President & Co-Founder @ ZeroTo1 | (previously) Founding Team @ Shipt | DM me for more info on TikTok Shop, ROI Influencer campaigns, and UGC ads that convert

ZeroTo1 is the “go-to” social commerce agency of record, driving revenue for category-leading and disruptive DTC companies through social ads, performance influencer strategies, and TikTok Shop management.

Our vision is to be the world's #1 Social Commerce agency while partnering with category-leading brands to guide them to their dream outcome of an exit or IPO through our creative, community, and influencer strategies.

We’re building a world-class culture of execution that enables our employees to experience exponential professional and personal growth.

Some of our clients include: ClickUp, Instacart, Landing, Jel Sert, Lowe’s, Feit Electric, Thumbtack, The Pets Table, MUD/WTR, Manna Vitality, Spoonful of Comfort, Jenny Craig, Nutrisystem, Organifi, Step One, Create Wellness, Diletosso, & more.

Riley Cronin 🚀

You win or you learn.

In September we launched one of the biggest business influencer brands on TikTok Shop.

We scaled it from zero to $300K GMV/month in 90 days.

Then it nearly collapsed in 48 hours.

Creators were using negative hooks calling him a scammer because the deals were that good, and the videos were going viral.

Then a product violation temporarily removed commissions.

A creator made a video saying the brand was stealing from them.
It spread fast.

The client left the platform within two days over brand safety concerns.

That failure exposed something real: we had no proactive system to prevent affiliates from posting non-compliant content, no way to monitor affiliate videos at scale, and no process to coach or remove creators who fell out of bounds in real-time.

We knew this wouldn't be the last time a client would consider leaving if we couldn't protect their brand while scaling.

So we built the infrastructure:
-> Sample governance tool that scores creators on brand safety before they're accepted.

-> Brief governance system with prohibited claims libraries, pre-approved hooks, and brand standards baked into every campaign.

-> Pre-amplification review queue so 100% of content is checked before it's boosted.
-> 48-hour containment process for non-compliant videos.

-> Weekly brand safety scorecard tracking flags, time-to-removal, sentiment ratios, and recovery actions.

The takeaway: as TikTok Shop matures and enterprise brands start taking it seriously, they won't trade brand equity for GMV.

And they shouldn't have to.

We learned that the hard way. Now it's a feature of how we operate.

No agency wins 100% of the time. Great agencies build a culture where every failure has a price and a purpose. 

I'm grateful for this failure that strengthened our position to help enterprise brands grow on TikTok Shop without sacrificing brand safety.

Riley Cronin

President & Co-Founder @ ZeroTo1 | Founding Team @ Shipt | DM me for more info on TikTok Shop, Partnership Ads, & Creator Communities.

The best ad creative supply chain that all DTC brands should be investing into is a creator community. 

Once your affiliate revenue offsets the total cost of the community, your producing 50+ partnership ads per month at net zero cost.

This gives you the diverse library of ad content Meta needs.

Plus you get to use a data driven approach to testing ads. 

Here's what to look for:
- Top performing organic performance (engagements, shares)
- Highest converting videos 
- High quality videos

Producing more high quality ad creative at the most efficient rate is the constraint holding every brand back from their next growth milestone.

Building a creator community is the best solution to that constraint.

How to build a brand-owned creator community on Instagram that produces 100s of organic videos monthly and tells you exactly which ads will scale before you spend a dollar.

This is the most strategic and efficient way to find winning ads without burning through your ad spend and influencer budget.
 
After 4 months your creator community becomes an ad creative supply chain that pays you to produce winning ads.
 
There is no bigger moat, or hack out there... 

And nobody is taking advantage of it.
 
Here is the 6 step process to start producing 100's of new organic videos that give you the data you need to strategically launch new ads that scale your account profitably:
 
Step 1:
Structure an offer to compensate creators on a performance basis:
creator gets free product, affiliate commissions, and % on ads that you launch
 
Step 2:
Recruit 100+ creators per month into your creator community
 
Step 3:
Give creators a creative brief with top selling angles and guidelines to reference. 
 
