The Best Agencies Know What They Don’t Do

This is it – the final SEO Weekly. 🎉

It’s been an absolute pleasure to share the last 52 weeks with you… When I started this series at the beginning of the year, I wasn’t sure if anyone would find it useful. But your engagement, your questions, and your feedback have made it one of the most rewarding things I’ve done this year. 

(And a special shout out to those who’ve messaged me in the TAB Barflies Group – if you’re not in there, you’re really missing out!)

Thank you for joining me through my ramblings – and thanks to Kyle for the opportunity! 🙏

As we head into the New Year, I wanted to leave you with one final piece of advice – something I wish I’d understood earlier in my own agency journey…

The best agencies know what they don’t do.

It’s Not About Doing Everything

Over the past 52 weeks, we’ve covered everything from breadcrumbs to backlinks, from schema markup to sales proposals, from technical audits to pricing strategies. And if there’s one theme that’s run through all of it, it’s this:

Running an agency is complex, and it’s not always right for any one person (or small team) to master everything.

From an SEO perspective, you can’t be the technical wizard AND the content genius AND the link building expert AND the local SEO specialist AND the strategist. You just can’t.

That’s not a weakness – it’s simply the truth.

The agencies that thrive aren’t the ones trying to do everything. They’re the ones who know their superpower and own it.

Find Your Strength

Maybe you’re brilliant at technical SEO – you can diagnose Core Web Vitals issues in your sleep and schema markup makes perfect sense to you. But writing engaging content? That’s not your thing.

Or perhaps you’re a content master – you understand search intent instinctively and can craft compelling copy that ranks and converts. But the technical side makes your head hurt.

Maybe you’re the strategy person – you can see the big picture, identify opportunities, and map out winning approaches. But you don’t want to be in the weeds of execution.

Or the web designer, or the plugin developer… (you’re getting the drift…)

All of these are valid. All of these are valuable.

The key is knowing which one is YOU, and having the courage to say “the rest isn’t my strength – I’ll partner for that.”

The Permission to Specialize

We’ve talked about outsourcing (Week 13), knowing when you need external help (Week 44), and the multi-disciplinary reality of modern SEO. The connecting piece is this:

You don’t have to do everything yourself.

In fact, trying to do everything yourself is often what holds agencies back. You spread yourself too thin, this means you deliver inconsistent (even mediocre) results across the board, and burn out trying to keep up with what’s going on… 

The best agencies pick their lane and stay in it. They know what they’re exceptional at, they own that completely, and they build partnerships for everything else.

That’s not a compromise – that’s strategy.

As We Head Into Next Year

My hope is that somewhere in these 52 weeks, you found something that helped you serve your clients better, price your services more confidently, or simply understand SEO a bit more clearly. 

My goal is (and always has been) to help agencies see the benefit of recurring revenue and how it lifts you out of the feast/famine cycle of project-based work… If even just one post made your agency stronger or your client relationships better, then this year was worth it.

As you plan for 2026, I’d encourage you to ask yourself:

✅ What am I genuinely excellent at?

✅ What do I enjoy doing?

✅ What should I stop trying to do myself?

The answers to those questions might just be your competitive advantage.

Thank You

To everyone who read these posts, shared them, asked questions, or just quietly followed along – thank you. It’s been a genuine privilege.

If you ever want to chat about SEO, agency life, or anything else, feel free to reach out.

Wishing you every success in 2026. May your rankings rise, your clients be happy, and your agency thrive in a way that serves you. 🚀

Here’s to knowing what you do best – and having the confidence to own it.

Pete 🫡