Interview with Lee Jackson discussing trends in 2021

Welcome to today's episode of the Agency Accelerator Podcast. We just ended a challenging year and in today's episode we are looking forward to trends in 2021. And it's a first for me today because it's the first time we've had a repeat guest with us and it's the wonderful Lee Jackson. So he shares his insights into what he sees coming down the road in 2021. So let's get on with today's episode of the Agency Accelerator Podcast.

Accelerate your agency's profitable growth with tools, tips and value added interviews with your host agency owner and coach, Rob DaCosta.

So welcome to today's episode of the Agency Accelerator Podcast. Today's a bit of a first for me because we have our first repeat guest, Lee Jackson. And Lee was on with us way back in March of this year on episode nine where we were talking about growth and transformation. So I am excited to have Lee back with us today. And just in case you haven't listened to that episode, Lee helps web agencies fall back in love with their business, which I really love that strap line, by the way. And he also runs Agency Transformation Live and is the co founder of EventsEngine. And if that wasn't enough, he also runs the Agency Trailblazer podcast. So welcome back, Lee. And I don't know how I did with your introduction, but is there anything else you wanted to add?

No, that's all absolutely correct. You can also find out a little bit of history in episode number nine of the Agency Accelerator Podcast.

Oh, yeah, exactly. So I thought this episode is going to be going out right at the end of an interesting year of 2020. So I thought it'd be really good to get some sense from you of what trends you've seen in your world with your clients and then move on to talk about some perspectives on what we might expect in 2021.

Cool.

So, yeah, Tammy, just let's just start off by saying what I mean, obviously so many things have been thrust upon us, but what are the typical trends you've seen happen this year with agencies?

I think most agencies have been surprised that they've been able to continue throughout this time. I think there was a small period of time, say, early kind of February, March 8th time, where a lot of agencies were very scared, the phone perhaps stopped ring, people started to freak out a little bit. People weren't spending and agency owners were worried that they would be struggling through 2020. But I just think that that was an initial reaction by the entire world saying, oh no, what's happening, what do we do? And everyone kind of freezes for a moment. But what I've seen, it's very common. There are a few agencies, unfortunately, that are still struggling. But I've seen for most agencies, their clients reaching out for help. If we think about this, we are technical people, we understand the web technology. We're already used to collaborating with freelancers, with consultants and with people all around the world. So all of this is second nature to us. And what we're seeing for a lot of the agencies that we work with is agency owners helping their clients transition from the physical to the digital space, but also enabling those clients to do more, I. E. Sell more or provide more services online. So that's actually outworked into more sales, more services, more work for these agencies. So whilst there was that initial fear in early 2020, it's actually turned itself around. And we were just talking before this, weren't we, buddy, about how tired we both are. Being quite busy. And I think a lot of people in 2020, especially agencies, have been extremely busy as people shift into this, I hate to say it, new normal.

I think it's interesting, as you say, I think probably we were all in shock back in sort of March time whenever this happened. And I think some, sadly, some agencies thought they could kind of almost hibernate and tread water and wait for it to be over. And of course, here we are, however, many months later, nine months later, and we're no further forward, really, till the vaccine comes out. I also think I saw some agencies being afraid to sell because they almost thought it was in bad taste. But I was saying to them, look, guys, if you're providing value to your audience and you can genuinely help them and like you say, help them shift to this online virtual world, then why on earth wouldn't you be trying to have those conversations with your clients?

I mean, a great example is locally here. There are many businesses, that's cafes, that's shops, et cetera, who are struggling to try and sell things online. So you'll see a craft company that creates such amazing crafts and things for the home and amazing gifts for Christmas, for example, and they're left using their mobile phone, trying to sell stuff through their Facebook page by uploading pictures and hoping that somebody will get in touch and maybe do a PayPal link, and it's all manual and it's all a nightmare and they're struggling to shift stock. And then you then have local agencies coming in and saying, hey, we can help you. We're not going to Take advantage of you. We do this for a living. We can help you create a shopping cart, we can help you shift the stock, we can help you with your stock management. All of that sort of stuff. That's not selling, that's not taking advantage necessarily. That what that is doing is really helping out a local business who is struggling right now to cope because they are not digital, digitally equipped. I'm sure other people have said this, but I've kind of coined a phrase for. For 2020 and at least beyond where there, I feel there'll be a digital renaissance. Other people will word it in different ways, but I think businesses are recognizing right now that digital, I. E. Being online, selling your services online, being connected via social media, all of those, having digital connections of some manner to your employees, using online tools, using productivity tools, all of these things are so freaking important because they have been the glue that have held us for 2020 and we just can no longer ignore it.

