The exact SOPs your agency needs at each growth stage. Stop trying to document everything - focus on what matters at your revenue level.
Agency SOPs by Revenue Stage: What to Document at $500K, $1M, and $3M
You started an agency for freedom. Creative control. No boss. Work from anywhere.
Now you're the bottleneck for everything because nothing is documented.
Every new hire shadows you for two weeks. Every project runs differently depending on who's managing it. Every client escalation lands on your desk because nobody knows the "right" way to handle it. You can't take a week off without the whole thing wobbling.
The irony: you sell marketing systems to clients while running your own business on tribal knowledge and Slack threads.
You need SOPs. But not the way most agencies build them.
Why Most Agency SOPs Fail
I've seen two failure modes, over and over.
Failure Mode 1: The Big Bang. The founder decides "we need to document everything." They block out a weekend. They open Google Docs. They write 14 SOPs in 48 hours. Each one is 6-8 pages. Nobody reads them. Six months later, every single one is outdated. The effort was wasted.
Failure Mode 2: The Novel. Someone writes one SOP - say, client onboarding - and it's 30 pages. Covers every edge case. Every possible scenario. Every exception. It's thorough. It's comprehensive. And nobody has ever read past page 3.
Both fail for the same reason: they ignore context. The SOPs a $400K agency needs are completely different from what a $2M agency needs. Writing the wrong ones at the wrong stage wastes time you don't have.
Here's what actually works: document the right things at the right revenue stage, keep each one to one page, and expand only when you outgrow the current system.
The One-Page SOP Format
Before we get into the stages, here's the format. Every SOP you write should fit this template:
SOP: [Name]
Owner: [Who maintains this document]
Last Updated: [Date]
Trigger: [When do you use this? What event kicks it off?]
STEPS:
1. [Action verb] [specific thing]
2. [Action verb] [specific thing]
3. [Action verb] [specific thing]
...
TOOLS NEEDED:
- [Tool 1]
- [Tool 2]
IF SOMETHING GOES WRONG:
- [First escalation step]
- [Second escalation step]
Rules:
- Under 10 steps. If you need more, you have two SOPs pretending to be one.
- Starts with a trigger. People need to know when to use it, not just how.
- Has an owner. No owner means nobody updates it. Outdated SOPs are worse than no SOPs.
- Fits on one page. If you can't explain it in one page, you don't understand it well enough.
This format is deliberate. We covered why traditional SOPs fail in our guide on standard operating procedures - the short version is that nobody reads 30-page documents. One page gets read. One page gets followed.
Stage 1: $0–$500K (Founder Does Everything)
At this stage, you are the agency. Maybe you have 1-3 contractors or a first hire. Most of the knowledge lives in your head. That's the problem - and the opportunity.
You don't need 20 SOPs. You need 5. These are the five things that will break first when you try to hand off work.
The 5 SOPs You Need Now
1. Client Onboarding
SOP: Client Onboarding
Owner: [Founder]
Last Updated: 2026-02-23
Trigger: Contract signed and payment received
STEPS:
1. Send welcome email (use template in [location])
2. Create client folder in Google Drive from template
3. Send intake questionnaire (Typeform link: [URL])
4. Schedule kickoff call within 5 business days
5. Create project in [PM tool] from template
6. Add client to Slack channel #client-[name]
7. Brief delivery person on scope and expectations
TOOLS NEEDED:
- Gmail, Google Drive, Typeform, [PM tool], Slack
IF SOMETHING GOES WRONG:
- Client unresponsive after 3 days → follow up by phone
- Scope questions → founder reviews before kickoff
If you want to eventually automate this, our client onboarding automation guide walks through the full build. But at $500K, the manual version with a checklist works fine. Automate later.
2. Project Delivery Checklist
This is the most important SOP at this stage. It's how you make sure nothing falls through the cracks when you're not the one doing the work.
SOP: Project Delivery Checklist
Owner: [Founder]
Last Updated: 2026-02-23
Trigger: New project kicks off
STEPS:
1. Confirm scope document is signed and in client folder
2. Break deliverables into tasks in [PM tool]
3. Assign tasks with due dates (buffer 2 days before client deadline)
4. Set weekly internal check-in (15 min, same day each week)
5. Send client status update every Friday by 4 PM
6. Run QA checklist before every deliverable ships (see QA SOP)
7. Get written client approval before marking deliverable complete
8. Log actual hours against estimate after each deliverable
TOOLS NEEDED:
- [PM tool], Google Docs, time tracker
IF SOMETHING GOES WRONG:
- Behind schedule → notify client before they notice, propose revised timeline
- Over budget by 20%+ → stop and review scope with founder
3. QA Process
SOP: Quality Assurance Before Delivery
Owner: [Founder]
Last Updated: 2026-02-23
Trigger: Deliverable ready to send to client
STEPS:
