From Scrappy Startup to
$2M Powerhouse Content Studio

How I Helped Build A Social Content Studio into a Scalable, High-Performing Agency
in Just 2 Years

How It Started

When the founder of a local social content studio, picked up the phone in late 2023, he wasn’t calling me, he was calling someone else.

He had just left a 15-year in-house career with a major theme park brand. He had a vision: build an agency that helped brands create deeper connections with their audiences through great content. But he’d never built an agency before, and he was looking for advice.

The person he called? A former boss of mine. I had been employee #1 at his agency and helped double its billings and headcount in just two years. So when he asked how he’d grown it, the answer was simple: “You need to call her.”

I had just discussed launching TLR when he called. And within weeks, I was under the hood at his agency.

  • At the time, there were three people and a dream.

    • He was writing and leading creative direction

    • A designer was making the work happen

    • A podcast producer was pushing content out

    • And there was no real infrastructure behind any of it

    There was passion. There was energy. There was talent. But no real agency foundation.

    That’s what I was brought in to build.

    My role wasn’t just operational, I became a strategic partner. I had the founder’s ear every day. We talked through every client meeting, every contract, every hire. I stepped in as Head of Operations & Account Management also running project management and running finance. Everything that makes an agency run behind the scenes? I owned it.

  • The first major shift came when I helped us hire a powerhouse Director of Social Content. She brought vision, rigor, and creative leadership. That hire transformed both our output and our internal culture.

  • Our directive was clear: “Make this feel like an established agency, even if we’re not there yet.”

    So I did. Within the first six months:

    • Built out core infrastructure using Monday.com for project management, Airtable for social content planning, Google Workspace for files and email, Slack for team communication, and Gusto for contractor payments.

    • Created client profitability tracking and AGI ratio systems, allowing us to make data-informed hiring and retention decisions.

    • Structured annual scopes that were not traditional retainers—but amortized, performance-driven contracts that gave us monthly recurring revenue (MRR) and measurable deliverables.

    • Helped them land enterprise clients by building polished decks, scope language, and pitch frameworks that looked bigger than we were.

    We grew with intention. We scaled with focus. And we didn’t overbuild, we built just enough to stretch.

  • When someone wasn’t delivering, we moved fast.

    The motto: right people, right seats, or off the bus.

    It was never personal, it was foundational. In a growing agency, you can’t afford to carry dead weight. People were with us for a couple months and if they weren’t the right fit they were let go.

  • Because we had a strong operational backbone, we were ready when the big contracts landed:

    • Major Healthcare Brand signed a $41K/month agreement

    • Major Food Retailer followed with $10K/month

    Just six months in, we hit $50K in MRR and kept going. We closed Year 1 at over $1M gross, and we’re tracking toward $2M in Year 2.

Behind the Scenes: 

In my role as fractional Head of Agency Operations and Account Management, some of my responsibilities included:

  • Scoping and pricing every client agreement

  • Hiring every full-time employee—no one was brought on without my input

  • Sitting in on every finance meeting, advising on forecasting, margins, and AGI concentration

  • Building client onboarding workflows, status reporting templates, delivery calendars, and communication protocols

  • Partnering with white-label vendors to expand services (like influencer campaigns and turnkey video production) without bloating our full-time team

By mid-Year 2, we had gone from 70% of our revenue tied to one client to a much healthier balance: two key clients at ~35% each, plus a growing stable of recurring project-based work.

"She’s the reason this agency is real.
I invested in her at the very beginning, even pulled money from a HELOC to pay her first invoices.
And I’d do it again.
Worth every penny."

— Content Agency Founder

What This Means for You

If I can help build an agency from a whiteboard and a dream into a $2M operation in under two years, imagine what I can do with an agency that already has a foundation and momentum.

Most of my clients are already running successful shops. They’ve got clients, teams, and processes, but they’re also feeling the friction: delivery gaps, scattered systems, under-leveraged talent, and operations that don’t scale cleanly.

That’s where I come in.

As a fractional Head of Operations or Agency Advisor, I bring:

  • Strategic insight across the full agency lifecycle—from pitch to project delivery to profitability

  • A trained eye for where the systems are slowing you down—and how to tighten them up

  • A practical, collaborative approach that helps your team do their best work without overhauling everything overnight

The kind of clarity and control that helps you stop reacting and start proactively building your best agency.