WordPress, agency life, and entrepreneur observations
Excerpts from The Friday Chaser
It’s a filter, not a pitch
Open up the analytics for your agency. If you have an “About” page in your main navigation, chances are it’s one of your top 3 most visited pages (it’s my 2nd). Then go ask your…
May 29, 2026
Making a case to hire you
Last week we talked about portfolios and how they help prospects see if they can picture themselves in your work. Case studies have some overlap, but they do something different. Where a portfolio says “We…
May 22, 2026
The best version (your version)
When I was teasing this series, I said “Curate your portfolio like a salesperson, not a designer.” But what does that actually mean? Imagine you handed the same assignment to a designer and a salesperson; build…
May 15, 2026
Reviews reduce their risk
Turns out a lot of you wanted the deeper-dive on the 5 underrated assets I touched on last week. So let’s kick it off with reviews. Put yourself in your prospect’s shoes for a second… They’re…
May 8, 2026
Criminally Underrated Assets
It’s easy to get overwhelmed by all the ways you can market your agency. Maybe you should start a YouTube channel or make TikTok videos? Write a blog a week? Go all-in on a newsletter?…
May 1, 2026
Showing your progress
For the first eight years running my agency, the same thing kept happening: I’d hand over a design I was proud of, and the client would take a red pen to it. Not just “make…
Apr 24, 2026
“Spending” time
It’s easy to spend a full day working and not touch the thing you know actually matters… The marketing stuff you’ve been putting off. The pricing you’ve been meaning to revisit. The follow-ups you said…
Apr 17, 2026
A CEO retreat
If you’re like most agency owners, you have a list a mile long of things you want to (or need to) do for your agency, but never seem to find the time. Looking at your…
Apr 10, 2026
The part I keep getting stuck on
Our annual survey came out this week, and truthfully, I’ve been pouring through the numbers since the first submissions came in a month ago — so I’ve had some time to sit with it. It’s…
Apr 3, 2026
Neither interesting, nor valuable
It wasn’t that long ago when simply having a website made your business stand out. You remember, when we’d proudly say “www dot…” 😅 But it didn’t take long before technology made it possible for…
Mar 27, 2026
Outcomes, not output
I’ve always tended to keep myself busy. Even on the weekends, I hate being idle. I still get up at 4am and find something to do (for the past 9 Saturdays it’s been making two…
Mar 20, 2026
That’s not what we sell
We’ve all been doing this long enough that it’s hard to really put ourselves in our customer’s shoes. I’ve certainly been guilty of talking over a client’s head, leaving out details, or assuming knowledge they…
Mar 13, 2026
You get to decide
It’s always interesting seeing the first submissions roll in for our annual survey. I spent about 30 hours on pre-production — wrestling with questions, rephrasing things meticulously, cutting down the list, re-ordering — and I…
Mar 6, 2026
Big, unignorable, flashing neon sign
Niching is one of those topics we’ve beaten to death over the years. In theory, there are a ton of benefits. But in practice, it’s hard to actually do. Either we go too broad: “I…
Feb 27, 2026
Seems pretty valuable to me
I’ve long been out of the business of trying to “convince” businesses they need a website. But with AI answering questions through platforms like ChatGPT or directly in the search results with Google’s AI responses,…
Feb 20, 2026
The dreaded “hit by a bus” question
It feels like it comes up in the group at least a few times a year (especially for solopreneurs)… The dreaded “hit by a bus” question. Basically, if you suddenly and unexpectedly couldn’t work, what…
Feb 13, 2026
Do my actions actually match my intentions?
I can’t believe how fast January just disappeared. It feels like we were just gearing up for the new year, and now we’re already a month in. In our TABLE groups, that means were getting…
Feb 6, 2026
Knowing people and being known
If you’re running an agency, there’s a good chance a big chunk of your leads come from referrals. That makes a lot of sense when you think about why. We sell something that’s expensive and…
Jan 30, 2026
You’ll barely recognize where you started
If you asked me about all the things I should stop doing, it wouldn’t take long to make a list. Eating like garbage… Doom-scrolling before bed… Checking work email on my phone during the weekend….
Jan 23, 2026
Procrastination dressed up as productivity
I’ve noticed that as business owners, there’s a little white lie we like to tell ourselves. We talk about the things we want (more sales, higher profits, better visibility, less time stuck in production work),…
Jan 16, 2026
