The Anti-Agency Approach: How to Grow Without Hiring a Bunch of People

If you’re a freelancer or service provider who doesn’t want to manage people, build an agency, or work 40+ hours a week, this episode is your permission slip to scale smarter—without adding chaos or headcount.

For the last seven years, I’ve made multiple six figures every single year with 1:1 services—and zero support on the delivery side. No junior team. No agency. Just smart systems, strategic packaging, and simple offers that convert.

In this episode, I’m walking you through the exact framework I teach inside the Strategist Society so you can grow your business without building a soul-sucking agency or trading profit for stress.

Topics Covered In This Episode:

1. You don’t need an agency to hit $20K+ months.
2. Profit margins matter more than team size or client count.
3. Hire for leverage, not delegation.
4. Systems are the foundation of sustainable growth.
5. You can scale without burning out or becoming a manager.

Find the full show notes at:  https://brandimowles.com/262

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Additional Resources:

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This is exactly what we do inside Strategist Society.

You’ll get the coaching, community, and framework to help you scale to $20K+ months—without building an agency and while keeping your time and profit intact.

Apply now at www.thestrategistsociety.com

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Transcript

262. The Anti-Agency Approach: How to Grow Without Hiring a Bunch of People

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[00:00:00] 

Brandi: Today's episode's all about the inter-agency approach, how you don't have to build an agency to scale. In fact, for most freelancers and service providers, hiring a big team just creates more stress and less profit. In this episode, I'm walking you through what it actually looks like to grow your business Without growing a soul sucking agency and what to do instead, if you want more freedom, more income, and more impact without all the people management. Welcome. Welcome back to another episode of the Serve Scale Soar podcast. My name is Brandi Mowles, and I am so excited to be with you today we are talking about one of my favorite topics that I have been harping on for the last six years, and that's how to scale your business.

Without growing an agency or creating a digital product. Now those two things are not bad things. There is a time and place for all of them, for some people, but it doesn't mean that it's right for most people. And so today

I'm really [00:01:00] gonna talk about what does it look like when you've hit your revenue ceiling and you feel that pressure of like, I wanna go to the next revenue number. But I don't wanna build an agency and you're not exactly sure if you wanna do a digital product or if that's right for you. I've been able to hit at least six figures, if not multiple, six figures every single year for the last seven years. With my one-on-one services, not including my course memberships, affiliate marketing, none of that, just my one-on-one services, six figures minimum.

Most of those years were multiple six figures with my one-on-one services. Even when it wasn't my primary income driver. So, and I've never had a team help me with that side. So we will talk about how can you get to multiple six figures Without becoming an agency. Here's the thing, you don't have to hire a team of 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 people and have a whole roster of [00:02:00] clients in order to scale.

What you do need to have is the right systems and the right business model in place, and we're not talking about working 40 hours a week. I'm talking about hitting multiple six figures while working less than 25 hours a week. And without managing a whole bunch of people, unless you got a family, then we know you're always managing a whole bunch of people.

We don't wanna add more to that, and that's actually the real reason why I never wanted an agency. I'm already running managing enough people as it is.

So let's jump on into this week's episode and really talk about where the agency model actually breaks down. 'cause I don't think it's a bad model. I just don't think it's really set up for most people. That are listening to this podcast, episode agencies work across the board. If you're looking to scale to really high numbers, like a million plus, and you're okay with low profit margins.

The average agency, and this is across the board, I [00:03:00] looked it up for advertising agencies that are small to midsize. They mostly run at 15 to 20% profit margins. I was like, holy moly, that sucks because I run my one-on-one services, and this has always been true, has always ran at 82% or higher.

So when we talk about agency models, now we're down to 10 to 20% profit. Where as a one-on-one service provider you're running at 75 to 80% profit margins. That's like game changer and especially when you get into breaking down the numbers and you actually do the math, which we have a training on this that you can go register for, that we'll talk about at the end where I actually break down what those numbers look like.

