Running a growing agency is both exciting and challenging. The rapid pace, increased client load, and expanding teams often make it difficult to maintain the efficient workflows you once had—and still find time to work on business strategy or simply get out of the office. In my chat with Henry DeVries, CEO of Indie Books International and host of the Agency Rainmaker podcast, he shared a staggering statistic: 50% of agency owners say their biggest challenge is juggling business development and administrative tasks alongside client fulfillment—a pain point that only intensifies as you grow.
If you’ve felt the chaos building, you’re not alone. Agency owners often find themselves at a tipping point when scaling their business. You might start noticing these common signs of operational strain:
- Slack is constantly going off, leaving you with little time to focus.
- You’re checking on client statuses through scattered chat messages.
- Questions from team members keep halting progress.
- There’s no centralized place to manage projects.
- Everyone has their own way of doing things, leading to confusion.
- There’s little consistency between projects and tasks.
- Projects are rarely completed on time, and when they are, it’s a last-minute rush.
- Mistakes keep happening, and fires constantly need to be put out.
- Tedious tasks are eating up everyone’s time.
- You think the next new hire will fix things, but you don’t have the resources to bring them on.
- You’re feeling tired and burnt out.
- You know there has to be a better way because “this” isn’t working anymore.
I know these struggles personally. When I was building my agency, I reached a breaking point. Scaling felt impossible. I was constantly stressed, and the systems that once worked were no longer cutting it. Eventually, I put the pieces together, creating a well-oiled machine that drew multiple eight-figure offers and led to my selling the company in 2018. Now, through my company Workday Ninja, I help agency owners implement centralized, automated systems like Monday, ClickUp, and Asana, and integrate them with tools like CRMs and email platforms, so they can streamline operations, reduce mistakes, and free up their time.
If you find yourself saying, “I want it to work like it used to,” it is the very sign that it’s time for a better system.
As an owner, you have to accept that the systems and processes that worked in the early days aren’t enough for the next phase of growth. You can’t be a part of everything like the first day of your business when it was just you. This is the crucial point where you either evolve your operations or risk being stuck in the day-to-day grind rather than truly running your business. Henry and I delve into this struggle in depth in a recent episode of Agency Rainmaker.
Let’s explore seven practical secrets agencies can use to break free from the daily grind, reclaim their time, and scale their businesses—without constantly needing to check in. You will notice a common thread throughout these secrets.
Along the way, we’ll share insights from my conversation with Henry that you can apply directly to your agency’s journey.
Top Secrets to Systematize and Scale Your Agency
1. Standardize Workflows for Consistency
One of the most common pain points agency owners face is a lack of consistency. You might have account managers each handling client onboarding differently, or creative teams managing their tasks in a variety of ways. Without a clear, standardized process, things can fall through the cracks, leading to delayed projects or frustrated clients.
A project management system allows you to create standardized workflows that everyone in your team follows. From onboarding new clients to managing ongoing projects, you can build templates and recurring tasks within your project management system that ensure every team member follows the same structure. Not only does this improve consistency, but it also enhances the client experience, as they receive the same high level of service across the board.
Many agencies have a project management system, but they use it poorly. They don’t have all their systems in there—it’s ad hoc. They’re not considering it a complete system to systemize their business. By setting up structured workflows and automations, you can eliminate mayhem and create a smooth process where team members know exactly what needs to happen next.
This part is so crucial that we created a free process mapping course and it is available here and this is one of our favorite tips for creating process maps using AI.
2. Automate Recurring Tasks to Save Time
If you’ve ever heard me talk about my favorite use of a project management system, it is recurring tasks. A recurring task is basically an automated reminder of something that needs to get done on a particular cadence (maybe every week, every quarter, when the task is complete, on a certain day—you get it). Agency life involves a lot of recurring tasks, from pulling reports to sending client updates to billing clients. These can easily slip through the cracks when managed manually or, worse, using a calendar reminder. However, by setting up automated recurring tasks in your project management system, these tasks can trigger at the right times, ensuring nothing is forgotten and remain open until the task is complete (something you don’t get in a calendar reminder).
Imagine automating the task of pulling monthly billable time reports or setting up recurring check-ins with clients. Even tasks like invoicing or assigning work to the right teams can be automated, reducing manual effort and freeing up your team’s time for more creative/strategic work. This easy automation allows agencies to avoid the headache of missing crucial tasks like invoicing, which can result in significant revenue loss if delayed. Asana and ClickUp are great for setting up recurring tasks. Monday does not have this functionality.