Step 4:
Review all content and coach creators to improve. You're building relationships AND a feedback loop that compounds over time.
 
Step 5:
Identify top organic, affiliate, and high quality videos weekly. If it meets your benchmarks, flight them as Partnership Ads on Meta
 
Step 6:
Ascend your consistent top performers into retainer creators to increase content output and increase testing of new angles
 
Now you're using data to identify potential winning ads AND creators worth investing in, instead of paying creators up front for deliverables without having a relationship with them, or knowing if they are going to convert for you.
 
The brands that win in 2026 will produce the highest volume of quality organic creative at the most efficient rate - and use data before putting media spend behind it.
 
By month 4 your affiliate revenue is paying for the total investment of your community. 

Once it's profitable, your creator community pays you to produce 100's of organic videos that give you the signal you need to find winning ads.
 
Plus it builds you a data backed creator roster that grows over time and drives full funnel value for your business.
 
No more blindly testing creatives, or coming out of pocket on expensive influencer campaigns before knowing if it's likely to convert.

Co-Founder @ Hydra | Co-Founder @ Howl Campfires | I Help Agencies & Professional Service Firms Scale Revenue & Profit

I help agencies, and consultants B2B service providers scale their revenue & profitability. 

My track record speaks for itself:

- I've helped 250+ agencies scale in the last 36 months. 
- Personally built 3 businesses to multiple millions in annual revenue. 
- 1 successful exit of my own, and 3 among our advisory team. 

How I can help you scale your business: 

1. Our D.N.A. Days

Where you come in person to Nashville, TN and sit alongside myself and our team, where we’ll complete a full audit of your business, establish your goals, and design a clear roadmap to solve what’s holding you back from scaling. 

Then, we give you our exact systems & processes to make it reality. 

2. Our Mastermind Program, the Hydra Growth Collective. 

This is our flagship offering that bundles all our proven systems, lead-gen, ops, and AI frameworks into weekly group calls, a private community, a full curriculum library, and two live, in-person growth intensives each year.

3. The Hydra Portfolio 

An invite-only offer for a minority stake of your business where we invest capital and work hands-on as part of your management team until we both win.

If you’re running a service business in the $500k–$10M range and want predictable scale, not more theory, fluff, or advice that keeps you spinning your wheels…

DM me “grow” to learn more. 

Also founder at HOWL Campfires, a DTC brand. We're a 100% Made In The USA, patented, portable propane fire pit line. 

Learn more about how we keep the forest & fire alive for generations to come at www.howlcampfires.com

Nicholas Kirchner

The best agencies are firing 80% of their clients right now.

And they're making more money because of it.

Ok, not literally 80%, but check out the math on simplifying your roster:

Before: 25 clients. $150K/month revenue. $60K profit. 40% margins.

After firing 20 clients and keeping the top 5:

5 clients. $75K/month revenue. $52K profit. 70% margins.

Wait. Read that again.

Half the revenue. Nearly the same profit. A fraction of the complexity.

Because those bottom 20 clients were eating your margins alive:

-> Constant scope creep
-> 80% of your support tickets
-> Lowest prices, highest demands
-> Team burnout from managing chaos

Your top clients are the opposite:
-> Clear expectations
-> Respect the process
-> Pay premium prices
-> Refer other premium clients

The Pareto Principle is real in agency life. 20% of your clients generate 80% of your profit.

The question isn't "can I afford to fire them?"

It's "can I afford not to?"

Every hour your team spends on a $2K client is an hour they're not delivering exceptional work for your $10K clients.

Protect your best relationships by removing the ones that drain you.

Built 3 Agencies | 1 Exit | Founder @ Hydra | Founder @ HOWL Campfires

3 revenue lines every agency needs to hit $100K/month:

Most agencies rely on one: monthly retainers.

That's like building a house on one pillar.