1. Creator self-reviews against brief (does it match what was asked?)
2. Check all links, formatting, spelling, brand guidelines
3. Second person reviews (if available - if not, wait 2 hours and self-review)
4. Compare against scope document - are we delivering what was promised?
5. Stage in client-ready format (PDF, shared link, etc.)
6. Send with context: what it is, what you need from them, by when
TOOLS NEEDED:
- Grammarly, scope document, brand guidelines
IF SOMETHING GOES WRONG:
- Client finds error → apologize, fix within 4 hours, add check to this SOP
4. Invoicing and Collections
SOP: Invoicing
Owner: [Founder]
Last Updated: 2026-02-23
Trigger: Milestone completed OR 1st of the month (retainers)
STEPS:
1. Verify deliverables were approved by client
2. Log billable hours and compare to estimate
3. Generate invoice in [tool] with correct line items
4. Send invoice with brief summary of work completed
5. If unpaid after 7 days → friendly reminder
6. If unpaid after 14 days → phone call
7. If unpaid after 30 days → pause work, escalate
TOOLS NEEDED:
- [Invoicing tool], time tracking data, client approval records
IF SOMETHING GOES WRONG:
- Client disputes amount → reference scope doc and approval records
- Chronic late payer → switch to prepayment for next engagement
5. New Hire First-Week Guide
SOP: First Week - New Team Member
Owner: [Founder]
Last Updated: 2026-02-23
Trigger: New hire or contractor starts
DAY 1:
1. Send login credentials for all tools (see tool access list)
2. Walk through client list - who they are, what we do for them
3. Review 2 recent project examples from start to finish
4. Assign a small, low-risk task to complete by end of Day 2
DAY 2-3:
5. Shadow a client call or review a recorded one
6. Complete first task, get feedback
7. Review all 4 other SOPs in this list
8. Assign first real (supervised) client task
DAY 4-5:
9. Complete supervised task, get detailed feedback
10. Daily 15-minute check-in for first 2 weeks
TOOLS NEEDED:
- Access to: [PM tool], Slack, Google Drive, email, time tracker
IF SOMETHING GOES WRONG:
- New hire struggling → extend supervised period, assign simpler work
- Culture fit concerns → address in Week 2 check-in, don't wait
What "Done" Looks Like at This Stage
Five one-page documents. Stored in a shared folder or Notion workspace - somewhere everyone can find them in two clicks. You review them once a quarter (put it on the calendar, or it won't happen).
Common mistakes at $0–$500K:
- Writing SOPs for things that only happen twice a year (don't bother)
- Making them too detailed (one page - period)
- Not assigning an owner (you're the owner of all five right now, and that's fine)
- Waiting until you "have time" (you never will - write them during your next slow week)
Stage 2: $500K–$1M (First Hires, First Chaos)
You've got 4-8 people now. Maybe a project manager. Maybe an account manager. Definitely more work than you can oversee personally.
This is the stage where things start breaking in new ways. Two people handle client complaints differently. Someone prices a project way too low. A client falls through the cracks during a handoff. You hired someone and they spent their first week confused because your "first-week guide" assumed founder availability you no longer have.
You need 8 more SOPs. These aren't nice-to-haves - they're the ones your first ops person (or your most organized PM) needs to keep things from unraveling.
The 8 SOPs You Add Next
6. Sales Qualification
SOP: Sales Qualification
Owner: [Sales lead or founder]
Trigger: New inbound lead or referral
QUALIFYING CRITERIA (must meet 3 of 4):
1. Budget: Can afford minimum engagement ($X/month)
2. Timeline: Needs to start within 60 days
3. Fit: Industry/service match (our sweet spot: [define it])
4. Authority: Talking to decision-maker, not researcher
STEPS:
1. Respond to inquiry within 4 business hours
2. Ask qualifying questions on first call (use script in [location])
3. Score lead against criteria above
4. If qualified → send proposal within 48 hours
5. If not qualified → polite decline email (template in [location])
6. Log outcome in CRM regardless
TOOLS NEEDED:
- CRM, call script, proposal template, decline template
Why this matters: at $500K, you said yes to everything. At $1M, saying yes to the wrong client costs you more than saying no. A bad-fit $5K client that eats 80 hours isn't revenue - it's a loss.
