You're in the pitch. Do you have a plan to win it?

We’re pleased to have Jody Sutter guest posting for us on the topic of the pitch. Do you have a plan to win it? Jody Sutter is a business development expert and the owner of The Sutter Company, a new business consultancy that advises small agencies on organizing and operationalizing their growth strategy.   She helps them generate revenue […]

Two Secrets For Writing Engaging Agency New Business Content

Two Secrets For Writing Engaging Agency New Business Content  We recently had a client come to us as they plan an internal review of their agency communications, and they asked several salient questions across categories and disciplines relating to new business.  One of those was a question I wanted to share, because agencies ask some version of it often:  What blog post subjects seem to be […]

Unique Positioning Without Supporting Content Is Wasted Positioning 

As we wrap up our content focus on our 2020 Agency New Business Report, I read a few articles recently that tie in nicely to a key stat I haven’t discussed yet.   63% of agencies stated their agency’s positioning is “somewhat unique” . . . and 23% indicated their positioning is “extremely unique”.  Interestingly, last year in […]

COVID-19 Disrupted New Business Efforts But Small and Mid-Sized Agencies See Key Advantages Over Larger Firms

While COVID-19 initially disrupted new business efforts this year, small and mid-sized agencies see some key advantages over larger firms, as taken from our annual RSW 2020 Agency New Business Report: Perspective On The Agency New Business Environment, 2020 and Beyond. This is the 10th year of the survey and we present comparable data available […]

Everyone’s a Salesperson When New Business Slows 

For this post, I want to give a shout-out-to all of you in the new business trenches, every mighty salesperson, whether you’re a new business director or a partner at your firm.  It’s no newsflash to point out that this business is hard.  A short, entertaining story to illustrate my point (at my expense):  When […]

One Big Reason Why You're Not Driving More New Business

Some agencies, in regards to their new business program, have a mindset that first meetings with a prospect should be solid gold and close fairly quickly. Those agencies tend to have three things in common: they’re 1) erratic in new business strategy, 2) hire and fire new business personnel fairly often, and 3) are generally […]

RSW Agency New Business Website Series, Pt. 2: SEO, or How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love The Metadata

RSW Agency New Business Website Series, Pt. 2: SEO, or How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love The Metadata Welcome to the 2nd installment of our series around agency new business websites, and in this case, SEO. In our previous edition, we covered the thought processes and design adjustments that make all the difference […]

Because I know you can handle it, get ready for some tough love for your ad agency positioning. A little background first: we’ve released our 2019 Agency New Business Report and one thing we know: agencies like to hear what their peers are doing to find new business success. Understandable, because you’re all so busy, […]

We got some great news from a client who’s been with us just over a year, that they won a sizable piece of business (900k+) from a door we opened for them and helped nurture. It’s not the topic of my post-but a quick initial takeaway: New business takes patience. This may seem so obvious […]

There’s a time and a place for storytelling in agency new business, and it’s not in your initial outreach. You’ve probably read or heard a good deal about storytelling in sales in the past couple of years. Just google storytelling in sales or some version of that and you will see countless articles/blog posts. AS […]