Yeah, and there's. I want to come back to the digital renaissance expression in a moment, but it seems to me there's two aspects to this. There's the technology aspect of literally helping someone move, perhaps a physical bricks and mortar store to be online, and all of the gubbings that goes with setting up the website and the e commerce aspect of it. But then of course there's the marketing piece as well, which is driving traffic in a slightly different way to get the footfall that might have come to your shop to now be going to your online shop. I've got a friend who has some Etsy stores and sells various things on Etsy stores. And he was under the misapprehension until sadly, he found out for himself that if he put his great products on Etsy and on Facebook, then they would sell like hotcakes. And of course, you know, it's now found out several months later that that is not true.

All right, well, some people are having that, though I guess it depends on the product.

Yeah, I mean, the product he's selling are not essential things. They're more like gifts and stuff. But I think the thing is he thought build it and they will come. And unfortunately that isn't the case. So we need to not only get the technology piece right, but we also need to get the marketing and the sales piece right. So that covers all of our agencies, from web development agencies through to marketing, comms, PR and so on.

So a great example of that then is locally, especially during the first lockdown, we had local supply companies who supplied hospitality, so they would provide food, eggs, you know, you name it, all of the essentials to the cafes, to the hotels and everything. And suddenly all of that business was completely switched off. On the flip side, you had normal people trying to go to the supermarket and you couldn't get into the supermarket because the queues were huge and you couldn't get on the online booking system because it was absolutely rammed. So there were people like us who could not actually order food. However, these local suppliers caught onto that and used social media to essentially build a brand new audience of consumers and attract people to their store, of which they were then able to fill the space that the supermarkets were struggling to fill, which was getting the essential groceries to our front door via delivery, via their. Via their websites and presumably supported by their local agencies. So that was fantastic. And for us, especially at the time my wife was pregnant, we were having, having to stay at home. That was an absolute lifesaver for us.

Yeah, I love hearing those stories of real entrepreneurial spirit and you know, to use that awful word of people working out how to pivot because, you know, you've seen some, some especially like in the retail space, you've seen some companies who have just sort of moaned about lockdown and all the rest of that and not really done anything. And then you've seen other people that have said, okay, well how do we get our product to our audience? And is. Is our audience slightly different now? A good example for me locally is a wholesalers that sold fruit and veggies to hotels and to conferences and so on. And of course they couldn't do that anymore. So they very quickly started selling to people like you and I. And as you say, I could suddenly get a box of good quality veg. I was supporting a local business and I was avoiding that awful experience of having to go into the supermarket, which when we first went into lockdown was quite a challenge.

Did you stock up on toilet rolls?

I didn't understand how to say hand on heart, that I have not bought one toilet roll.

Ew.

In this period of. Because I go to Costco and buy them from there. But yeah, crazy. No, I haven't. And it's. I mean, that's a whole other topic. But what is going on in human psychology that we suddenly decide that we should buy loads of toilet rolls or pasta or something.

Yeah. Although it hasn't happened, this lockdown. Not, not locally here anyway. There's been no rush on local services, which has been great.

Yeah. It doesn't feel too much like we're in anywhere near as tough a lockdown as we were last time, we're supposed to be. Have you seen any other examples of any of your clients pivoting and serving their audience slightly different way?

