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

Would you like access to our advanced agency training for FREE? https://www.agencymastery360.com/training

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

Subscribe Apple | Spotify | iHeart Radio

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 the