The agency model is built to sign you, not keep you.
Most people who call us are unhappy with their current agency. Usually they think it's bad luck, or a bad fit. It's neither. The model produces this outcome on purpose. Here's how it works, and how we built something different.
Seven things that are true at most agencies.
1. The sales team is the best team.
Agencies spend heavily on sales. The people who woo you, with the pitch deck and the case studies and the confident answers, are professionals at exactly that. Sometimes a real strategist joins the call to close it. That's usually the last time you'll talk to them.
2. The contract comes before the diagnosis.
Six months, often twelve, signed before anyone has looked seriously at your accounts. Once it's signed, the agency knows precisely how much revenue you represent. Everything after that is cost management.
3. The work goes to whoever's available.
A junior associate, often new, often carrying dozens of accounts, runs your campaigns day to day. The talented strategists exist, but they're assigned where the money is: the top 5% of clients by spend. If you're spending $5,000 a month, you are not in that 5%.
4. The account manager is the buffer.
Because the person doing the work can't be put in front of you, the agency adds a layer: someone personable whose job is to manage your expectations, relay questions, and keep you calm. You're paying for a translator between you and your own campaigns.
5. The fee grows with your spend.
Most agency contracts include a percentage of ad spend. That means the agency earns more when you spend more, regardless of whether the extra spend is profitable for you. It is very hard to give honest budget advice inside that structure, and most don't try.
6. “You need to spend more” is the diagnosis for everything.
When performance is poor, the explanation is that your budget is too small to see results. Sometimes that's true. Mostly it's the answer that costs the agency nothing and earns it something.
7. They do everything, so nothing especially well.
Web design, branding, social content, video, PR, ads, SEO. Full-service sounds convenient. In practice it means a generalist team and no deep expertise in the thing that actually drives your revenue.
None of this requires bad people. It's what the incentives produce. An agency structured this way doesn't need you to renew. It needs to spend less servicing you than it bills you, for the length of the contract, and then find the next client. That's the model.
Six decisions, made on day one, never changed.
- No account managers. There is no one between you and the work. The strategist running your campaigns is the person you email, the person on your monthly review, and the person who picks up when you call.
- Senior strategists only. Everyone here has years of agency or independent experience and has managed seven-figure budgets. There is no junior bench to hand smaller accounts to, so every client gets the senior person.
- Never a long-term contract. Month to month, since 2018. Clients stay because the numbers say so, not because a document does.
- Never a percentage of spend. A flat $95 an hour for every service. If trimming your budget improves your results, we trim it. We have no financial reason to do anything else.
- Your accounts, your data. We work inside ad accounts you own. Every campaign, audience, and report stays with you. You can leave any time and take everything. Clients rarely do.
- One thing, done well. Paid media and search. No websites, no logos, no social content calendars. We turned down that revenue so we could be excellent at the thing that drives yours.
Every client gets the strategist most agencies reserve for their top 5%.
Not because we're generous. Because we didn't hire anyone else.
What this costs you.
Being honest about the trade-offs is part of the model, so: we're seven people, and we say no to work that would stretch us thin. We don't build websites or do brand design; we'll happily point you to people who do. And if what you want is a dedicated account manager to take you to lunch, we are the wrong agency. You'll get a strategist who'd rather show you the numbers.
How we take over an account without a gap.
Most of our clients came from another agency. The move is less painful than people expect, if a few things happen in the right order.
- Confirm you own the accounts. Before you give notice, check that the Google Ads, Meta, and analytics accounts are under your business, not the agency's. If they aren't, we'll help you get them moved or rebuilt first.
- Get read-only access to us early. We review what's running while the old agency is still in place. No changes, just understanding.
- Overlap for a week. We build the new structure alongside the old one, then switch. No dark period, no lost history.
- Keep everything. Conversion data, audiences, creative, search-term history. It all stays. That's what owning your accounts is for.
If you're in the middle of a contract, we'll tell you honestly whether it's worth waiting it out or paying to leave. Sometimes it's the former.
Thirty minutes with a strategist, not a salesperson.
We'll look at what you're running and tell you what we'd change, whether or not you hire us.
Tell us what you're working on.
We read every message the same day. If it looks like a fit, the next step is a 30-minute call, not a sales sequence.
