Ep 47: From Fired to $4M Leads: Phil Bacon on Building a Productized Agency

Key Takeaways

• Fired on a Friday, freelancing by Monday: Phil’s agency journey began after an unexpected dismissal.
• Early growth came from four key relationships—proof that nurturing a tight referral network can fill an entire pipeline.
• Retainers + the first official hire were the “this is a real agency now” moment.
• Standardising services into a product catalogue ended price haggling and let the team quote proposals without Phil’s input.
• Founder bottlenecks are inevitable; recognising and delegating them is step one in scaling.
• True “lead problems” often start higher up the funnel—fix awareness and consistency first.
• Foundations beat gimmicks: streamlined tech stack (Zoho CRM → email, trimmed ad spend, live-chat bot) yielded seven-figure opportunities for a niche B2B client.
• Niching down to tech & engineering manufacturers keeps positioning razor sharp while still big enough to grow.

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