Field notes for running a sharper agency
Practical guides on agency growth, client management, and AI-powered marketing operations — reviewed by real people before they go out.
AI Agents Are Quietly Taking Over Agency Reporting — Here Is What Actually Changes
Agencies with functional AI reporting agents are cutting report prep from 15 hours a month to under 2. Here is what the shift actually looks like day to day, and where the human still has to stay in the loop.
Retainers Are Losing to Performance-Based Pricing. Here Is Why Clients Are Asking for It
Clients increasingly want to pay for outcomes, not hours. Agencies that can prove attribution are winning longer contracts because of it — and the ones that cannot are losing margin to in-house teams.
Social Algorithms Stopped Caring About Follower Count. Most Agencies Have Not Updated Their Reporting To Match
Platforms in 2026 are optimizing for saves, shares, and watch time over raw engagement — and follower count barely factors into distribution anymore. If your monthly report still leads with follower growth, it is measuring the wrong thing.
Stop Optimizing for Traffic. Google and Every Platform Are Now Rewarding Intent-Match Instead
The agencies still chasing pageviews are optimizing for a metric that stopped correlating with revenue. The shift in 2026 is toward content so specific to a narrow audience that it converts because of how precisely it matches intent — not despite it.