The #1 Problem Holding Inbound Agencies Back

You learn a lot of lessons when you’re building an inbound agency. As we worked to grow our agency, GuavaBox, we felt a major pain. When we started DoInbound, we found that we weren’t alone. Inbound agency owners around the world were feeling this pain, too.

The #1 problem holding inbound agencies from growth:

After a client signs a contract, there is no clear plan for moving forward.

Typically things go like this….

• Spend a lot of time marketing.
• Start talking to a lead.
• Conversation stretches out across a few calls.
• You’re trying to sell both the idea of inbound and your agency.
• They ask for a proposal, you send a contract.
• They say yes (cue the fireworks!)

This is the moment that most people slip. I know this all too well because this is where we slipped, too. Let me share how it all went down.

It was our first inbound retainer. 

Gray, Brandon, and I had been working for months learning the inbound methodology. We were shifting our agency from a project-based shop to a retainer-based business.

The client was a legacy client. We had done some video work for them in the past and knew they would see value from inbound marketing. They were a manufacturer of high-abrasion steel. Their steel lined the bed of dump trucks and buckets in coal and gold mines.

When they said yes to our inbound contract, we were ecstatic! It was a mile-high experience.

It wasn’t until a few weeks later that I actually realized how much of a mess we were in.

We had no system in place. We had no internal processes. We weren’t strategic about who we were talking to in the organization.

We were marketers, so what was the first thing we started doing? Blogging.

You’re supposed to have a CTA at the end of each post? What should we use? The corporate brochure should work until we can track down the VP who will help us create an eBook.

The blog started out strong for a few weeks, then things started to slow down as our momentum and content ideas faded. It didn’t take us long to realize that without a detailed plan from the beginning, inbound was an uphill battle.

From those early retainers, Gray and I learned a valuable lesson.

Lesson: If you want to delight your clients and grow a scalable agency, you need to start smart and start fast!

Why is it so important to take the right action early?

1. You need to set the expectation from the beginning that you are in charge.
2. You need to put the right building blocks in place early so that your performance is measured correctly come renewal conversations.
3. Starting fast out of the gate gets people excited and bought into the process. Without buy-in from the organization, you’re dead in the water.

With these reasons in mind, here are 5 actions that need to happen to help you start fast!

5 Key Actions That Need to Happen in the First 300 Hours of an Inbound Retainer

1) Build Inbound Buy-In

When you’re starting out, you need to build inbound buy-in. It’s great if the CEO and marketing department are on-board, but to make a real impact you’ll need support from people outside the marketing department.

2) Understand the Current Status of the Company

As an inbound partner, you need to understand the current status of the organization.  By understanding how their internal teams interact, you can better support the shift to inbound.

3) Select a Focus

Most companies want growth. To grow fast, they think they need to target as many markets as possible. This “spray & pray” method doesn’t work with inbound marketing.

Inbound is a laser-focused approach. Early in the inbound partnership, you need to identify the target audience. For most companies, this will boil down to 3-4 different markets/buyer types.

4) Get to Know the Buyer Personas

A good inbound plan puts the customer at the center of everything. Once you’ve helped your client select a focus, it’s time to get to know the people there.

Methods to help know each buyer persona:

• Research online
• In-person conversations
• Surveys and market research

The more information you can gather from the source, the better off you’ll be. Company leaders will be confident that they know their buyers. Don’t take their word for it!

Speak with real customers to understand the Awareness Stage questions they’re asking.

5) Outline Content to Reach Each Persona

The fuel for an Inbound GamePlan is the questions that your customer’s buyer personas are asking. Use the Buyer’s Journey to organize and understand buyer persona questions. Use customer and prospect interviews to uncover pains and triggers.

With a list of questions, pains, and triggers in place you can outline content. Use your creative marketing mind and effective keyword research.

Outline content offers, lead nurturing emails, and blog posts for each persona. Break down each phase of the Buyer’s Journey.

Recap

Adding these 5 key actions to your agency on-boarding process will help you start quickly. The process that orchestrates each of these steps is critical.

If you want to scale your agency, this process needs to unfold like clockwork. Keep reading this page to learn how you can incorporate this process at your agency.

What is the #2 thing holding agencies back from growth?

After no process to build a good strategy, there is another pain that holds inbound agencies back. We felt this one as well as we were growing. Working legacy clients for up-sells and reaching out to your network only lasts so long.

