Going from solo to a small team should feel like growth. For this social media agency duo, it felt like chaos — until they built a system.
Alex and Dana started their social media agency as a side project while both worked full-time. Within 18 months they had enough clients to go full-time together, and within another year they'd hired their first team member — a content writer named Jamie.
Going from two to three people broke everything.
When it was just Alex and Dana, they communicated by text and a shared Google Sheet. Not elegant, but functional. Adding Jamie exposed the limits immediately.
"Jamie didn't know what was urgent. I didn't know what Jamie had already done. Dana was duplicating work because she didn't know I'd already handled something," Alex recalls.
Missed deadlines started. A client's Monday post went out on Wednesday. A content calendar was submitted without revisions because Jamie didn't know revisions had been requested. Client trust started to slip.
"We realized we'd scaled our revenue but not our operations. We were still running a two-person setup with three people inside it."
They tried several project management tools — one was too complex for a three-person team, one was too simple. Builtomate struck the balance: project and task structure without the enterprise overhead.
"It had what we needed: tasks, assignments, due dates, a Kanban board, and time tracking. Nothing we didn't need."
Each client is a project. Content for each client (posts, captions, graphics briefs, reporting) becomes individual tasks. Tasks are assigned to either Alex, Dana, or Jamie with a clear due date.
The Kanban board gives the whole team a real-time view: what's in draft, what's in review, what's approved, what's scheduled. No one has to ask "what's the status?" — the board shows it.
Alex reviews the board each morning. If anything is stuck in review for more than a day, she follows up. Dana uses the time tracking to see how long content creation actually takes — informing how they price new clients.
"Jamie can work independently now because the tasks are clear. She knows exactly what she's doing, when it's due, and where to put it when it's done."
In the six months since implementing Builtomate, the agency has had zero missed client deadlines — after a period where they were missing at least one per week.
Content delivery speed improved dramatically. Because tasks move through a clear workflow instead of an improvised one, pieces that previously took five days to move from draft to published now take three.
"Our client retention rate has gone from 70% to 91% since we sorted out our operations. The work was always good. The delivery was the problem."
Tom W.
Marketing Consultant
Lena S.
Freelance Illustrator
Sarah K.
UX Designer