Article - Working hard but not getting the results you deserve

READ: 1 min

AUTHOR: Robert Craven

Despite our best intentions we spend too much time in the detail of the agency and we lose the plot; suddenly everything seems a bit like hard work. We become addicted to this hard work and think that this is what running your own agency is all about. It is time to step back and set about making some changes.

The best-kept secret

The best-kept secret of successfully growing an agency is simple – take massive action. Don’t take half-measures. Action and speed are everything. Without action nothing happens. 

What have you been meaning to do but avoided doing?

Be proud

I despair of standing in front of young agency founders who seem to apologise for their very existence. Painfully shy and embarrassed about their business aspirations, it seems like they’ve already decided that the business will fail.

Get rid of those voices inside your head

Most entrepreneurs have a voice in their head which keeps telling them things like “You’ll never make it”, “You charge too much” or “You are an impostor and don’t deserve success”. Eliminate all this negative thinking, as it is singularly unhelpful.

Sort your pricing

Charge what your products and services are worth – don’t be shy. Demonstrate their value; show customers how you can help them. Stop selling yourself short. “Because you’re worth it!”.

Ask for the business

If you don’t ask for the business then your competitors will. You have a great product, and you know that your customers will love it, so ask for the business. Now! And always ask for referrals.

Sort your marketing

In a survey of 15,000 business owners we carried out back in 2014, most scored themselves as ‘high’ for their operations performance but ‘low’ for their marketing performance. I doubt much has changed. To improve your financial performance, sort your marketing: get more, better customers – they are more profitable and more pleasurable to work with.

Fix the under-performers – sack the scum!

You have seriously under-performing staff, suppliers and customers. You spend a disproportionate amount of time trying to sort them out. Just let them go and find some better ones. Suddenly you can concentrate your energy on constructive things rather than dealing with these energy drainers.

You might have sown the seeds of your own destruction

We go into business to do our own thing – put two fingers up at systems, processes and controls. My first and toughest lesson in growing up was that the one thing that a business needs to grow is systems, processes and controls.

You are the bottleneck – sack yourself (as best as you can!)

There is a tendency to grow your agency around yourself as the owner. You become addicted to being the centre of attention. But it is you that is holding your business back. You are the bottleneck. You are the problem.

Take evasive, decisive action now. It is your business. It is up to you. Some tough decisions ahead?

You don’t have to make them alone.