Well, so you mentioned that I'm the founder of Event Engine, and our clients are events organizers. So this is conferences that rely on physical footfall. They need people in a room. They have exhibitors, especially for the larger expos as well, that we support. So these are huge spaces, physical locations. Everybody comes to one place. You meet each other, you see each other, you make friends, you develop relationships, you look at products, you touch products. You know, this is an entire industry that is practically on its knees when you can't meet together. And yet we are seeing with our clients, them embracing online and creating experiences for their exhibitors, for their visitors online in some incredible ways. We have one conference organizer, one of our clients. They look after multiple conferences per year, and they've decided to put, at least for the next six months still, all of their events digitally, as opposed to paying deposits and not being 100% sure if they're going to be allowed to do it in six months. They're just saying, right, for the next six months now we're digital. And they've essentially been reviewing that and then continuing throughout the year. I mean, it's a good job they did that, to be honest, because a lot of event companies thought that in October this would have all blown over. But as we're now aware, that's not the case. Even with the positive shoots of a vaccine, I think event companies are still making those decisions. Instead of hanging on and waiting and postponing. Instead, what they're doing is embracing technology and leaning on their agency partners like ourselves and others in the industry to be able to deliver great experiences and still get those results. What's really important, something that I've been teaching for a long time, is kind of, you should be driven by the outcomes. So how can you create the same outcome in a different environment? So, like you said, the dreaded word pivot. I use that word sometimes. I like to say pirouette. It sounds way more fancy. But the pivot isn't necessarily you changing your business and suddenly becoming a specialist in accountants. The pivot can be, how can we help you get those same results? How can we help you deliver that thing you've delivered in a completely different and unique way? And that is still a pirouette or a pivot.

Yeah, and I love that. I mean, I'll link to the show notes, but I did an interview with someone who produces video and they do a lot of stuff for events. And he, he was talking about that they worked for a company that had one big event, you know, where dinner jackets and all that kind of stuff. Over a few days and very close to lockdown, it all changed and they had to really quickly move it online, which I think you probably did with your agency Transformation Live, which I'll ask you about in a sec. Yeah, but he talked about how they just did some really interesting things with augmented reality, how they still managed to do their champagne reception virtually by sending everyone bottles of champagne. And everyone showed up on Zoom in their DJs and they were still able to kind of create some of that community spirit, albeit in a different way. And I think, you know, probably for quite some time to come, event organizers are still going to have to think about different ways of serving their audience and perhaps also look at different revenue streams. Whereas before they might have had one big event, they might have to look at different ways of enabling their audience to consume the content that they would have delivered at that big event.

Exactly.

I think, right, Lee, that when we last spoke, you were coming up to your agency Transformation Live event, which I think you probably quite quickly had to move that online. Am I right in saying that?

Well, yeah, it was mid lockdown. My event would have happened during lockdown, so I had no choice but to move it online. Did see the signs obviously quite early and decided to go all in. I sent out a message to everybody explaining that it was too risky if people were going to be able to travel. A lot of people had to make decisions whether they were going to travel globally because we had people from all around the world wanting to come in. So it made sense for me to convert it to a completely digital event and offer a free ticket if we could do a physical event the following year. We've also made the choice again this year because vaccine will still potentially take six more months for those ticket holders. We're extending that free ticket again for another digital event this year and we're going to do another digital get together. If we can do a small physical one this year, we certainly will for a day three if we're allowed to have X amount of people in a room. But that would be something we do only if and when we know we can do it.

Yeah. And I guess the message that you're giving about the value and the outcomes is the same message I say to people, which is if you can find ways of serving your clients, if you can really understand what they're trying to achieve and you can find ways of helping them, then you should be getting out there and helping them. And as I said, I've seen some of my clients who have retracted because they thought they could just hold it out or they thought they had, there was no way of doing that. And then I've seen another client. I have a client that is a PR agency that works in the health and beauty space. And they've just done a brilliant job at, you know, pivoting and helping their clients who are running spas and so on, service their audience in a different way, whether that be through getting their products online or providing tutorial videos and all that kind of stuff. So they've actually managed to remain pretty busy in a sector that you would assume has just been completely decimated by 2020.

It's insane, isn't it?

Yeah. So let's just turn our heads towards a, hopefully a slightly brighter time and set maybe a better work life balance year for many of us as well at 2021. And I'm interested for you to get your crystal ball out and do a bit of gazing and maybe talk to us a bit more about this term digital Renaissance and just some of the things that you think we might see in 2021.