Inbound leads are the life blood of your inbound agency. The #2 problem holding inbound agencies back from growth is:

No marketing plan for new leads.

We all know it is important. We spend our days selling the idea of inbound. When it comes down to it, however, few agencies have a strong marketing plan.

An agency without a steady stream of inbound leads is in one sticky mess…

• Stuck with legacy clients.
• Stuck doing old-school marketing tactics.
• Stuck convincing people they need inbound.
• Stuck testing new ideas on clients.
• Stuck with no case study for success.

When you’re stuck, you’re not moving forward. To keep moving your agency forward, you need a plan to attract more inbound leads.

5 Actions to Tap into a Stream of Inbound Leads

1) Shift your mindset.

Leads are important for your agency. It’s time to start acting like it.

This requires a significant shift in your mindset. You need to think of yourself as your biggest retainer. If you’re not marketing well, you’re on the path to going out of business.

This requires building an Inbound GamePlan for your agency. You need to take the time and make this a priority.

2) Select an Agency Focus.

Inbound is a precision sport, not a spray and pray. You wouldn’t build a plan for your clients that positioned them as the company for anyone. Why would you do it to your agency?

The more specific you become as an agency, the more focused your marketing efforts can be. Selecting an agency focus brings clarity to your agency growth strategy.

For an example, check out Kuno Creative. They’re a successful inbound agency out of Cleveland. I had the chance to interview Co-Founder John McTigue and he shared how they found their focus.

Kuno targets companies in the SaaS, Speciality Manufacturing, and Healthcare industries. These are wide categories with a lot of potential clients.

This focus helps them create specialized marketing campaigns. Each of these campaigns target a specific buyer persona pain.

How to Select a Focus for Your Agency

• Do you have expertise in an industry?
• Have you collected a set of clients that are within the same industry?

Once you’ve selected a focus, you can build an Inbound GamePlan to help you reach the targets in this niche.

3) Understand your value proposition.

This is marketing 101, but so many agencies ignore this. It took us a few years at GuavaBox to wrap our minds around what makes us different.

If you’re going to sell yourself to a client, you must first believe in who you are. You must know what makes you different. This is your value proposition.

• What are the attributes that set you apart from every other inbound agency in the world?
• How do you, your team, and your agency framework help your clients achieve their goals?

Take time to articulate your agency value proposition. With this understanding you’re better positioned to create an Inbound GamePlan for your agency.

Weave this message into your lead nurturing emails at the Consideration and Decision Stages. You’ll learn more about that process later on this page.

4) Build an Inbound GamePlan for your agency.

Points 1-3 in this section cover a lot of background. These things only make an impact if you put them into action.

You need to start with yourself. Practice the inbound methodology with dedication and precision. Even if you don’t have a client base yet, begin to hone your skills on your own work.

Build a persona-focused plan that will attract the people you need to make this happen.

There is a lot that goes into building an Inbound GamePlan. You don’t need to go at this alone. You can read on this page how to stand on the shoulders of those who have gone before you.

5) Start inbound batch days

Once you’ve created an Inbound GamePlan, it is time to start creating content. This is a challenging task. As an entrepreneur, there is a lot on your plate.

One trick that can help is implementing inbound batch days. On these days you unite together and tackle content creation, optimization, and outreach.

Select a recurring time slot each week and make it happen!

The good news is that with a proper system and framework in place, you can overcome each of these problems. This can open the doors to agency growth. The secret is an Inbound GamePlan.

5 Ways an Inbound GamePlan Makes You a More Profitable Agency

1) Gives your agency a sales tool to get in the door with more prospects.

The inbound agency sales process is long. If you’re not careful, you can waste a lot of time talking to the wrong type of lead.

Working with the wrong type of client can end up costing your agency more than the value of the new business. Some clients are just needy people and aren’t a good fit. It can be hard to tell how the working relationship will function just from the sales process.

Do you have a prospect that you think is qualified?

Use the Inbound GamePlan process to verify that they’re a client that you want to work with over the long haul.

2) Adds a new revenue stream

Every successful inbound engagement needs to start with strategy. You can use the Inbound GamePlan process to get paid for your strategy. This is your most important asset! Time to start getting paid for it.

To give you a point of reference, we sell GamePlans for $3,000 – $5,000.

