Are you too involved in your agency’s operations? Too stuck working IN the business to work ON the business? It's time to fire yourself from some of operations tasks and increase agency valuation. Removing yourself from daily operations is a great way to prepare your agency for an eventual sale and increase its valuation when the time comes. Start by identifying tasks you don't like as well as the ones someone else could do much better. Tom Foster is the founder of Foster Web Marketing, a digital agency that helps doctors and lawyers get in front of their ideal customers. Clients usually come to them to build their websites, but many choose to also have them handle aspects like website optimization and content creation. After transforming to a fully virtual model, it took an acquisition offer for Tom to realize he needed to change some things in order to increase its value. In this interview, we’ll discuss: Preparing your agency for a future sale. The different approaches to sale. Firing yourself from your agency tasks. Sponsors and Resources Wix: Today’s episode is sponsored by the Wix Partner Program. Being a Wix Partner is ideal for freelancers and digital agencies that design and develop websites for their clients. Check out Wix.com/Partners to learn more and become a member of the community for free. What's your agency's valuation? Get the formula here. Subscribe Apple | Spotify | iHeart Radio | Stitcher | Radio FM   Podcast Takeover!! Get to know your Smart Agency Guest Host:  Dr. Jeremy Weisz is the co-founder of Rise25, an agency that helps companies launch and run podcasts profitably. He followed Jason’s podcast and eventually joined the mastermind and has been a guest on the podcast before. Today, he’s helping Jason bring something new to the Smart Agency podcast audience by interviewing a special guest and bringing a new perspective to the show. Are You the One Bringing Down Your Agency's Valuation? Tom originally entered the world of technology to focus on sales and marketing in 1991 after serving a six-year tour in the Marines. Right after the Marines, he went to work in software sales doing cold calls, fax blasts, and selling translation software. He ended up being very successful early on and got into the software business in the floppy disc era. After forming his own agency, Foster Web Marketing, Tom started working on an all-in-one solution SaaS for website building. Creating his own software was a big undertaking, but there weren’t as many options back then. The platform, called DSS, continues to be part of his agency’s main offering. The platform offers CMS, CRM, lead management system and SEO tool, social media tools. Everything you’ll need for DIY digital marketing. Recently, he received an offer to sell his agency. Although it was very flattering the time just wasn’t right. However, it helped him realize he needed to fix some things to increase the agency’s value to where he knew it could be. The most noticeable problem was that Tom was involved in everything. As the agency’s visionary, he knew he needed to fire himself that were not the most effective ways to spend his time. Try a Different Approaches to Grow Agency Sales For Tom, constant communication is the most important aspect of training someone in a new task in your agency. Of course, he also likes to hire people who bring their own experience. He recently hired someone with a lot of experience in a different area of sales. There are different types of sales people and different approaches to the sale: Hunters find prospects and generate interest Trappers close the sale Tom used to exclusively hire trappers but now he wants a more well-rounded sales team. Rather than just continuing what he has done over the years,  he's looking for a new or different approach. He understand what he's been doing has gotten the agency where it is. However, in order to grow it's important to hire someone to get them to the next level. Fire Yourself From Agency