7. Scoping and Estimation
SOP: Project Scoping
Owner: [PM lead]
Trigger: Qualified lead needs a proposal
STEPS:
1. Identify project type (see project type definitions)
2. Pull template estimate for that project type
3. List all deliverables - be specific (not "social media" but "12 posts/month")
4. Add hours estimate per deliverable (use historical data)
5. Add 15% buffer for revisions and unexpected work
6. Define what's explicitly OUT of scope
7. Get founder review on any project over $[X]
8. Document assumptions that affect the estimate
HISTORICAL ESTIMATES (update quarterly):
- Website redesign: 120-180 hours
- Monthly retainer (SEO): 25-35 hours/month
- Campaign launch: 40-60 hours
- Brand strategy: 60-80 hours
8. Client Communication Cadence
SOP: Client Communication
Owner: [Account manager]
Trigger: Ongoing - applies to all active clients
WEEKLY (every Friday by 4 PM):
- Send status update email (template in [location])
- Include: completed this week, in progress, coming next week, blockers
MONTHLY (first week of month):
- Send performance report with metrics
- Schedule 30-minute review call
- Document action items from call in shared doc
AD HOC:
- Issue discovered → notify client within 4 hours
- Scope change requested → respond within 24 hours with impact assessment
- Good news (big win, milestone) → share immediately
RULES:
- Never let a client email sit unanswered for >24 hours
- If you don't have an answer, acknowledge receipt and give a timeline
- All client-facing communications CC the project manager
9. Time Tracking
SOP: Time Tracking
Owner: [Operations]
Trigger: Every working day
RULES:
1. Track time daily - not "at the end of the week from memory"
2. Log to specific client AND project (not just "Client A")
3. Minimum increment: 15 minutes
4. Non-billable time gets tracked too (internal meetings, admin, BD)
5. Submit weekly timesheet by Monday 10 AM
WHAT TO TRACK:
- Client billable work (by project)
- Internal work (meetings, training, admin)
- Business development (proposals, pitches)
- Bench time (unallocated)
Time tracking feeds your utilization rate, which is the single most important financial metric for an agency at this stage. If you're not tracking time, you're guessing at profitability.
10. Resource Allocation
SOP: Weekly Resource Allocation
Owner: [PM lead or operations]
Trigger: Every Monday morning
STEPS:
1. Pull current utilization by person (target: 70% billable)
2. Review project deadlines for coming 2 weeks
3. Identify overallocated team members (>85% = red flag)
4. Identify underallocated team members (<50% = find them work)
5. Adjust assignments - move work from overloaded to underloaded
6. Flag capacity gaps to founder (need contractor? need to hire?)
7. Update resource grid and share with team leads
FORMAT:
| Person | This Week | Next Week | Utilization |
|---------|-----------|-----------|-------------|
| Sarah | Client A (25h), Client B (10h) | ... | 78% |
| Mike | Client C (20h), Internal (8h) | ... | 62% |
11. Escalation Paths
SOP: Escalation Paths
Owner: [Operations]
Trigger: Issue that exceeds normal resolution authority
LEVEL 1 - PM handles:
- Deliverable revision requests (within scope)
- Minor timeline adjustments (<3 days)
- Internal resource conflicts
LEVEL 2 - Account manager + PM handle:
- Client unhappy with deliverable quality
- Timeline slipping >3 days
- Budget trending 20%+ over estimate
LEVEL 3 - Founder handles:
- Client threatens to leave
- Scope dispute involving contract terms
- Team performance issue affecting delivery
- Any issue involving money >$5,000
RULES:
- Never surprise the founder. Escalate early, not late.
- Document every escalation: what happened, who was involved, resolution
- Every Level 3 gets a post-mortem within 1 week
12. Client Offboarding
SOP: Client Offboarding
Owner: [Account manager]
Trigger: Client contract ends (planned or unplanned)
STEPS:
1. Confirm final deliverables are complete and approved
2. Send final invoice and confirm payment
3. Transfer all client assets (files, access, data)
4. Remove client from internal tools (Slack, PM tool)
5. Send offboarding survey (template in [location])
6. Schedule 15-minute exit interview if client is willing
7. Document lessons learned (what went well, what didn't)
8. Add client to "past clients" CRM segment for future outreach
9. Send a thank-you note (real one, not a template)
TOOLS NEEDED:
- CRM, file transfer tool, survey tool
13. Monthly Reporting
SOP: Monthly Agency Report
Owner: [Operations]
Trigger: Last business day of each month
FINANCIAL:
1. Pull total revenue by client
2. Calculate gross margin per client (revenue - direct labor cost)
3. Flag any client below 25% margin
4. Compare actuals to forecast
OPERATIONAL:
5. Pull team utilization rates (target: 70% average)
6. Count project overruns this month (target: <20% of projects)
7. Log scope creep incidents and $ captured vs. absorbed
8. Track average days from contract to kickoff
TEAM:
9. Log overtime hours by person
10. Note any hiring needs or capacity constraints
FORMAT: Use dashboard template in [location]
REVIEW: Founder + ops review meeting, first Monday of following month
What "Done" Looks Like at This Stage
Thirteen SOPs total. Each one page. An ops person (or your most organized PM) owns the review cycle - quarterly reviews, updating what's changed.
