The Playbook Podcast from Agency Focus

In this episode, John Suder and Bart Mroz break down a smarter way for agencies to find sales opportunities using one of the most honest signals available: job postings. They explain why job postings are more useful than vague intent signals like fundi...

Discover why traditional ABM often falls short for founder-led agencies and how a shift in strategy and tools can unlock deeper client relationships and more efficient growth. This episode explores a revolutionary approach to revenue intelligence that ...

Why QBRs Fail Agencies (and What to Do Instead): Build a Team Listening System John Suder and co-host Bart Mroz argue that the traditional quarterly business review (QBR) is “a confession” that an agency hasn’t been paying attention during the 89 days ...

John Suder and co-host Bart Mroz argue that asking “Which jobs will AI take?” is the wrong question because task-based “exposure to AI” models fail to predict real outcomes. Citing Benedict Evans, they note that despite decades of automation tools, the...

John Suder and Bart Mroz challenge agency owners to audit their client roster by writing, in one sentence with a number, the measurable outcome each client is paying for; if it takes a paragraph, the agency is selling activity instead of results. They ...

John Suder and co-host Bart Mroz discuss why agencies are calling the market “challenging,” arguing it’s more than a temporary downturn: structural shifts are reshaping the agency business. They explain how the past two decades of tailwinds—expanding i...

John Suder and Bart Mroz of Agency Focus discuss why flat or slow-growing agencies often misdiagnose their problem as “needing more clients,” then outline Bart’s framework of three leaky revenue buckets: new money (net new logos), current money (growin...

At the Agency Hackers Conference in Miami, Bart Mroz interviews Steve Guberman of Agency Outsight about the agency landscape heading into 2026. Steve says Q1 showed renewed contract activity and more normal sales cycles, though uncertainty around wars,...

At a Bureau event in Austin, Bart Mroz (Agency Focus) interviews Carl Smith (The Bureau) about where the agency industry is headed in 2026. Carl argues agencies are stuck chasing past “easy mode” and have become noisy generalists, while clients increas...

Marty Ringlein, CEO and co-founder of Agree.com ( https://Agree.com ) and a longtime designer/engineer and agency owner, discusses his agency, which launched in 2005–06 and was acquired by Twitter in 2012 to help Twitter go mobile-first; then a year at...

Agency Focus is the podcast for agency owners who are done winging it. Every week, host Bart Mroz sits down with operators, founders, and growth experts to talk about what actually moves the needle — client acquisition, business development, and buildi...