Here's the framework that changed everything for me:

Revenue Line 1: Core Retainers (60% of revenue)
-> $8-15K/month clients
-> Predictable, recurring
-> This is your foundation
-> Target: 6-8 clients at $10K avg = $60-80K/month

Revenue Line 2: Project Revenue (25% of revenue)
-> Strategy builds, audits, website launches
-> $5-25K one-time projects
-> These often convert to retainers
-> Target: 1-2 projects/month = $15-25K

Revenue Line 3: Strategic Revenue (15% of revenue)
-> Consulting, training, licensing
-> High margin, low delivery cost
-> Positions you as the expert, not the vendor
-> Target: $10-15K/month

Why this matters:

If you lose a retainer client, you don't panic. Project revenue covers the gap. Strategic revenue builds your moat.

The agencies at $100K+/month aren't just doing more of the same thing.

They built three engines, not one.

Which revenue line are you missing?

Your agency's biggest competitor isn't another agency.

It's your client's internal team.

Every day, someone at your client's company is making the case that they could do what you do in-house for less.

And if you're selling hours and deliverables, they're probably right.

Here's how agencies lose to in-house teams:

-> You send reports. They want strategy.
-> You execute tasks. They want someone who thinks about their business at 2AM.
-> You show activity. They want to see impact on revenue.

Here's how you become irreplaceable:

1. Own a metric, not a channel. Don't be "the SEO agency." Be "the team that generates 200 qualified leads per quarter."

2. Integrate into their decision-making. Attend their planning meetings. Know their pipeline. Understand their board's priorities.

3. Bring insights they can't get internally. Your advantage is seeing patterns across 10+ companies in their space. Use it.

4. Build switching costs through systems. Create proprietary dashboards, processes, and frameworks that only work with you.

The agencies that never get replaced aren't better at marketing.

They're better at making themselves essential to the business.

Are you a vendor or a partner? The answer determines your shelf life.

Every agency owner hits a wall at $30K/month.

You're working 60+ hour weeks. You're the salesperson, the strategist, the project manager, and the closer. Your calendar is full. Your bank account says you should feel successful.

But you're exhausted.

Here's why $30K/month is the hardest ceiling to break:

It's the maximum output of one person doing everything.

You can't sell more because you're delivering.
You can't deliver more because you're selling.
You can't hire because margins are too thin.
You can't raise prices because you're afraid of losing what you have.

The only way through is to break the cycle:

Step 1: Raise your prices 30-50% on new clients. You'll close fewer, but each one is worth more. This creates breathing room.

Step 2: Use that room to build ONE system. A repeatable sales process OR a standardized delivery playbook. Not both. One.

Step 3: Make your first hire against that system. Not a generalist. A specialist who can run the system you built.

Step 4: Repeat.

The agency owners I know who broke through $30K/month didn't find a secret strategy.

They gave themselves permission to stop doing everything and start building something.

An agency owner came to us doing $40K/month.

Solid team. Great fulfillment. Clients loved the work.

But every month was a coin flip on whether they'd hit their number.

Some months: 5 new clients. Other months: zero.

We built them a client acquisition funnel from scratch:

-> Custom VSL speaking directly to their ideal client
-> Paid traffic dialed in to their niche
-> Automated follow-up sequence
-> Booking page optimized for show rates

Within 60 days:

-> Customer acquisition cost: $2,400 (for $8K/month retainer clients)
-> Pipeline went from empty to 12+ qualified calls per week
-> Revenue hit $85K by month 3

The biggest shift wasn't the revenue.

It was the founder sleeping through the night for the first time in two years because they knew where next month's clients were coming from.

Predictability changes everything. Not just your P&L — your life.

If your agency relies on you personally to generate every client, something has to change.

6 months ago, an agency founder told me:

"I just need one more big client and everything will be fine."

I'd heard that line a hundred times. Usually from agency owners doing $40K-$80K/month who are one lost client away from a crisis.

Here's what his business looked like then:

-> Revenue: $55K/month (but swung between $35K and $70K)
-> Client acquisition: 100% referrals and word of mouth
-> Pipeline: Empty. Every new client felt like a miracle.
-> Founder time on sales: 20+ hours/week

Here's what it looks like now:

-> Revenue: $110K/month (and hasn't dipped below $95K in 4 months)
-> Client acquisition: Paid funnel generating 10+ calls/week
-> Pipeline: 6-8 weeks of scheduled demos at any given time
-> Founder time on sales: 2 hours/week (reviewing call recordings)

The difference wasn't "one more big client."