So. Let's talk some real talk. Most freelancers start hiring before they're even truly ready. This is where the agency model really starts breaking down. The common problems that come up with agency growth is your [00:04:00] profit margin sink. We just talked about that. You go from 75 to 80% profit margins down to 10 to 20% profit margins.

You become a manager instead of a service provider. Most people aren't at the leadership level when they start like hiring people that they need to be. In order to manage people. 'cause there's a difference between managing people and micromanaging. And a lot of us, especially service providers, we're good at micromanaging because we've been micromanaging clients to get what we need in order to do our job.

And it's different when you have a team. There also has to be a level of trust that's built. A lot of us are also not very trusting of other people doing our job. And I'm not calling you out, I'm also calling myself out. We're stretched thin, managing clients. And a team. So you want more time back and you think the answer to that is to hire a bunch of people, but then you're not getting any more time back.

You're actually now managing different people instead of clients. You're managing team members and your quality can slip, [00:05:00] which affects referrals and retention. So I actually consult with a lot of agencies. They hire me to come in and consult on what they're doing, which is so funny because I'm the inter-agency model.

But I have a lot of agencies who hire me to do consulting. 'cause one thing that I'm really good at is seeing where systems are broken and where the holes are. And so when a lot of these agencies that harm me that are. We're doing half a million to a million, and then they hire me to do consultant. One of the first things I see is quality control issues where balls are being dropped in.

Client retention has decreased over the years, so maybe they used to be able to keep a client for 12 months to two years, and now all of a sudden they're turning clients out every three months, and that comes to quality control. What is happening that clients are leaving? So quickly, and this is the biggest red flag.

The other red flag that I see is that there's not the correct systems in place, and there's [00:06:00] usually a bottleneck. So everything's coming back to certain people. So there's either a quality issue, and then it's like no one actually knows what they're responsible for. So are they doing copy? Are they doing graphics?

Is this person supposed to also do this? Who signs off on all this? And then also a client has to sign off on it. And then there's a communication breakdown, because usually what these agencies do is they put clients into project management systems, which get all so messy. Clients do not need to be in project management systems.

It gets messy. And so they need systems in place to actually make sure that that agencies running efficient. But what happens is there are low profit margins, high churn, and then also. The owner of the agency who wanted more time back is actually just spending all their time putting out fires, whether it's client fires or team member fires, or both at the same time.

So what they wanted was freedom with their schedule. They wanted more income, they wanted to [00:07:00] work class, they wanted this like agency dream. And then what they're getting on the flip side of that is. None of that. They're making less money. They're working more. They have clients that are angry. Their marketing has to double because they're churned so bad.

So when we think about the agency model, it doesn't mean all agencies are broken. But in the last several years, we have seen a lot of people who say that they have very successful agencies closing those agencies down. And I've been in the backend consulting on them and. Saying exactly what is going on.

We also have a lot of people in convergence for Clients Strategist Society who were working in agencies and saw the Hot Mess Express that was going on. Now they wanna go off on their own to get away from that. Just because the gurus are telling you to go start an agency doesn't mean that it's always the right path.

So what do you actually want? And that's where we need to come back to is does an agency model actually align [00:08:00] with your goals and what you want? Because most service providers, when I talk to them, they want more freedom in their schedule. They want more time. Time is so important, especially if you're a mom.

You're like craving that time. They want more income. And a lot of times they want less clients once they get to a certain level. You may be sitting there, but Brandy, I want more clients. But do you want more clients or do you want more income? Because more clients means more work, less clients, but more income can also be a possibility.

And that's what we teach in Strategist Society. They wanna do work they're really good at, they don't wanna manage people like that is not what they signed up for. As service providers, we have a heart of service. We really want to serve our clients and we like being in the background. And so a lot of times we're, we end up not being good at managing people, we were actually better at doing the work with clients or consulting or using our brain for strategy.

