The DigitalMarketer Podcast · Scalable Media Network

The Amazon-Inspired Secrets to Effortless Agency Growth with Jordan Ross

April 16, 2024·37 min·3 clips

Jordan Ross reveals Solomon's paradox: why you can't solve your own business problems.

Agency owners get too close. The cold open starts with a blunt operator point: outside advisors can often see problems faster because the people inside the business are wrapped up in emotion, bias, and proximity. Mark DeGrasse introduces Jordan Ross, founder and CEO of Eight Figure Agency, for a conversation about scaling, exiting, and keeping some sanity while running an agency. The main subject is culture, but Ross keeps it practical. Culture is what people say, do, feel, and perform when leadership is not around. That definition has some bite. A business can demand high output and still leave people resentful, which Ross connects to his time at Amazon and the company’s own growing pains. Output by itself is not enough. The better question is whether people can perform at a high level and still feel okay when they go home and talk about the job. Ross turns that into manager homework. He says leaders need a process for tracking four variables if they want people to stay. First are personal short-term and long-term goals. Then come professional short-term and long-term goals. Money is named plainly too. Ross includes what each person wants to make now and later, so compensation ambition becomes something to manage instead of something to guess at. Then he adds love language. It is the oddball variable, but he makes the case that it helps leaders understand how someone feels valued. Mark sets up the agency owner problem, while Ross builds the culture framework. The ad boundary is clear. Near the end of the supplied excerpt, the audio moves into Digital Marketer certification material about product photos, UGC, and e-commerce modules instead of the Jordan Ross culture thread.

As heard by us

A practical agency-growth discussion that turns culture into daily management work: goals, pay expectations, recognition, and retention.

Jordan Ross treats agency growth as a management problem rooted in culture, not just momentum. Mark DeGrasse opens with small businesses under pressure to keep people motivated and growing, and Ross defines culture in blunt operational terms: what employees say, do, feel, and…

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Why you'd press play

If your agency is growing and the people side feels harder to read, start here.

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