Why These Agency Partners Did an Eight-Month Soft Launch Before the Real Partnership Started with Josh Hanosh & Kevin Howe | Ep #919

Finding the right business partner isn't about filling a skills gap—it's about solving a leadership gap that hiring can't fix. In this episode, Josh Hanosh and Kevin Howe, co-founders of a full-service digital marketing agency, share how they merged two successful agencies after years of friendship and peer mentoring, why they spent eight months "soft-launching" their partnership before making it official, and what the first year of integration really cost them.

They also explain how complementary strengths—not identical backgrounds—became their greatest competitive advantage, why founders should expect a temporary slowdown after a merger, and how Josh's years as a teacher unexpectedly prepared him to become an exceptional agency leader.

What You'll Learn

• Why a true leadership partner solves problems that even great hires can't.
• How an eight-month partnership trial reduced risk before a legal merger.
• What founders should realistically expect during the first year after merging marketing agencies.
• Why complementary weaknesses often create stronger partnerships than similar strengths.
• How teaching skills translate directly into better leadership, client management, and team development.
• Why visionary founders need leadership teams willing to challenge priorities—not simply approve every new idea.
• How balancing innovation with operational focus allows agencies to grow without sacrificing execution.

Key Takeaways

• A leadership partner is fundamentally different from a key employee because ownership creates long-term alignment that incentives alone rarely achieve.
• Test partnerships operationally before combining finances, equity, and legal structures.
• The first year after a merger is typically an integration year—not a growth year—so plan expectations accordingly.
• Great managers teach rather than tell, creating stronger teams that can operate independently.
• Healthy leadership teams protect focus by saying "not yet" to good ideas that would distract from the highest priorities.
• Sustainable growth for any digital agency comes from complementary leadership, disciplined execution, and systems—not simply adding more people or launching more initiatives.

Have you ever realized that the thing your agency needs most is the exact thing you are worst at? Have you been trying to hire your way to a leadership partner when the right one might already be someone you know?

Today’s featured guest built a full-service agency by merging two separate agencies after years of running in the same professional circles. They’ll walk through how the merger actually happened, why they soft-launched it for eight months before making it legal, and how their complementary weaknesses turned out to be the most valuable thing either of them brought to the table.

Josh Hanosh and Kevin Howe are the co-founders of Three29, a full-service digital marketing agency. Kevin started his agency in 2010 after the web division at his employer shut down, building from a single client into a team over fifteen years. Josh left eight years of teaching math and computer science after a student asked him why he was not doing what he told them to do.

They merged their two agencies after years of friendship and peer mentoring, soft-launching the partnership for eight months before combining finances and legal structure. Three29 has since built Visible, an AI-powered analytics and optimization platform, and is now positioning around GEO alongside traditional digital marketing services.

In this episode, we’ll discuss:

• The partnership soft launch

• What the first twelve months looked like

•  How a career in teaching made Josh a better manager

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Sponsors and Resources

E2M Solutions: Today's episode of the Smart Agency Masterclass is sponsored by E2M Solutions, a web design and development agency that has provided white-label services for the past 10 years to agencies all over the world. Check out e2msolutions.com/smartagency and get 10% off for the first three months of service.

Why the Merger Happened and What Made It Different From a Hire

Kevin had tried to solve his growth ceiling the usual way: salespeople, key employees, internal promotions. None of it held. The ceiling was not a skills gap that a hire could close. It was a leadership gap that required someone with genuine ownership mentality. That is not something you can interview for or create through a compensation structure. The conversation about merging with Josh happened almost by accident and moved quickly once it started, because both of them already knew what the other could do.

What made the arrangement structurally different from other partnerships either had seen is how they entered it. Instead of signing papers and hope for the best, they worked together for eight months with shared clients but separate finances and a clear exit ramp if the working relationship did not hold. That trial period removed the pressure that tends to make founders commit to the wrong arrangement before they have enough information. By the time the legal structure was formalized, they already knew they worked well together and understood how their individual strengths fit without overlap.

What the First Twelve Months After a Merger Actually Cost

Kevin and Josh admit the first year was harder than expected and produced less than either of them had projected. Integrating two teams, two client bases, two financial structures, and two ways of doing things took nearly all of the bandwidth they had assumed would go toward growth. The things they wanted to build together, the new positioning, the new service lines, the platform they eventually launched: those did not start moving in any real way until the second year.

This is a pattern worth understanding before any founder considers a merger as a growth strategy. The combination of two ongoing operations creates a temporary period of higher complexity, not lower. The payoff is real. Josh describes having a partner with genuine ownership mentality as something no hire ever delivered. Kevin describes having Josh handle the strategy side as giving him back the work he is actually built for. But neither of those outcomes arrived on day one, and founders who go in expecting immediate lift will misread the first twelve months as evidence the merger was a mistake.

How Teaching Prepared This Owner to Manage an Agency Team

Not every agency owner is cut to be a manager, and many admit to being terrible at it. However, Josh's teaching background actually gave him just what he needed to succeed:

• The patience to let someone struggle toward an answer rather than handing it to them

• The ability to explain complex concepts one level above where the other person is, not ten levels above

• The instinct to serve rather than impress

These are not soft skills. They are the exact capabilities that determine whether clients stay, whether junior employees grow into senior ones, and whether a founder can eventually step back without the team falling apart.

In fact, one Mastermind member hires former teachers specifically because they can onboard and train in a way that most founder-operators cannot. The person who makes clients feel smart instead of dumb, who can walk a prospect through the agency's entire process without fear that the prospect will go do it themselves, is the person who wins the relationship. Josh built that instinct over eight years before he ever had a client.

The Trap of Too Many Good Ideas at Once

Agency owners are often visionaries, which can be both a strength and a challenge. It can be a source of many distractions unless there's someone there to slow you down.

 When Three29 set out to build Visible, an AI-powered analytics and optimization platform, the opportunity was obvious. However, the execution challenge was equally obvious: building a software company while continuing to deliver exceptional client work.

With two visionary founders, a team operating at full capacity, and enough ideas to fill the next three years, something had to give.

The team pushed back, and they were right to do so.

A healthy leadership team doesn't exist to say yes to every new idea. It exists to create the discipline that turns the right ideas into reality. Vision provides the acceleration, but execution requires brakes as much as a gas pedal.

Founders should expect their teams to challenge priorities, question timing, and protect focus.

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