But that doesn't necessarily mean you translate well into. Being a manager of [00:09:00] people. The truth. An agency can give you growth, but it's not always the kind of growth you want. Freedom isn't just time off. It's control over your calendar and your capacity. So if you're like, yes, I want more revenue, I don't wanna manage a team, then this is where the anti agency approach comes in.

This is my signature approach, and this is what it is. The inter-agency approach is about growing through strategy, packaging, pricing, positioning, not a head count of how many clients you have. When people tell me they're working with 20 clients, I'm like, oh, that sucks. Like that's my response. Some people be like, oh my gosh, that's amazing.

I'm like, oh my gosh. That sucks because the more clients that you have. The more balls that can be dropped, and chances are you're not serving those clients as effectively as if you only had half of that. So 10 clients, you can serve better than you can. 20. There's three main [00:10:00] components of the anti agency approach.

One strategic packaging, two selective support, and three is streamlined systems.

When we talk about strategic packaging, we're talking about moving from being an implementer to a strategic partner.

We're talking about the strategist trifecta packaging, and this is something that we teach inside a strategist society, and it's having the three packages that you really want in order to be strategic with your offering. Now, this is once you've already landed a few clients, if you're just getting started, don't worry about this.

This is once you already have some clients, we have the done for you services, so that's probably what you're doing now. We have a done with you package, which can look like a six week project. It can look like a VIP day. We go over all that, and then you have a consulting or fractional CMO offer. And so what we do when we have all those is that we can focus on our champagne clients at different stages and what they [00:11:00] need right now, and they all feed into each other.

We focus on results, not just through the deliverables. We're not being like, Hey, you're gonna get this, this, and this. We're like, Hey, this is our outcome. This is what we're working towards, and we're gonna do what it takes to get there. So maybe in to get to your 20 K months, maybe you have five retainer clients and then you're doing one done with you client each month, and then maybe you have one VIP day and that gets you there. So to get there, we're offering different things . That way, your calendar has less things on it.

You're taking less discovery calls, and those discovery calls actually convert higher because instead of one package that only fits one person looking for retainer services, we actually can fit people into different packages and different levels of support. So when we have our strategic package in place, and those three, were converting more people into discovery calls.

We're keeping clients longer and we're meeting [00:12:00] clients where they are, but we're also positioning ourself as a strategist, not just a task doer. And then we go into selective support. The second step of the inter-agency approach, you don't need five subcontractors. You don't need junior ad managers. You need smart support, a VA to handle admin, a tech person.

For occasional builds a copywriter for client work if needed. Think specialist support, not full-time hires.

So when we think about these, when we talk about selective support, specialist support, I want you to first off, do you actually need the support or are you feeling overwhelmed by something else? A lot of strategist, society members will come to me and they're like, I need to hire. I need to hire. I need to hire.

And I'm like, great, let's think about what we need to hire for. And then they tell me, and I'm like, no, that's not what you need at all. So the first thing we're gonna do is we're gonna do a two week time audit. And through that two week time audit, we're really gonna see where our [00:13:00] gaps or holds, where we're spending time with one of our strategy society members.

She didn't need to hire anyone. She needed to get rid of all these meetings that were on her calendar. And we came up with a way to eliminate. Six hours off of her calendar every single week, y'all six hours of meetings that she was able to eliminate that weren't needed. And so when we do that, we find, okay, you don't need to hire anyone.

But then there are people who. They were really struggling with reporting, like reporting was just taking so long. So they were like, I'm gonna bring in someone to do reporting. Instead, we created an AI prompt and help them get through that. And now they use the AI prompt and created a little mini chat bot thingy that spits out the reports each week.

And that took off extra time each week and they weren't, they didn't need to hire, but then. We have people in strategist Society who do they have a full client roster. They are very streamlined. They did need to hire help. So what do they do? They did their time on it. They [00:14:00] saw the low laying tasks that could be outsourced, and they hired a VA paid per hour, and they got off all the busy work.

