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Agency Audit Questionnaire

Please answer as much as you can, adjusting for your particular type of agency. This helps us analyze not only where you are, but where you want to be in the future.


In addition, the answers in this questionnaire, help us identify commonalities and determine a way that we can work together. Your full name

Your email

General Overview

Describe your position, including how long ago you founded the agency and a brief snapshot of your previous positions (headline bio).

What has influenced you most (people, books, life factors and so on)?

What is your greatest life achievement?

What one thing, more than anything else, do you want to accomplish in this business before you get out?

Describe your company as a sports team.  Who are your key players and how much are they paid?

Can you describe the corporate structure of your organization? Who is the CEO? Who is responsible for Finance, Technology, Marketing/Sales, and Strategy/Creative/Operations?

What are your goals (as owner/founder/s)?

Describe the full ownership structure, cap table, and compensation (Salary totals and disbursements)

What is the power structure? Please consider communication style(s), whether hands-on/hands-off, regarding management, who the key decision-makers are, and so on. 

Explain, realistically, how much more business you can add without having to add any more people, equipment, service or space.

What are your ultimate goals for the business - personally and professionally?

Explain where all your time is being spent versus where it should be spent.

How do you describe your agency to someone outside the industry? Ie. The jargon-free version.

What’s the one thing your agency does better than anyone else?

Financial Information

What percentage of revenue is COGS (that doesn’t include employees but does include outside contractors and other similar expenses)?

How much cash does the company generally keep in the bank to feel comfortable?

What are your top three biggest expenses each month?

Services Overview

Where does most of your business come from? Can you provide a breakdown of the major service areas and how much revenue each of these drives per month?

What does a client get when they work with your agency?

What makes your agency better than the competition? Why does a prospect choose to purchase from your agency vs. another?

What products or services would you like to offer, but you don't have the capabilities right now?

Can you describe your top three or four biggest competitors?

Can you describe the vision for your agency in the next three years? Please describe the services that you would add or the employees and skills that you would need to adjust.

Sales Overview

Describe the typical sales cycle to close a sale, from generating the lead through to a close.

How do you track your pipeline right now?

How many active deals do you have in the pipeline right now?

What do you do with prospects that do not close?

What do you consider to be a healthy pipeline for your agency? Please describe the number of deals or the amount of deals at any one point in time.

Can you describe your top four client testimonials/case studies that you always reference in the sales cycle?

After a deal closes, how do you collect the first payment, and what are typically the terms (due on receipt, net 30)?

Can you describe who is responsible for leading the sales process?

Can you describe where the majority of your leads get surfaced from?

Marketing Overview

Describe the company's marketing philosophy.

Describe every successful advertising, selling or marketing program you have engaged in for the last three years that has worked.

Do you have a marketing budget? How much and on what do you regularly spend?

Describe who runs your marketing efforts?

Can you upload a recent proposal that won a deal?

Can you upload a services presentation or agency overview slide deck that you would show to a prospect?

Employees and Key Resources

Other than the owners and founders, who are your top two or three key employees and why?

What is your employee churn rate?

How do you pay employees (biweekly, bimonthly)?

What payroll processing software or company do you use?

Can you describe how you handle performance reviews and how often employees get raises?

Do you have job descriptions and roles established? If so, how are these documented?

Do you have any employee performance issues?

Do you offer employee benefits, and if so, can you describe them?

Do you have an employee handbook, and how often is it updated?

Do you have any key freelancers or contractors that you typically leverage regularly?

Operations Overview

How do you track projects?

How do you track the performance of each employee?

How do you know if employees are using their time efficiently?

How do you determine if you have resource constraints and need to hire?

How do employees communicate regularly? Do you use email, Slack, or something else?

Can you describe how your teams meet on a regular basis? Are there daily, weekly, or other types of cadences involved?

Do you have SOPs in place? If so, how are these documented?

Who in the agency acts as the main point of contact for each client?

What software do you use to invoice clients and collect payments?

How do you manage late payments from clients? Do you have a follow-up process? Is there someone on your team responsible for this process?

What are your typical payment terms?

As an owner or founder, have you ever stepped away from the business for more than two weeks? If so, how did you manage the company while stepping away?