It was replacing hope with a system.

You don't need one more client. You need a machine that produces clients on demand.

What does your pipeline look like right now?

How I replaced my entire team with AI agents in just 2 weeks...

(You'll never believe how easy this was) 

I didn't. 

Now quit consuming AI fear slop larping as  productivity and get back to work.

Unpopular opinion: Most agency owners don't have a revenue problem.

They have a margin problem disguised as a revenue problem.

I've talked to dozens of agency founders doing $50K-$100K/month who are barely taking home $8K.

They think the answer is more clients. So they chase more revenue. Which means more team. More overhead. More complexity.

And somehow they end up at $120K/month still taking home $8K.

Here's what actually moves the needle:

-> Fire your bottom 20% of clients. The ones who drain your team, pay late, and scope-creep every project. They cost you more than they pay you.

-> Raise prices on new clients by 30%. If your funnel is dialed in and your positioning is sharp, the right clients won't flinch.

-> Systematize delivery so you're not throwing custom solutions at every engagement. Productized delivery = predictable margins.

Revenue is vanity. 

Profit is sanity. 

Cash in the founder's pocket is reality.

The fastest way to kill your agency is to say yes to everyone.

I learned this the hard way.

At $25K/month, I was taking every client who could fog a mirror and sign a contract. Restaurants, dentists, e-commerce, SaaS, coaches. You name it, I'd pitch it.

My team was drowning. Every client needed a different playbook. Every onboarding was starting from scratch. Every deliverable was custom.

Then I did something that felt insane at the time:

I fired 60% of my clients.

Kept only B2B companies between $1M-$10M in revenue.

Here's what happened in the next 6 months:

-> Revenue dropped 30% in month one
-> By month three, it was back to where it started
-> By month six, it had doubled

Why?

Because focus creates compounding advantages:

-> Your case studies are relevant to every prospect
-> Your team gets better at the same thing every week
-> Your processes scale because they're repeatable
-> Your content attracts the exact right audience
-> Referrals happen naturally because clients know who to send you

The math on specialization is brutal but simple:

A generalist can serve 100 industries poorly.
A specialist can dominate 1 industry completely.

Domination pays better than participation.

Who are you saying no to?

Unpopular opinion: Most agencies don't have a marketing problem.

They have a pricing problem.

I've consulted with agencies doing $50K-$1.5M/month. 

The ones that struggle all have one thing in common:

They charge based on what feels comfortable, not what the work is worth.

Here's the pricing ladder most agency owners never build:

Level 1: Cost-plus pricing

"Our costs are X, so we charge X + margin."
Result: You'll always be replaceable.

Level 2: Market-rate pricing

"Everyone else charges $5K, so we charge $5K."
Result: You're competing on sameness.

Level 3: Value-based pricing

"This will generate $500K in revenue for you. Our fee is $50K."
Result: The client sees you as an investment, not an expense.

Most agencies are stuck at Level 1 or 2.

The jump to Level 3 requires one thing: confidence in your ability to deliver a measurable result.

If you can't clearly articulate the ROI of your work, you'll always be stuck competing on price.

Three ways to start moving up:

-> Track every dollar of value you create for clients
-> Build case studies around revenue impact, not vanity metrics
-> Stop quoting hours and start quoting outcomes

The market will pay you whatever you have the courage to charge.

I used to think the hardest part of running an agency was getting clients.

I was wrong.

The hardest part is getting the RIGHT clients, consistently.

At my first agency, we'd have a great month, land 3-4 clients from a referral burst. Then nothing for 6 weeks. Team sitting idle. Cash flow tanking.

So we'd panic-discount. Take on bad-fit work. Restart the cycle.

The turning point wasn't a new offer or a better pitch.

It was building a client acquisition funnel that worked whether I was having a good month or a bad one.

