Agency book writing and publishing can seem like a daunting mountain to climb. But with the right people to help you through the process, it can be one of the best things you can do to uplevel your thought leadership efforts. 

That’s why this week, I invited Shadley Grei, an agency book publishing expert and newer member of AMI, onto the show to share how agency owners can start thinking about writing their first (or next) book with the help of a ghostwriter. He shares how his agency helps other agency owners discover if their ideas are ready to become a full-fledged book, and how to start compiling it all to collaborate with a ghostwriter. 

As the visionaries of the agency, we need to be always looking for the new, unspoken angles of things in the work we do, and Shadley helps agency owners share their perspectives without the pressure of having to do it alone. 

If you think you might be ready to finally get your idea or vision out in writing in 2025, this episode has all the info you need to start turning that idea into reality.  

A big thank you to our podcast’s presenting sponsor, White Label IQ. They’re an amazing resource for agencies who want to outsource their design, dev, or PPC work at wholesale prices. Check out their special offer (10 free hours!) for podcast listeners here.

What You Will Learn in This Episode:

• How a ghostwriter can be a partner in helping you find unseen angles for your book
• How to get a seat at the table and show clients you’re capable of more
• What producing a book can do for the agency and agency owner
• How and why Shadley got interested in starting his own publishing company
• The fun of partnering with thought leaders to help their ideas come to life
• Using a ghostwriter isn’t cheating — it’s a strategy
• 3 ways to know if you’re ready to write a book
• Getting over fear and owning your expertise

I wanted to wait until after the holidays to talk about this topic because it’s a bit heavier than what we usually talk about on the show. But it’s something that Danyel and I have noticed weighing heavily on a lot of you since COVID, and that is agency owner grief. 

It’s true that many of you have experienced quite a lot of loss and change these past few years  — with the way we work, how well our business is doing, AI, our overall productivity, and so much more. It’s a lot of change to handle, and for many of us, we haven’t taken the proper time to actually acknowledge our grief and begin to let it go. 

But without taking those first steps, that grief will continue to take hold of us and affect us in all aspects of our business — and even our personal lives. Many of you report being restless, unable to focus, depressed, uninspired, feeling heavy, and burnt out. And it’s all because we’re burning the candle at both ends without taking the time to acknowledge just how much change we’ve gone through in the past 5 years as agency owners. 

So I hope you’ll join me and take some time to take stock of everything that’s happened from 2020 to now — the good and the bad — and start to recognize just how much we’ve gone through so we can collectively learn to grieve and begin to let go of the bad to make more room for some good. 

A big thank you to our podcast’s presenting sponsor, White Label IQ. They’re an amazing resource for agencies who want to outsource their design, dev, or PPC work at wholesale prices. Check out their special offer (10 free hours!) for podcast listeners here.

What You Will Learn in This Episode:

• Why agency owners are struggling mentally and emotionally more than ever

• Understanding agency owner grief and what’s caused it to increase in the past 5 years

• Addressing agency owner grief

• The 5 stages of grief and how it manifests for agency owners

• The trickle effect of grief on agencies

• How we can begin to identify our grief 

• Starting the healing process after we identify the source of our grief

• Seeing post-COVID as an agency renaissance

Many agency owners feel like their clients are putting them in a box of specific skills they’re able to perform for them. And for many of us, that’s not a good feeling. We’re wired to think creatively and break free from that metaphorical box, but it can be hard to communicate that to our clients in a sea of competition.

So, it’s time to break out of that box in 2025. 

That means we need fresh ideas, innovative thought leadership, and non-obvious thinking. And there’s nobody better to talk to us about this than Rohit Bhargava, from Non-Obvious Company. He knows exactly what it’s like to be put in a box creatively, but he’s even better at breaking out of it. 

For years, he’s taken a hold of the status quo to challenge it, question it, and ask more of it so that he can stay ahead of the conversation and shape it to better serve his clients — and his agency. 

So join us to get inspired to do some fresh, non-obvious thinking in this week’s episode.

A big thank you to our podcast’s presenting sponsor, White Label IQ. They’re an amazing resource for agencies who want to outsource their design, dev, or PPC work at wholesale prices. Check out their special offer (10 free hours!) for podcast listeners here.

What You Will Learn in This Episode:

• What should be on every agency owner’s mind in 2025
• How to get a seat at the table and show clients you’re capable of more
• The importance of thought leadership to make sales come to you
• The difference between content creation and thought leadership
• How to apply non-obvious thinking to our agency work
• Getting our clients to be more open-minded, creative thinkers with us
• The role of AI in the future of agencies
• The importance of demonstrating real connection and chemistry to both potential and current clients
• Trends agency owners should be paying attention to in 2025

Almost no agency owner got into the agency world for their passion for bookkeeping. And if you did — great! You’re several steps ahead of most of us. But the reality is, most of us are just happy to keep cash in the bank for payroll and probably aren’t looking at the finances as much as we should be. 

Sandy Catour joined me this week to share why we should rewire this habit. Agency owners should be just as involved with the agency finances as their finance and accounting teams, and they should be in frequent communication with one another. 

Without a good understanding of your cash forecast, how your money is being spent, and where you’re losing the most profit, it’s impossible to run the agency by the numbers and keep a good handle on where all your money is going. 

So join us to get a realistic look at what agency owners should care about the most in the agency financial reports and what they can talk to their finance teams more openly and honestly about in 2025.  

A big thank you to our podcast’s presenting sponsor, White Label IQ. They’re an amazing resource for agencies who want to outsource their design, dev, or PPC work at wholesale prices. Check out their special offer (10 free hours!) for podcast listeners here.

What You Will Learn in This Episode:

• How an agency owner should approach agency finances

• How agency finance conversations differ between small and medium agencies

• What financial reports you should be looking at as an agency owner

• Knowing how to price and how to find profit black holes in the numbers

• How agency owners should think about the financial roles in their company and how they serve the agency

• How to communicate well with your financial team

• What monthly financial meetings should look like with your accountants, bookkeepers, or other finance team members

• Getting an accounting person to put together a cash forecast and what that should look like