (20:50)
Make space to invest in your leaders; set a deliberate example, make space for weekly coaching, quarterly time with all your leaders to share challenges and knowledge, and facilitate helpful connections for them (22:10).
Horizontal positioning may sometimes be an easier place to begin, adding a vertical position as your portfolio develops and you see opportunities emerge (27:15)

Exit paths: considering your options and life post-exit

Season 1 · Episode 4

Wednesday, January 29, 2025 • Duration 34:09

Welcome to the Agency Health Podcast, where we dig deeper into key agency topics – the what, why, and how – mining actionable insights to help build a better firm.

This episode is part of a mini-series on beginning with the end in mind. As we’ll find, building for your exit from the start helps create a thriving agency that delivers great value for you, your team, and your clients.

On this episode, I’m talking to Sarah Durham of Compton Durham, comparing her experiences successfully selling two agencies.

Sarah started Big Duck early in her career, leading it for over 27 years. She purchased Advomatic 2 years before selling both firms, one via a merger and another via a worker-owned co-op. Now, as an advisor and ICF-credentialed coach, Sarah supports directors and owners at the apex of their leadership journey.

Key Insights:

Running your agency so you can sell it is just running your firm well; it doesn’t commit you to selling it (2:38).
Ask yourself: what would you want to do after selling your firm? Who are you if not an agency owner? Let reflection on these questions help guide how you think about and approach the idea of exciting your firm (6:17).
To transition ownership to a worker-owned co-op, you need workers who (1) want that (2) are prepared to buy in (3) have the experience and capabilities to take on more responsibility. Building a strong, empowered leadership team is a good first step, something every agency needs anyway.
Co-op vs. ESOP … for firms under $10 million, an ESOP may not be viable, but worker-owned co-ops can work for small firms and offer a lot of flexibility in how they are structured (22:00).
Good coaching is about holding space for what’s really important, not letting that be crowded out by what is noisy or feels urgent (30:52).
There are many ways to exit your agency well and it probably isn’t as complicated or challenging as you imagine; explore the options; it might be good (32:49).

References:

ICA Group, a non profit Sarah recommends and worked with to develop Big Duck’s worker-owned cooperative

Ways to win: building a firm for healthy sustainability

Season 1 · Episode 3

Wednesday, January 15, 2025 • Duration 42:00

Welcome to the Agency Health Podcast, where we dig deeper into key agency topics – the what, why, and how – mining actionable insights to help build a better firm.

This episode is part of a mini-series on beginning with the end in mind. As we’ll find, building for your exit from the start helps create a thriving agency that delivers great value for you, your team, and your clients.

In this episode, I’m talking to Shaun Tyndall of Inclind about how to play the long game well. Very few agencies pass the 25-year milestone, but Shaun and his team have developed a few ways to keep a good thing going.

Shaun started Inclind right out of college, and the agency has reinvented itself multiple times since. Shaun has valuable insights to share about beginning with the end in mind, exit options and legacy, and what keeps his enthusiasm strong.

Key Insights:

If you’re running a healthy agency doing meaningful work with people (clients and team) you enjoy, there’s no pressure to chase a short-term exit.
A focus on solving complex problems for larger and more complex organizations makes your expertise harder to replace by another agency or by clients’ in-house teams. It also keeps things interesting and rewarding!
Build long-term client relationships by helping them advance their most important business goals and metrics. This approach aligns you with long-term value creation (increasing LTV and retainer revenue) and builds mutual success and sustainability.
It’s much easier to keep a great client than to make a new one. Invest in these relationships, look out for their best interest, and continue to evolve your capabilities to serve the needs of your best clients as they change.
Stop and think: how would you approach your firm differently if you wanted to be leading it happily still in 25 years? A long-term, even multi-generational perspective on building a firm and creating wealth can be an inspiring contrast to the pressure to grow fast and sell.

References:

Learn more about Inclind

Coming up in this series on beginning with the end in mind are:

Agency Health Podcast – Details, episodes & analysis

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Agency Health Podcast – Details, episodes & analysis

Podcast details

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