-> Same cost per lead, every month
-> Same number of qualified calls, every week
-> Same close rate, within a few percentage points

That's when the agency stopped feeling like a rollercoaster and started feeling like a business.

Most agency owners are one predictable acquisition system away from the version of their business they've been chasing for years.

There's a ceiling at $1M that most agencies can't break through.

Not because they lack talent.
Not because their niche is wrong.
Not because the market is saturated.

It's because they built a job, not a business.

Here's the pattern I see every time:

$0-$100K: You do everything. Sales, delivery, admin. It works because you're hungry.

$100K-$300K: You hire help. But you're still the bottleneck. Every decision runs through you.

$300K-$500K: Revenue grows, but so does complexity. You're managing people, not building systems. Margins shrink. You're busier than ever but making less per hour than when you started.

The $500K ceiling isn't a revenue problem but really an architecture problem.

What do I mean by this? 

To break through, you need:

-> Productized services (not custom everything)
-> A sales process that doesn't require you
-> Delivery systems that scale without more bodies
-> Pricing tied to outcomes, not hours

The agencies that hit $5-10M+ didn't just get more clients.

They rebuilt the machine.

If you're stuck between $100K-$300K, the answer isn't working harder. It's working differently.

Your competitors aren't beating you on skill. 

They're beating you on packaging.

Two agencies. 
Same niche. 
Same level of talent.

Agency A charges $4K/month. 

Agency B charges $12K/month.

The difference isn't quality. It's how they present the exact same thing.

Agency A's website: "We offer SEO, PPC, social media, email marketing, and web design."

Agency B's website: "We help B2B SaaS companies generate 200+ demo requests per quarter through full-funnel demand generation."

Agency A's proposal: 8 pages of deliverables and timelines.

Agency B's proposal: 3 pages focused on the client's revenue gap and a clear path to close it.

Agency A's sales call: "Here's what we do and how we do it."

Agency B's sales call: "Here's what's costing you $50K/month in missed revenue and how we fix it in 90 days."

Packaging is:

-> Who you say you serve
-> The problem you lead with
-> The outcome you promise
-> The language you use

You probably don't need to get better at your craft.

You need to get better at presenting it.

Your agency doesn't have a sales problem. It has a math problem.

Most owners think: "I need more leads."

What they actually need: Better unit economics.

Let me show you:

Agency A:
-> 100 leads/month
-> 10% close rate = 10 new clients
-> $3K avg deal = $30K new MRR
-> 4-month avg retention
-> Lifetime value: $12K per client
-> CAC: $2,500
-> LTV:CAC ratio: 4.8:1

Agency B:
-> 20 leads/month
-> 30% close rate = 6 new clients
-> $8K avg deal = $48K new MRR
-> 14-month avg retention
-> Lifetime value: $112K per client
-> CAC: $4,000
-> LTV:CAC ratio: 28:1

Agency B has 80% fewer leads and still wins by every measure that matters.

The difference:

-> Better positioning (higher close rate)
-> Premium pricing (higher deal value)
-> Stickier delivery (longer retention)

You don't need more leads. You need better math.

Fix the fundamentals before you scale the top of funnel.

Stop selling deliverables. Start selling outcomes.

"We'll post 3X per week on Instagram" = $2K/month

"We'll build a content system that generates 50+ inbound leads per quarter" = $8K/month

Same work. 4X the price.

The difference is what you're anchoring to.

Deliverables anchor to effort. Outcomes anchor to value.

When you sell deliverables:
-> Clients compare you to cheaper alternatives
-> They micromanage the process
-> They question every invoice
-> They leave when someone offers more for less

When you sell outcomes:
-> Clients see you as a strategic partner
-> They trust your process
-> They measure ROI, not activity
-> They stay because the results compound

Here's a simple reframe for any service:

OLD: "We manage your paid ads"
NEW: "We build a client acquisition engine that delivers X qualified leads at $Y cost per lead"

OLD: "We redesign your website"
NEW: "We build a conversion platform that turns 3% of visitors into booked calls"

The words you use determine the price you charge.

Choose them carefully.