Well, so I actually branded up a podcast called the Digital Renaissance Podcast, and I was going to start doing all sorts of content for business owners around it. And I did about six episodes and then realized I was making the same mistake I make all the time, which is get a new idea and go with it without thinking it through and without thinking of what actually I wanted as a result of it, and then realizing it was a distraction and realizing that I was again taking on too much and had to rein it all back. And then the reason I say that is I really think that people will look back at 2020 and go, Holy crap, what a year. That was scary. And it was amazing all at the same time. We really need to focus on what's important, and I think a lot of businesses are going to focus on what's really important, making some really big decisions, some really big changes in how they operate, in where they operate. So can't remember if we talked on the recording now or whether this was beforehand, but we've made the decision for one of our agencies you mentioned at the beginning. I own two businesses. One of our AGENC is going fully, fully virtual now. So we're closing the office here, which none of us have been in for nearly a year. We've Got young kids, et cetera. It made no sense for us all to work in the same office environment and put each other at risk. We've had nearly a year all working digitally from home and it's worked really well. So we're going to continue that and close an office. And I think that will carry on throughout the world. A lot of businesses finding ways to work digitally. I am concerned for the high street especially as I imagine people are going to still be nervous even mid next year. Even if there is a vaccine, I think the world is going to slowly creep out of the hidey holes kind of very tentatively. And I do think there are going to be a lot of companies that do struggle. But somebody mentioned the other day that perhaps the shop, real estate spaces that may be empty might start to shift a little bit and you might find local offices, you know, people who might have gone to a shared office space might actually be renting in what used to be an old grocery store, grocery shop and converting that into a small place for them to work, et cetera. So I'm imagining we're going to see the high street change a little bit as well with a few more service based businesses. I mean, I know I'm doing big predictions here, but you did say get the crystal ball, mate. So, so these are the sorts of things I can see and obviously for the digital renaissance, I can see agencies having conversations with their clients saying what outcomes do you need? What were the outcomes you were after in 2019? What was highlighted during 2020 that was absolutely essential and really, really important to your business. And Therefore how in 2021 can we help you do that? Is that by rolling out software? Is that by rolling out a brand new website? Is that by creating something new for you? How can we help you? So I can see a lot of agencies growing in that capacity as well.

Yeah. How do you. You talked about, I think is a really good point. A couple of things that you and I are so similar on is that I think many entrepreneurs get seduced by starting projects and not finishing them. And I'm guilty. I'm just trying to take someone on full time at the moment to just really help me organize my life and do a lot of the data stuff that I'm not very good at. So I kind of get that. But how do you think agencies will be able to figure out what is important? That might be a silly question, but if they look back on 2020 and they go blimey, that was crazy, did so many things I need to focus in 2021. How do they go about working that out?

Oh, absolutely. Easy. Sorry. Because if you listen to episode nine, we went through. Well, I think we did. Because if it was agency transformation, I will have gone through my five stages of transformation with you. So that's what my event's all about. It's the five stages of transformation. And we really, really believe that to transform any business or even to start a business, you need to start right at the very beginning, which is your identity. Once you've worked out your entity, you, you build your value, then you start to build your platform on your message, then you improve on your output and then you scale for the future, et cetera. That's kind of the five stages. And with the business, if you look at 2020 and take a look at you as a company, think about what are your strengths, what is your mission, what's your passion, who are you helping, what problems are you solving? All of that is really, really crucial to building a good, solid business. A good, solid foundation for a business that you love. So for us, for, we love building event websites inside of event engine and creating experiences and helping our clients attract high paying exhibitors and high paying sponsors. So it's very, very specific. We get a real buzz out of that. We know that there's real high value in that, which means we've dropped all of our other ideas and we're just focusing in on that very specific mission. We know who we want to help, we know why we want to help them. We absolutely love doing it, we're passionate about it. And all of the other ideas which were slight distractions where we thought, perh, we could create our own basecamp version of the event software that we have. And all these other little distractions have all just been left by the wayside so we can focus on doing the really, really important things that we know make money, but we also know resonate with our passions and our skills. So what I would encourage any agency listening right now to have a look. What are your passions? What are your skills? Who are the people that you're looking after? What are their biggest pain points and problems? And how do your products and services solve all of those problems and that's really where you want to be focusing your business. I've not seen any full service agency, any agency that spreads themselves too thin, be successful. Perhaps you have. I've never seen it because I've been one before and it was hell. But the moment you go right, these few things are really important to me. I'm really good at them as an agency. And these people over here, that camp of people, be they an industry, be they a type of client, whoever they are, they're the people that I want to serve and I'm going to go look after them like crazy.

