Transitioning from Freelancer to CEO

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What do you do when your career takes an unexpected left turn? And how do you know when it’s time to stop hustling like a freelancer and start leading like a CEO? Today’s featured guest found herself in that situation and made the bold choice to go from career misstep to becoming an agency owner. She'll dive into what it really takes to go from a one-woman shop with dial-up internet to leading a team with vision, systems, and staying power. From handwritten letters with a 15% close rate to breaking free from client dependency and leveraging AI without losing the human touch, she shares the hard-earned lessons every agency owner needs to hear.

Kriston Sellier is the President and Founder of Id8, a specialized branding agency based in Atlanta. With more than 25 years in the business, she’s built a reputation for helping food, beverage, and manufacturing brands stand out and thrive. Kriston is passionate about research-driven branding, cultivating strong communities, and proving that the human side of leadership is just as critical as the strategy.

In this episode, we’ll discuss:                                   

• Starting over after being fired.

• Outgrowing freelance mode.

• What do agency owners need to grow?

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Thriving in the Agency World After Being Fired

Kriston didn’t step into agency ownership with a clean, corporate plan. She was fired. After leaving IBM to co-found an agency, she found herself pushed out after a handshake deal gone wrong. At 20-something, she was suddenly unemployed and staring down two options: get another job or finally chase her dream of starting her own shop.

It wasn’t easy, but that leap turned out to be the right one. Starting out with no clients, she set a modest goal of making $35,000 in her first year. Instead, she closed out her first nine months with $90,000. That was the moment she knew she wasn’t just freelancing; she was building something real.

From Cold Calls to Handwritten Letters: Building the First Client Base

Kriston started with just a basement office and dial-up internet. Since this was the 90s, if her husband picked up the phone line upstairs it would disconnect the whole system.

She started out making cold calls to every food and beverage brand in the Yellow Pages. Additionally, she also sent handwritten letters pitching her services, yielding an impressive 15% close rate. In today’s digital-first world, that kind of return sounds impossible, but back then it got her first wave of clients. It’s a reminder that persistence and a personal touch can cut through the noise, even if the tools have changed.

Outgrowing Freelance Mode and Thinking Like a CEO

Like many agency owners, Kriston spent the early years acting more like a freelancer than a CEO. That all changed in 2006 when one client made up 75% of her business. The sleepless nights and anxiety from being handcuffed to a single account forced her to rethink everything.

A colleague recommended working with a business consultant, so Kriston hired one and for four years, she worked with a full-time consultant who helped her transition from operator to CEO. That shift meant putting systems in place, committing to sales, and most importantly, diversifying her client base. Within the first year of working with her consultant, she added 25 new clients and broke free from the one-client trap.

What Agency CEOs Need to Grow?

Kriston strongly believes that CEOs should surround themselves with subject matter experts. Every agency owner needs a good advisory board that tells them the truths they doesn’t necessarily want to hear, which is why she recommends relying on financial, HR, and sales consultants that can help you look at things from a different perspective.

Regarding her role as CEO, Kriston definitely sees herself as more of a coach than a manager. For her, leadership is about helping team members uncover the real issues behind their challenges and guiding them to their own solutions. Likewise, the best team members are those who show they’re coachable and open to feedback.

She doesn’t see failure as the end of the road but as a symptom of something deeper. Her job is to help her team ask the right questions, recognize the root cause, and take ownership of the fix. That shift from micromanaging tasks to coaching outcomes not only freed her up as a leader but also empowered her team to make better decisions without her constant oversight.

AI, Research, and the Future of Agencies

Running a research-based agency, Kriston is a big fan of Perplexity, a research-focused AI she uses 20–40 times a day for everything from writing stronger emails to analyzing massive datasets. But she’s quick to point out that AI isn’t a replacement for agencies—it’s an enhancer.

Where some fear AI will eliminate agency work, Kriston agrees that companies will still want experts to navigate the complexity and not DIY everything themselves. Clients may use AI for certain tasks, but they’ll still rely on agencies for strategy, creativity, and execution..

AI + human expertise is the winning formula. And with large organizations outsourcing more marketing again, Kriston believes the future is bright for agencies that bring innovation, research, and personal connection to the table.

Cooperation Over Competition

Kriston wants agency owners to stop treating each other like competitors and start seeing each other as collaborators. She believes the industry’s future depends on agency owners being open, honest, and willing to share both wins and lessons learned.

Most agency owners see every other shop as a threat when they’re starting out, fearful of competition instead of open to collaboration. At some point, however, through masterminds and peer groups, they come to realize the real growth comes when owners start to build community and create strategic partnerships.

For Kriston, it all comes back to community, the same mission she set when she started ID8 decades ago. Build the community, and the business will follow.

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