I had lunch a couple of weeks ago with a guy that has been operating an agency for over twenty years. I asked him what the perfect agency looked like and he said, “If you want to make money: just you or a couple of account managers and everything outsourced overseas.”
I know of several agencies that already operate with this sort of model and one of my friends is shifting his local team to an international one. As time passes, pressure will build that will cause it to become the standard or a common approach.
In the meantime, no-code tools and AI can do more and more of the specialized work that agencies need.
The agency of the future will probably be a combination of software and commoditized labor.
The evolution of competition in the market needs is going to change your business.
It’s a wave of change. A shifting bell curve that’s always leaning into the future.
At the front are people, “ahead of the curve.” They reap the majority of the benefits and surf the transition. On the backside, is the floating jetsam and wreckage of the businesses that ignored the changes and were thrown onto the reef and destroyed.
As a business owner, one of your jobs is to look ahead and figure out how to navigate change. To harness its energy for growth where possible and to avoid disaster when you can’t.
Featured image is Géricault’s the Raft of the Medusa (1819). Used under public domain.