Yeah, I mean, I completely concur with that. And I, you know, I talk about all the time about the importance of niching and. And how to work that out. By working out who are the people that you can help the best, where are you most profitable and where's your passion? And the overlap of those three areas really helps people understand that. And that's what you're saying, really, that's the sweet spot.

But I think people will look at 2020 and go, oh, my gosh, we ended up doing this thing for people and it was very successful and people really appreciated it and we loved doing it. And look at 2019 and look at 2018. Look at all that stuff we were doing. And that will help people, I think, focus on the most important products and services that they've got to offer. I do think 2021 is going to be different for a lot of people in a positive way because we've all been so busy and then all being at home and realized home ain't that bad.

Yeah. I also think that perhaps, rightly or wrongly, a lot of agencies have tried to do lots of different things in 2020 because they felt like that's what they needed to do to survive.

Yeah, fair enough. That's good.

I hope that people will take stock, and this episode is a perfect time for people just to take stock of their year as they start planning for the following year to actually apply what you're saying, Lee, and think about where they do their best work, where they enjoy it and where their skills are and what their audience needs.

Absolutely.

In my group coaching call this week, one of the questions we had from someone was the fact that I'm working with this particular agency to help them establish their niche and they have a business development company that works for them who's saying you shouldn't be niching because if you niche, you will end up with a lot of conflict of interest. You're narrowing your audience, and that's going to be really problematic for you. And it was a really great question, really, because I clearly don't agree at all with what the business development company's saying, and neither did the other members. And the message to her was, no, that sounds like it's more to do with the business development agency than your strategy. It's going to be so much easier to win business when you have a clear niche and look different and be an expert and charge high fees. So I am completely with you.

I don't know how the phrase goes, but something along the lines of if you serve everybody, then you serve nobody. And even putting it right down into a classic networking situation, if you were going to stand up in a network meeting and say I'm looking for anybody who needs a website, then I guarantee you will get zero or very unlikely to get any leads whatsoever. And even if you get a lead, it's probably not going to be the sort of lead you need the moment you stand up and say I am looking for this particular type of business who has this particular problem. So blah, blah, blah blah, you are pre qualifying those leads and you're going to get some good quality leads.

Yeah, absolutely, completely agree. Any other crystal ball gazing thoughts about next year?

I imagine that we are going to. We've seen this anyway. So for years we've seen anybody starting an agency and that's about thing because we see it advertised on, on Facebook, et cetera. You can start an agency. There's YouTube videos on how to start an agency and we do have a lot of companies or a lot of people appearing saying oh well, I know how to install a WordPress or a Joomla. Or a Drupal theme. I can whack a site together, I can use a page builder. I'm now an agency and I imagine there are a lot of people who had a bit of a passion for tinkering, a bit like we all did many years ago back in the 90s because we're all old now and, and they're looking at starting agencies themselves. So. So it's not a bad thing for us as competition because clearly these are people starting something new, they're probably not going to be successful at doing it, et cetera. But that's then in itself the other problem. You have the cost of entry potentially being driven down because there appears to be all this extra competition. But then you also have the bad name that may result for the industry because of the people who are trying to get cheap sites because they're brand new and not doing a good job. And you may see an increase therefore in people's negative experiences with design agencies, with web agencies, with social media agencies, etc. I would caveat though that with where we've talked about niching, where we've said hey, be a specialist agency serving a particular type of person with a particular type of need Then that is going to elevate you to the extent that you will not have to compete anyway with those that I have described. But that's. That is just one little worry I have for 20, 21 and beyond is a marked increase in the low cost of entry because you're already seeing it, aren't you, in the design industry with these pay monthly unlimited design services, et cetera. So I'm not sure what's going to happen next and that kind of worries me a little bit.