Adding a paid Inbound GamePlan to your agency sales process can help separate yourself from the pack. This will also show you which leads are serious about making changes and taking action.

3) Create buy-in from around your client’s organization

For inbound to be successful for your clients, there needs to be buy-in. This means reaching key people outside the marketing department.

They’re critical to truly understanding customer questions, capturing content, and providing internal momentum for inbound.

The GamePlan Creation Process is more important than the actual deliverable. The process starts conversation. The process shows people what is possible.

Use the GamePlan Creation Process to rally support to the inbound movement. This is your opportunity to teach what inbound could do for your client’s company.  It’s your chance to show why each team member should care about inbound.

4) Clients get a chance to see exactly what inbound would look like for their company.

Inbound is a lofty idea. It can be hard for some prospects to wrap their mind around the whole thing.

Selling an Inbound GamePlan means that you’re not selling a theory any more. You can show them exactly how to attract, convert, nurture, and delight their prospects in a clear plan.

Here again, the GamePlan Creation Process is fruitful. The key team members can begin to see the pieces of the strategy coming together.

The finalized Inbound GamePlan gives them the chance to see it all come together. They can see how focusing on industry and personas is important. They can see how tactics align with their high-level goals.

5) Gives your agency the documented processes

Earlier, we talked about 5 Key Actions That Need to Happen in the First 300 Hours of an Inbound Retainer. Each of these items are mission-critical.

How do you make sure each of these things happen every time? Documented and repeatable processes.

From right inside DoInbound, you can manage the entire Inbound GamePlan creation process.

On the operational side, what do you need to include?

The Four Sections of an Inbound GamePlan

1) In-Depth Self-Assessment

The goal of this section is to unite the team with a focus on the customer. You dig into questions like:

• What is the company’s current situation?
  • How many leads come through the website?
  • What percentage of leads are qualified?
  • What is the value of a lead?
• What is the competition up to?

You can gather this information through the GamePlan On-Boarding Process. Then use the Inbound GamePlan Discovery meeting to better understand the metrics.

2) Detailed Buyer Personas

The goal of this section is to create a laser-like focus on the customer.

• Who are your most profitable customers?
• What similarities do they share?
• What does a day in their shoes feel like?
• What are their common questions?

Here you will build detailed buyer personas using a repeatable template. The key points of focus are the persona questions. These questions will serve as the backbone of the content strategy in steps 3 and 4.

3) Build the Engine

Here you want to illustrate the power of personalization and marketing automation. Tools like HubSpot are only as powerful as the content within them.

This is where you build your automation and nurturing strategy. You do this by digging into the Buyer’s Journey:

• What questions are asked at the Awareness Stage?
• What questions are asked at the Consideration Stage?
• What questions are asked at the Decision Stage?
• What questions are asked at the Customer Stage?
• How will the automation system be set up?

An Inbound GamePlans establishes a system and process for this information.

4) Persona-Focused Inbound Campaigns

The last step focuses on attracting the right people. Make your client’s website a destination for target personas.

• What resources will attract personas?
• What Inbound Marketing Campaigns should be planned for the next 12 months?
• What type of content resonates with our target personas?
• What are the titles of several Awareness Stage eBooks?
• What social media platforms will have the best ROI for our brand, based on our personas and campaigns?

Want to build one for your clients and your agency?

You have two options…

1. The first option is to blaze your own trail to the top of the mountain.
2. The second option is to follow the path blazed for you.

I’m excited to share with you more about the second path. That is the path that I wish existed when we started selling Inbound GamePlans!

“Let’s GamePlan!” Training Course Overview

The mission of “Let’s GamePlan!” is to empower you with a repeatable process. This course will teach you the skills and give you the confidence to offer Inbound GamePlans.

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Detailed Video Lessons

The course includes 8 training modules with 45 video lessons.

• Module 1: Positioning an Inbound GamePlan
• Module 2: Pricing an Inbound GamePlan
• Module 3: Closing an Inbound GamePlan
• Module 4: Digging into Templates
• Module 5: Helpful Tools When Building GamePlans
• Module 6: Gathering Information to Build an Inbound GamePlan
• Module 7: Building an Inbound GamePlan
• Module 8: Presenting a Finalized Inbound GamePlan

Inside each of these modules is all the information you need. We’ve documented each phase of the process and shared it in this course.

We want to help you take action. You will have the process to sell, create, and deliver Inbound GamePlans in just two weeks.