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 10 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.
How To Find and Keep the Right People to Scale Your Agency with Dan Salganik | Ep #838
If hiring one of the biggest challenges you’ve encountered when it comes to running your agency? How do you sift through hundreds of applications when most don’t even read the job description? Today’s featured guest opens up about the realities of building a team, the role that gave him his time back, and why finding the right people, not unicorns, but the right fits can make or break an agency’s growth.
Why Do Agency Owners Feel Trapped in Their Own Business? And How To Break Free with Dan Fisher | Ep #837
Ever feel like running your agency is just one long grind of “good enough” projects, endless deadlines, and late-night work sessions? Most agency owners start out chasing freedom, only to find themselves trapped by clients, culture struggles, and their own workaholic habits. Today’s featured guest is certainly familiar with this cycle, so how was he able to build a business that works for him instead of the other way around? By focusing on clarity, culture, and constant evolution.
Will AI Really Change Agencies? Why the Human Element Still Wins with Josh Payne | Ep #836
Are you wondering how AI will really change the way agencies work? Will it replace your team, or make them better than ever? Artificial intelligence continues to be at the forefront of most tech conversations, and that’s exactly why agency owners can’t afford to ignore it.
Today’s guest believes the real future of AI in agencies isn’t about replacement—it’s about augmentation. Humans bring the high-leverage ideas, AI scales the execution, and the magic happens in the collaboration between the two.
That’s why he challenges his team to master a skill first—understanding every step—before delegating pieces of it to AI. By doing so, they not only achieve stronger results but also gain the ability to explain, teach, and refine the process. For agencies, this thoughtful integration turns AI from a threat into a powerful accelerator.
Why Agencies Must Lead With Strategy (Not Just Execution) With Pete Caputa | Ep #835
Are you stuck acting like an order taker instead of leading your clients with strategy? If you want to grow an agency that survives the competition, you need to do more than deliver pretty websites or manage ad budgets. You need to lead with strategy, prove it with data, and guide your clients through the journey—not the other way around.
Too many agencies are still making decisions based on “gut feelings” instead of data, which is why today’s featured guest is tackling exactly that problem—making it easier for everyone in a company to use data daily, so decisions are grounded in reality, not instinct.
How Thought Leadership Can Be Your Agency’s Biggest Growth Lever with Chris Long | Ep #833
Which growth drivers are fueling your agency right now? For today’s featured guest, the answer is clear: thought leadership. It’s the single biggest driver consistently bringing his agency the best opportunities. While it can be difficult to separate genuine impact from vanity metrics, the deliberate effort to establish both himself and his agency as industry experts has proven invaluable for growth.
But building that kind of authority doesn’t happen by accident. It requires intentional work—stepping onto stages at conferences, showing up in interviews and podcasts, and, just as importantly, encouraging your team to create and share content of their own. In this conversation, he breaks down the strategies that help expand thought leadership beyond the founder, and why agency leaders must remember: expertise is a long game, one that compounds over time to deliver lasting results.
Why Hitting $1M Won’t Save Your Agency (and What Will) With Justin Rashidi | Ep#832
Are you an agency owner chasing the $1 million mark, believing that milestone will finally transform your business? Today’s featured guest once felt the same way—until he got there and discovered it was all a myth. Hitting seven figures looked like success on paper, but behind the scenes he was burning himself out just to keep things afloat. In this episode, he reveals the processes that helped him escape that no man’s land, the critical lessons he learned about hiring, and the one thing he would do differently if he had the chance to start over.
What to Do When a Google Algorithm Update Kills Your Inbound Traffic with Chris Raulf | Ep #831
Is your agency’s strategy diversified enough to withstand sudden algorithm changes? Today’s featured guest, an SEO veteran, learned this the hard way. While he focused on client work, his own website grew outdated. Then, one Google update hit and overnight his agency lost 80% of its organic traffic; their main source of leads.
The agency eventually recovered, but not without leaving him with a powerful lesson: always invest in the three pillars of growth. In this episode, he shares his chaotic first encounter with SEO, the biggest lessons from a long career in the industry, and the “superpower” that helps him better understand and adapt to algorithm shifts.
Launch a Second Agency While Still Growing Your First One? with Greg Peters | Ep #830
Would you ever run two agencies at once? What if splitting your brand was the smartest way to protect and grow both?
Today’s featured guest spotted a booming opportunity in a regulated market—but knew that advertising those services alongside his work for conservative and tech clients could hurt his existing agency. His solution? Launch a separate brand. The move paid off as the regulated market surged during the pandemic.
He shares what it’s like to manage rapid growth, why he built a true people-first culture from day one, and how he stays optimistic even when agency life gets messy.
How to Break Through Your Agency’s Revenue Ceiling (Without Hiring a COO) With Alex Membrillo | Ep #828
What happens when the agency you’ve built is just… stuck? Or when you hit a revenue ceiling, lose a major client, and start wondering if you’ve been playing the wrong game entirely? Those moments either break you or become the pivot points that redefine everything.
In this episode, you’ll hear from an agency owner who’s lived through the grind growing his agency from scratch, riding out recessions, choosing a niche that would help him get out of “no man’s land”. He’ll discuss the strategic bet that broke through plateaus, why he still refuses to hire a COO, and the million-dollar risk that could have sunk him but ended up being a worth-while bet on his vision.
How to Scale an Agency by Simplifying Your Offer and Niching Down with Nate Freedman | Ep #826
What happens when you stop chasing $30K projects—and start solving real problems for $300 clients in a way that actually works?
Today’s featured guest had been building $32,000 websites for mid-market companies. On paper, it looked like success. But in reality, he felt stuck—unfulfilled and back in a corporate-style grind that didn’t align with the kind of work or life he truly wanted.
When he took a step back, he realized something important: the clients he really wanted to serve were already reaching out. These were smaller, $300K businesses with many of the same challenges agencies see across the board—but without the bloated complexity.
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.
