Episode Details

Growing your agency means hiring great people to help you get there. And hiring top talent shouldn't be limited by geographic boundaries. On today's show, one agency owner tells us why his agency's increased productivity and sales are the result of having a remote team.

In this episode, we'll cover:

• Is it time to get an office for your agency?
• How to be productive with a remote team.
• Must-have technology for a remote team.
• Balancing a remote team business model.
• How to hire remote employees.

Tim Cameron-Kitchen is the founder and Head Ninja at Exposure Ninja, the UK-based digital agency he started four years ago. In addition to growing an amazing business in a very short time, Tim has also written four bestselling books on digital marketing. Today, Tim's here to tell us why his agency's office space has been vacant for three years and how that has increased productivity and helped him scale his agency.

Is It Time to Get Office Space?

Starting as a freelancer and occasionally farming out work to other freelancers, it was a no-brainer for Tim to work 100% at home. However, as he grew to a network for 15+ he was getting nudged by others into working from a "real office." So he signed a 5 year lease and started commuting to it every day. The result was disastrous…

Tim hated his commute, he hated interruptions, and he hated being pulled into office politics. In addition, he had hired some local talent which turned out to be convenient but not awesome in terms of skill-level and effectiveness. Creativity, productivity, and sales were all down which Tim attributes to the new mandate of working in the office.

So naturally, Tim chucked the office… after only 6 months. As a result, productivity increased in the first month and sales increased the next.

How to Be Productive with a Remote Team

When you're working remotely you can work around your lifestyle, which ultimately optimizes productivity. More work gets done in less time when there are fewer interruptions and distractions. It means working smarter, not harder. (It doesn't necessarily mean you're laying on a beach working… but you could :) )

Thanks to technology, we can work collaboratively without being in the same physical location. Advanced technology allows us to work differently now than just 5 years ago. The software tools Tim and his team love to use are:

• Hubstaff - time tracking and accountability
• Teamwork - project management software
• Slack - communications, messaging and archiving software
• Email ticket system - filters, organizes and assigns tasks based on incoming emails

Even weekly department meetings are held remotely. Tim says internal meetings are done via Skype audio and meeting notes are posted to Slack. They've found it to be the most efficient way to keep each department on the same page.

Creating Culture with a Remote Team

It's not an easy thing to create culture among a group of people who've never met. But, Exposure Ninja has a pretty strong culture, nonetheless. It can get lonely working from home full time, so they've found ways to alleviate that problem. Tim explained how they turned typical "water cooler talk" about TV shows, hobbies and pets into Slack channels. Co-workers can get more personal by sharing and communicating in group-chats on topics that interest them. They also do an annual holiday party or meet-up in order to socialize in person.

Balancing a Remote Team Business Model

Some love it, some hate it. The