How an Agency Grew Fast to Over $4 Million and Sold Quick

<p>Hollis Carter is an entrepreneur and avid skier who, after founding many companies in his career, recently became the co-founder of the <a href="http://babybathwater.com/" target= "_blank" rel="noopener">Baby Bathwater Institute</a>, a membership-based community of entrepreneurs with a focus on cultivating natural, mutually beneficial relationships. Since his business relied on many in-person events, it was quite affected by the Covid 19 pandemic and subsequent restrictions. During this time of cancellations and being stuck at home, Hollis thought of a way to add value to the members during this new situation and started to offer a series of services with a performance-based model. This model quickly grew and he ended up selling it before actually having to fully build an agency. In this interview, he talked about the process of building and growing an agency to over $4 million and then selling it, all during a pandemic.</p> <h2>3 Golden Nuggets</h2> <ol> <li><strong>Growing an agency during Covid.</strong> Before the pandemic, Hollis was organizing many in-person events. Once they were canceled <a href="https://jasonswenk.com/4-things-hard-times/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">because of this new situation</a>, he realized he had a perfect opportunity to offer a new service that would offer value to members of his mastermind. There was already a business relationship and he knew their products and believed in them. So he got ready to work under a performance-based model. “It was really very simple,” he says. The offer included podcast interviews, email lists, and content sites. He spent on setting up all the automation and tracking and found someone to handle that. And of course, under this model he was working with clients, not for them.</li> <li><strong>Simplifying the offer.</strong> How can you <a href= "https://jasonswenk.com/back-to-the-basics/" target="_blank" rel= "noopener">make things simpler for you</a>? First of all, don’t just take a good deal. This agency had the advantage of having a group of