Yeah, I think you're just giving a big advert for saying guys show up as a specialist gives me understand who your ideal target customer is and pains that they have that you can solve and market yourself to those people. Don't end up getting into a battle of some of price because there's a freelancer who offering to build a website for 500 quid.

I'd have gone bankrupt in 2008 if I'd have carried on with the price war, because we did enter that price war. And even in 2008, Upwork, which was called something else now I can't remember its name, was still a hell of a lot cheaper than we could ever hope to be. And we were trying to compete at that level. Thankfully, we realized what we were doing and went down the niche. But, yeah, we were very much in danger of entering that space and being no more.

Yeah, well, there you go. And I think, you know, when times are tough or when an agency's just struggling to get clients, there is a tendency to spread themselves further and then, you know, differentiate themselves on price. And that is a road to a lot of stress, a lot of nervous thing and a lot of clients who don't really appreciate what you do.

Absolutely.

So let me ask you the question that I always ask and I'm. I hope you didn't cheat on this, but I'm really interested to ask you the same question and see if you give me the same answer. Because, you know, I ask all my guests, if you go back in time, give your younger self one piece of advice, what would it be? I got a feeling you're going to say the same thing. But let me ask you.

I was bullied all my life at school and it was hell. I hated school. I was always scared and I always felt like I had to try and become somebody that I wasn't. So this is very, very easy for me and that is to be yourself and to recognize who you are. I listened for a very long time to who I thought I had to be because of these bullies and created a Persona that wasn't real, that wasn't the real Lee. And I did the same in business as well. And clients bullied us as well. And I tried to create this whole Persona of Lee, the guy who's in a suit and tie, who's very professional, who's very confident, yada, yada, yada, yada, and just created this entire Persona. Did it in my career as well, and move my way through businesses. It works, don't get me wrong. But the entire time I was miserable, you know, and I was working with people that I didn't resonate with, with people who were horrible, who I didn't like. All of the above, did it in business, attracting clients that were not right. And a few years ago, when I launched the podcast and finally decided to just show up as me, which is a goofball who loves Star Wars. I love programming. I love old machines. I love programming and basic and doing stuff on the raspberry PI. And I like to wear a cap and I like to wear skinny jeans and a hoodie and rock up and just be myself and all of that sort of stuff. The moment I started being myself, everything changed. We started to attract really great clients. I've signed hundreds of thousands of pounds worth of contracts in skinny jeans and a hoodie in big corporate London offices, and nobody batted an eyelid. So I would say, be your freaking self. I would tell myself that over and over again, be true to you, which is why identity is so fricking important. And I feel like I would have said that last time, I can't be sure.

But the good thing is you say that, but you articulated it in a slightly different way. So I think that's really good.

Oh, good.

I think. Well, that advice just expands in all sorts of ways, doesn't it? In terms of, like, the business that you are, the culture of your business, that kind of you take. I did chuckle because I saw in your Facebook group the other day you posted a picture of yourself.

I always take the mick out myself.

In a shirt and tie.

Lee, Someone said I look like Jason Statham. I was like, yes, thank you, I'll take that.

But a really good bit of advice. So, Lee, just last, before we wrap this episode up, how can people find out more about Lee Jackson and all of the things that you are up to?

The easiest way is agencytrailblazer.com that's the podcast. And if you want to come and hang out in the group where I make fun of myself mainly, then that's just put forward slash group on the end or click on the big link at the top of the website and come and join the Facebook group as well, of which Rob is also in.

Yeah, I can highly recommend it that you've managed to create a Facebook group that's really engaged and lots of interesting conversations go on. So I would encourage everyone to do that and also to go check out Lee's great podcast as well. So great to have you back on the show again, Lee, and and I'll get you back on at the end of 2021, which seems a long way.

Away, but does that mean I'll be the first third time guest?

You probably will be. So there you go. I hope you found that really interesting and useful. I always find it really insightful getting different perspectives when I have guests on the podcast. As ever, please share the episode with your colleagues. Make sure you've hit the subscribe button, and if you enjoy listening to the Agency Excitement Accelerator Podcast, please consider leaving a review since that helps the algorithm get my podcast out to more people. Other than that, have a brilliant rest of the week and I'll see you next week on the next episode of the Agency Accelerator Podcast.