Smart Agency Masterclass Podcast with Jason Swenk
Bi-weekly interviews, strategy, and advice for building your marketing agency the smart way.
The popular agency podcast has just turned 12 years old and covers everything from starting a successful agency to selling your agency.
#1 Agency Leadership Podcast. Check Out Our Past Guests.
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Seth Godin
Best selling Author of Purple Cow, This is Marketing, Linchpin, Permission Marketing
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Guy Kawasaki
Guy Kawasaki is the chief evangelist of Canva and former Apple chief evangelist
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Gino Wickman
The creator of the Entrepreneurial Operating System (EOS) and author of Traction.
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Neil Patel
Founder of CrazyEgg, Kissmetrics, and other multimillion dollar companies
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![Uri Levine]()
Uri Levine
Co-founder of Waze
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Joey Coleman
Recognized for his expertise in customer retention & enhancing client loyalty
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Mike Michaelowicz
Best-selling author of Profit First and Clock Work
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Amy Porterfield
Renowned online marketing expert and educator
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Pat Flynn
The leaders in the podcast space
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Jay Baer
Best Selling author of Talk Triggers, Hug Your Haters, and one of the best speakers
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Todd Herman
Coach to Elite pro athletes, leaders, and public figures
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Dan Martell
Author of Buy Back Your Time. Influential coach in SaaS startups.
Why Your Agency Can’t Scale Until You Stop Being the Doer with Matt Kovacs | Ep #893
Have you ever wondered how to strike that balance between managing your team and ensuring success for your clients? Today's featured guest is here is talk about what it actually takes to evolve from doing the work to building a team that can win without you.
The conversation cuts through common agency myths, like hiring better clients first or relying on RFPs, and instead exposes the real drivers of growth: team strength, leadership evolution, and structural leverage.
Why Doing More Is Holding Your Agency Back (And What to Do Instead) with Darby Copenhaver | Ep #892
In this rapidly evolving agency landscape, uncertainty has become the norm rather than the exception. From overwhelming decision paralysis caused by AI and doubts on how to move forward with clarity, owners need to adapt to constant change, identifying true bottlenecks, evolving their role, and simplifying systems to scale effectively.
Today’s featured guest is the first point of contact for agency founders experiencing these very struggles. As someone very in tune with the issues founders face, he’ll talk about the steps they need to take to prevent becoming a bottleneck that gets in the way of their own growth and share why growth isn’t about doing more; it’s about becoming something different.
Why Agencies Lose Clients: Confusing Reports and Outdated Operating Models with Nate Jenson | Ep #890
Do you assume a very complicated report will guarantee clients appreciate all the work you’re putting into generating leads for their business? It may end up having the opposite effect. Our featured guest will unpack how agencies and financial service firms face strikingly similar structural problems. From vague service promises to bloated processes and inefficient teams, both industries are being forced to evolve, especially as automation and AI raise expectations around speed, clarity, and decision-making.
Burned Out Agency Owner to AI Architect: The Real Shift Founders Must Make With Austin Armstrong | Ep #888
How are you protecting yourself from the real risk of owner burnout?
Agency owners often burn out because they built a business that depends entirely on them.
Today’s featured guest is a former agency owner turned AI SaaS founder. He'll unpack what really caused his agency collapse, what he learned from it, and how he rebuilt from a completely different role.
Why Project-Based Agencies Feel Profitable But Aren’t Sustainable with Michael Boychuk | Ep #887
Are you winning exciting projects but still feeling exhausted at the end of every quarter? Does your agency look successful from the outside, yet feel fragile or chaotic behind the scenes?
For most agency owners, the real struggle isn’t creativity. It’s sustainability. Landing big projects isn’t usually the hardest part. The real challenge begins after the win, when you have to deliver consistently, protect your margins, manage your team, and somehow still have the energy to lead.
How to Raise Your Agency Prices From $2,500 to $45,000/Month (Without Changing Deliverables) With Eli Rubel | Ep #885
Most agency owners don’t fail because they’re bad at delivery.
They fail because they underprice, overcomplicate, and build businesses that trap them instead of freeing them.
Today’s featured guest unpacks the type of life he envisioned when he set out to start an agency, it took to scale from charging $2,500 a month to closing $45,000/month retainers, surviving a market collapse, and making the counterintuitive decision to split one agency into two.
Built for Freedom. How to Create a Lifestyle Agency That Doesn’t Burn You Out with Marissa Rosen | Ep #883
Most agency owners start out chasing freedom and then wake up one day realizing they’ve built a job they can’t escape. Today’s featured guest will unpack what it actually looks like to build a lifestyle-first agency that protects your time, adapts to AI, and still pays the bills without burning you out. She has run a small profitable agency for over a decade without a bloated team, nonstop chaos, or ego-driven “scale at all costs” thinking, and she breaks down how designing your agency backward from your life (not an exit slide) changes everything.
Stop Building a Job: How to Build an Agency That Supports Your Life with Brian Franks | Ep #881
Most agencies are one bad month, or one health scare, away from chaos. In this episode, Brian Franks shares how his agency survived a sudden medical emergency because it was built on trust, relationships, and the right level of involvement (not bloated systems or massive teams). If your agency can’t run without you, this conversation will hit close to home.
Surviving a 70% Loss In Agency Revenue. From Panic to Purpose with Melany Robinson | Ep #880
When Melanie Robinson lost 70% of her agency’s revenue overnight during COVID, she didn’t just “cut costs.” She rebuilt her team around trust, ownership, and shared sacrifice and learned why keeping C players is one of the most expensive mistakes agency owners make. This episode is a masterclass in leadership, culture, and making hard decisions without losing your soul.
#1 Overlooked Exit Strategy: Selling Your Agency to a Team Member with Natalie Henley | Ep #878
If you're an agency owner fantasizing about walking away with a payout and your legacy intact but dread the PE sharks or culture-killing acquirers, this is your playbook.
Natalie Henley didn’t just survive buying out her boss. She turned it into the best thing that ever happened to her and her agency.
About the Show
The popular agency podcast has been around since 2014 and covers everything from starting a successful agency to selling your agency. What makes this podcast a must-listen is Swenk’s background as the founder and CEO of an agency for over a decade. Swenk brings his own experience to the table, besides the expertise of his guests. He mostly covers topics that help growing agencies scale to the next level.
YOUR HOST
JASON SWENK
Smart Agency Masterclass
Jason is a family man who also happens to have created a couple big marketing agencies, helped thousands of agency owners, and had a big agency exit too.