So there are times that you need to hire. I'm not saying that. You don't need to hire, but what I'm saying is there's a smart way to do it and a smart way to hire it doesn't mean you need to jump to junior ad managers and things like that. There's usually a better way and more effective way to get more time back without actually bringing on a junior ad manager.

Bringing on junior ad managers is where I see the biggest holes and pain points and fires needing to be put out. Instead, we're looking for selective specialists. Support. So if you're gonna hire first, let's look and see, is there anything we can automate? Is there anything that AI can help us with? Is there anything we can eliminate?

And then if there's not, what is the thing based on our time study that would give us the most time and flexibility back? Maybe it's a va, [00:15:00] maybe it's a graphic designer, but we need to figure out who it is and what they can do and how much time they're actually gonna take off our plate. And then we have to make sure our profit margins support paying them.

Okay, so then the third step in this process of the inter-agency approach is streamline systems. Are you using tools like HoneyBook, Clickup, sauna Notion, ddo, whatever it is? Do we have templates for onboarding, reporting audits, strategy docs? We should not be creating things from scratch. We should have systems and templates set up for everything.

Systems equal Scaling without people don't solve people problems with people. Solve them with processes first. That is the quickest way to solve problems is with systems. So it always surprises me when we onboard a new strategist site member and they're like, I'm doing six, eight, $10,000 months and I'm not using a project management system.

I'm like, wait, what? How do you keep track of [00:16:00] everything? And they're like, in my head or on a piece of paper and I'm like, no, no, no, no, no. And we click quickly, showed them how to get in the habit of using a project management system, or they're creating proposals in like Canva or Google Docs. And I'm like, no, we have one click installs into HoneyBook.

Why are we using something else? Even me when I just onboarded a new, um, done with you client? I would used all of our templates, the same templates I give in Strategist Society. I imported my contract. Quickly filled it out, got the invoice sent out. All of this took less than 10 minutes because I have templates.

Why are we recreating the wheel all the time? You have to have streamlined systems if you want to scale.

So what does this look like in real life? In real life, we have strategist society members who are working with. Five to six clients, they're making $20,000 and they're either letting AI and systems run their whole business while they're working 20 to 25 hours a week, or they have one support role on [00:17:00] their team.

You don't need. A big team in order to have big revenue, and they're still running at 75% profit. Then we have people who are doing 20, $30,000 a month. This is where I was without anyone supporting them on their team and running at 80, 85, 90% profit margins. Revenue grows, profit stays strong, and you stay in control with either one of these options.

But we have to focus on these three first. So many people wanna put the cart before the horse, and that's not how it works. When you have these three things dialed in, then you can be like, okay, now it's time to bring someone in if I need them. Maybe you can get away with not needing any of those people, and you can find ways to do things streamlined AI or to get rid of things that you shouldn't even be doing or you don't need to do.

Or maybe they're redundant. You don't need to build an agency to scale. We need to focus on packaging and positioning you as a strategist, only hiring [00:18:00] for leverage, not delegation, streamlining everything that can be templated or automated. If you've been thinking, do I really need to hire a team to grow?

This is your permission slip. You don't.

So if you're ready to build a wildly profitable service-based business without building an agency, this is exactly what we do. In Strategist Society, you'll get coaching, training, the framework to help you scale to 20 K plus months without growing a soul sucking agency and loving your clients that you're working with.

So if you're like, yes, Brandy, this is exactly what I need, this is the podcast episode I needed, then go to the strategist society.com and you can apply to work together with us. And I am beyond excited to hear how you're gonna use the inter-agency approach to build your. Business. Remember, focus on profit fulfillment and flexibility, not vanity metrics like your team size or how many clients you have.

Until next week, my [00:19:00] friends, go out, serve your clients, scale your business, and soar into the success you deserve.