Most agency owners are sitting on a goldmine and don't realize it.

You already have the hardest thing to get in business: paying clients.

But instead of going deeper with them, you're chasing new logos.

Here's the math most people miss:

Acquiring a new client costs 5-7X more than expanding an existing one.

Your current clients already trust you. They already know your work. They're already paying you.

The easiest path to $100K/month isn't 20 new clients.

It's turning your 8 clients at $5K into 8 clients at $12K.

How to do it:

Step 1: Audit every client's business for gaps you could fill
Step 2: Build a "next level" service tier that solves their biggest bottleneck
Step 3: Present it as a growth plan, not an upsell
Step 4: Tie your pricing to the outcome, not the hours

One of my clients went from $38K/month to $87K/month in 90 days.

They didn't add a single new client.

They just stopped leaving money on the table with the ones they already had.

Your next $50K/month is probably hiding inside your current book of business.

Your proposal isn't losing on price.

It's losing on positioning.

I've reviewed hundreds of agency proposals. The ones that lose all look the same:

-> "Here's what we'll deliver"
-> "Here's what it costs"
-> "Here's our timeline"

The ones that win at $10K+ look different:

-> "Here's the problem you don't know you have"
-> "Here's what it's costing you every month"
-> "Here's the outcome we'll create"

The first proposal sells tasks.
The second sells transformation.

A client will haggle over $5K for "social media management."

That same client won't blink at $12K for "a system that generates 40 qualified leads per month."

Same work but a different frame.

The highest-paid agencies aren't better at delivery. 

They're better at framing the problem in a way that makes their price feel like a bargain.

If you're competing on price, you've already lost the positioning battle.

Rewrite your proposal around the cost of inaction, not the cost of your services.

Unpopular opinion: 

Most agencies should stop doing outbound immediately.

Before you come for me...

Hear me out.

I'm not anti-outbound. 

I'm anti-outbound as your ONLY strategy.

Here's what I see at agencies doing $50K-$200K/month:

-> Founder sends 500 cold DMs a week
-> Books 10-15 calls
-> Closes 2-3 clients
-> Feels productive but is burning out
-> Revenue flatlines the second they stop

The agencies scaling past this have something different:

A funnel that generates inbound demand without the founder's daily effort.

-> Paid traffic driving qualified prospects to a VSL
-> Prospects self-educating before the call
-> Sales team closing warm leads, not cold ones
-> Founder focused on delivery and strategy, not prospecting

If you want to see how we set this up and why it works so well, hit the link in my profile.

"We can't afford to invest in client acquisition right now."

I hear this from agency owners doing $50K-$100K/month.

And I get it. Money feels tight when revenue is inconsistent.

But here's what they're actually saying:

"We can't afford to stop relying on unpredictable revenue."

Let me run the math on what "free" client acquisition actually costs:

-> Founder spending 15 hours/week on outreach
-> At a conservative $200/hour founder value
-> That's $12,000/month in hidden cost
-> For maybe 2-3 clients

Now compare that to a paid funnel:

-> $3K-$5K/month in ad spend
-> 0 hours of founder time
-> Same 2-3 clients, but consistent
-> Every dollar tracked and optimized

The agency that "can't afford" a funnel is already paying for one.

You're just paying with the most expensive resource you have: you (the founders) time.

The biggest mistake I made scaling my first agency:

I thought more leads = more revenue.

So I cranked up outreach. 
More cold emails. 
More DMs. 
More networking events. 
More, more, more.

And it worked, sort of.

We grew revenue. 

But our close rate dropped. 
Our client quality tanked. 
Our team was drowning in bad-fit projects.

More leads didn't grow the business. 

It just made the chaos louder.

The fix wasn't volume. 

It was: 

-> A VSL that pre-qualified prospects before the call
-> A funnel that attracted the exact client profile we wanted
-> A booking system that filtered out tire-kickers automatically

We went from 30 calls/month (closing 4) to 15 calls/month (closing 6).

Half the volume. 
50% more revenue. 
And a team that actually liked the work.

More isn't better. 

Better is better.

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