Cameron Gawley is the Co-Founder and CEO of BuzzShift, a digital growth agency for early-stage startups and industry-leading brands such as USAA, Verizon, Neighborhood Goods, Four Corners Brewing Co., Mooala, Everlane, Jack Black Skincare, and Twilio. BuzzShift works with both high-growth startups and mature industry leaders to deliver the strategic planning resources and digital marketing services essential to growth.
In addition to leading BuzzShift, Cameron is the founder of a Direct-to-Consumer (DTC) Luxury CBD Wellness brand, LevelOrganics, and investor in a stealth Men’s Skincare brand. He also serves as an investor and advisor to a number of tech startups, teaches Digital Marketing Analytics at Southern Methodist University, and mentors a number of passionate entrepreneurs on their own journey to Brand Success.
In this episode, we talk about why most agency owners struggle to create profitability for their companies, and it’s mostly because they do not know how to create a holistic, long-term strategy for their agency and their clients. Cameron also gives advice for those agency owners thinking of being acquired someday or in the near future.
This Cast Covers:
- Why Cameron and Buzzshift decided to hyperfocus on serving direct to consumer brands space (02:04)
- One of the biggest contributors to a high win rate when it comes to getting in front of clients – building a proforma (06:00)
- Making strategic decisions by following a decision tree starting from looking at the outcomes then looking at quantitative data (09:53)
- Strategy oftentimes creates profitability for your company (13:10)
- Why most agencies should focus on creating a holistic strategy and having a “measure twice, cut once mentality” (15:41)
- Having both builders and drivers to establish trust and a really good benchmark with your clients (20:01)
- The journey Buzzshift went on to be acquired twice (24:52)
- How to get more specialized and more focused if you want to be acquired as an agency (31:31)
- Cameron’s advice for agency owners who want to exit someday (32:27)
- Why you need an exit planning strategy as early as now (32:52)
- Design your life first, and then design your business around that life (37:15)
- Why agency owners need to spend time just sitting back and reflecting about their lives now more than ever (40:24)