3. Improve Capacity Planning to Manage Growth
As your agency grows, managing the team’s workload becomes more complex. Many agency owners reach a point where they realize that they can no longer manage the chaos in their heads or on random spreadsheets. This is where capacity planning tools in a project management system can be a game-changer.
By using a project management system, you can view each team member’s workload and make adjustments in real time. This ensures that no one is overloaded, and resources are being distributed effectively. I use ClickUp for managing Workday Ninja because of its native hierarchy that makes advanced capacity planning viewable in one click. By properly allocating resources, you can double the output without hiring additional staff, simply by redistributing workloads.
4. Automated Client Onboarding: The Key to Long-Term Success
Client onboarding is one of the most critical aspects of your agency’s workflow. When done correctly, it sets the tone for a successful partnership. When mishandled, it can lead to frustration and dissatisfaction from the start.
Automating client onboarding from a won deal in your CRM to a kicking off: a client project with all of the tasks listed for onboarding in your project management system, new folder in Drive or Dropbox, a drafted welcome email, and adding them to your newsletter ensures that every client receives the same, high-quality experience. By the way, that all happens in less than a minute when using automation. When done manually, the average time it takes an agency to onboard a new client is two weeks.
Streamlining the handoff between sales and account management reduces onboarding time by weeks, improving both client and employee satisfaction. This ensures that nothing is missed and that you’re building strong relationships from day one.
Pro tip: One of my favorite things that is automatically created in our project management system when a new client comes on board is a task is assigned for connecting with new clients on LinkedIn.
5. Centralize Communication and Collaboration
And I don’t mean Slack (or chat) or forwarding emails back and forth. Instead of having team members juggling emails, Slack messages, and in-person conversations, a centralized project management tool allows everyone to communicate in context to the correct task/project. When using a project management system correctly, everything has a place. This ensures that all information, updates, feedback, approvals, etc. are visible and easily accessible. It does require a change in habit and change management training! It takes time and consistency for the change to stick, but once it does, it makes a huge, positive difference for everyone on the team.
By keeping all communication within the project management system, agency owners can reduce miscommunication, avoid dropped balls, and make sure everyone is aligned on the project’s goals and next steps. Whether it’s for client-facing work or internal collaboration, having one platform for all discussions can significantly reduce the time wasted searching for information.
For a walkthrough and more details on this structure, watch this video.
6. Build a Knowledge Base to Scale Beyond Yourself
As an agency owner, it’s easy to fall into the trap of thinking that you need to be involved in every decision. But to truly scale, you need to get the institutional knowledge out of your head and into a system that your team can access.
When scaling my first agency, I created videos explaining the processes for handling large contracts and then had an assistant translate them into detailed documentation. Over time, this allowed my team to manage $3 million contracts independently, freeing me up to focus on other aspects of the business.
A knowledge base should include how-tos, training, and SOPs that your team can refer to anytime. Tools like Loom can help create video walkthroughs, and using AI to build a step-by-step process from the transcript, which can be linked to tasks and subtasks in your project management system for easy access. Arvo is a great tool for hosting your knowledge base docs and is geared towards appealing to Millennials and Gen-Z.
7. Monitor Key Metrics and Optimize Performance
One of the most critical aspects of running a successful agency is understanding how your team and projects are performing. With a project management system, you can track key metrics such as task completion rates, time spent on projects, and even client satisfaction.
I recommend using dashboards to keep an eye on these metrics, which can help identify bottlenecks, monitor client projects, and assess overall team performance. This type of visibility is crucial for making informed decisions and optimizing your workflows for efficiency and profitability.
Get out of the day-to-day
Systematizing your agency is key to scaling successfully. From automating repetitive tasks to improving capacity planning and building a strong knowledge base, your agency can completely change how it operates. The key to getting started is finding the right tool—whether it’s Asana, ClickUp, or Monday—that fits your agency’s unique needs.
- Use this free tool to find out which project management system is the best for you out of Asana, ClickUp and Monday.
If you read through all seven secrets, you’ll know that automation can happen between your project management system and the other software platforms you use because you use multiple platforms to run your agency.
- Get 25 custom automation ideas that can be implemented in your business with Willy the Workflow Wizard here.
By embracing these systems, you’ll not only save time but also empower your team to work more efficiently and effectively, ultimately positioning your agency for long-term growth and success.