Common mistakes at $500K–$1M:
- Not hiring an ops person and expecting PMs to do it. PMs manage projects. Operations manages the system. Different jobs.
- Copying SOPs from the internet instead of documenting how your agency actually works. Generic SOPs get ignored.
- Skipping the estimation SOP and wondering why every project loses money.
- Not tracking time because "we trust our team." Trust and measurement aren't opposites.
For a deeper look at the operational infrastructure your agency needs at this stage, see the full agency operations playbook.
Stage 3: $1M–$3M (Systems, Not Just Documents)
Here's where the game changes.
At $1M+, your problem isn't documentation. You probably have SOPs. The problem is that SOPs are static documents and your agency is a dynamic system. People forget to follow the checklist. The steps are right but they take too long. The information exists but it's in three different places.
SOPs got you from $500K to $1M. They won't get you from $1M to $3M.
At this stage, your SOPs become specs for automation. The document that says "create a client folder, add them to the PM tool, send a welcome email" becomes an automation that does all three in 60 seconds with zero manual input.
What Changes
From documents to workflows. Your onboarding SOP doesn't live in a Google Doc anymore - it's a Zapier/Make/n8n workflow that fires automatically when a deal closes. The SOP document becomes the documentation for the automation, not the process itself.
From checklists to dashboards. Your resource allocation SOP doesn't require someone to manually pull utilization numbers every Monday. You have a dashboard that updates in real-time. The SOP becomes "review this dashboard every Monday and take action on red flags."
From manual reporting to automated reporting. Your monthly report doesn't require 4 hours of data pulling. The data feeds into a template automatically. The SOP becomes "review the auto-generated report, add narrative, and distribute."
The SOPs That Become Automations
SOP → AUTOMATION MAPPING
Client Onboarding (SOP #1)
→ Automate: Welcome email, folder creation, PM project setup, Slack channel
→ Manual: Kickoff call, relationship building, scope review
→ Tool: Zapier/Make/n8n triggered by CRM deal stage change
Invoicing (SOP #4)
→ Automate: Invoice generation from time tracking data, send on schedule
→ Manual: Approval review before send, dispute resolution
→ Tool: [Invoicing tool] + time tracker integration
Client Communication (SOP #8)
→ Automate: Weekly status email populated from PM tool data
→ Manual: Review auto-generated draft, add personal context, send
→ Tool: PM tool API + email automation
Resource Allocation (SOP #10)
→ Automate: Utilization dashboard, over/underallocation alerts
→ Manual: Weekly review meeting, staffing decisions
→ Tool: Time tracker + dashboard (Databox, Google Sheets, or custom)
Monthly Reporting (SOP #13)
→ Automate: Data pull, dashboard population, report template fill
→ Manual: Narrative, recommendations, review meeting
→ Tool: Data connectors + reporting template
New SOPs at This Stage
You also need a few new ones:
14. Capacity Planning (Quarterly)
SOP: Quarterly Capacity Planning
Owner: [Operations Director]
Trigger: First week of each quarter
STEPS:
1. Pull pipeline forecast from CRM (expected new revenue next 90 days)
2. Calculate hours required to deliver forecasted work
3. Calculate current team capacity (headcount × billable hours target)
4. Gap analysis: required hours vs. available hours
5. If gap >15% → begin hiring process (takes 60-90 days to fill)
6. If surplus >20% → reduce contractor spend or accelerate BD
7. Model 3 scenarios: conservative, expected, aggressive
8. Present to leadership with hiring/contractor recommendations
INPUTS:
- CRM pipeline data
- Current team utilization
- Historical hours-per-project-type data
- Planned departures or leaves
15. SOP Maintenance
SOP: SOP Review and Maintenance
Owner: [Operations Director]
Trigger: Last week of each quarter
STEPS:
1. List all active SOPs with last-updated date
2. Flag any SOP not updated in >90 days
3. For each flagged SOP: ask the owner - is this still accurate?
4. Update or archive SOPs that are outdated
5. Identify process gaps: what are people asking about that has no SOP?
6. Prioritize new SOPs based on frequency and impact
7. Assign owners and deadlines for new SOPs
8. Publish updated SOP index to team
RULES:
- If nobody used an SOP in 90 days, consider deleting it
- If an SOP is wrong, it's worse than no SOP
- Max 20 active SOPs at any time (more = nobody reads any of them)
What "Done" Looks Like at This Stage
Your SOPs are no longer the system - they're the documentation of the system. The actual system is automations, dashboards, and templates that run with minimal manual input. When someone new joins, they don't read 15 SOPs on day one. They see the automations working and the dashboards updating and they learn the system by operating within it.
You should be running an operations audit at least twice a year at this point. The audit tells you where your systems are leaking. The SOPs tell you how the systems are supposed to work. The automations actually do the work.
Common mistakes at $1M–$3M:
- Automating a broken process. If the manual version doesn't work, the automated version will break faster. Fix the process, then automate it.
- Keeping everything in documents when it should be in systems. If someone has to remember to check a Google Doc, they won't.
- Not investing in an ops person (or an ops consultant). At this stage, operations isn't a part-time job for the founder. It's a full-time function.
- Building custom software when off-the-shelf tools will do. You don't need a custom app. You need Zapier and a well-structured Airtable base.
The Full SOP Roadmap
Here's the complete picture:
STAGE 1: $0–$500K (5 SOPs)
├── Client Onboarding
├── Project Delivery Checklist
├── QA Process
├── Invoicing
└── New Hire First-Week Guide
STAGE 2: $500K–$1M (+8 SOPs = 13 total)
├── Sales Qualification
├── Scoping & Estimation
├── Client Communication Cadence
├── Time Tracking
├── Resource Allocation
├── Escalation Paths
├── Client Offboarding
└── Monthly Reporting
STAGE 3: $1M–$3M (+2 SOPs + automation layer)
├── Capacity Planning (quarterly)
├── SOP Maintenance (quarterly)
└── Convert Stage 1-2 SOPs into automated workflows
Don't skip stages. A $400K agency trying to build capacity planning dashboards is solving the wrong problem. A $2M agency still doing manual onboarding is leaving money and client experience on the table.
Start This Week
Pick your stage. Look at the SOPs listed. Ask yourself: which of these would have prevented a problem in the last 30 days?
Start there. One SOP. One page. One hour of your time.
Most agencies stall at $1M because they have $500K systems. The fix isn't working harder - it's documenting and automating what already works.
Your agency doesn't need a 200-page operations manual. It needs the right 5 SOPs today, the right 13 next quarter, and the right automations next year.
Frequently Asked Questions
What SOPs should a marketing agency have?
At minimum: client onboarding, project delivery checklist, QA before delivery, invoicing, and new hire onboarding. These five cover the workflows that break first when you start delegating. As you grow past $500K, add sales qualification, scoping, client communication cadence, time tracking, resource allocation, escalation paths, offboarding, and monthly reporting. Don't try to document everything at once - match your SOPs to your revenue stage.
How do I create an agency operations manual?
Don't create a manual. Create individual one-page SOPs with a clear trigger, numbered steps (under 10), tools needed, and an owner. Store them in one shared location. A "manual" sounds like a book - and nobody reads agency operations books. Thirteen one-page documents that people actually reference beats a 200-page manual collecting dust every time.
What's the difference between SOPs and automation?
SOPs are documents describing how a process should work. Automation is software that executes the process without manual steps. At small scale ($0–$500K), SOPs are enough - the checklist keeps you consistent. At larger scale ($1M+), SOPs become the specifications for automation. The onboarding SOP becomes the Zapier workflow. The reporting SOP becomes the automated dashboard. Documents describe. Automation executes.
How often should I update agency SOPs?
Review every 90 days. Any SOP not updated in 90 days is suspect. Ask the owner: is this still how we actually do it? If nobody used the SOP in 90 days, consider deleting it. Outdated SOPs are worse than no SOPs because they give false confidence. Keep a maximum of 20 active SOPs - more than that and nobody reads any of them.
When should an agency hire an operations person?
Around $500K–$750K in revenue, or when you have 5+ team members. Before that, the founder can maintain the SOPs and run the weekly reviews. After that, you need someone whose job is the system, not the projects. This can be a fractional ops person or consultant at first. By $1M, operations should be someone's primary focus - not a side responsibility for a project manager.
Cedar Operations builds the operational infrastructure - SOPs, automations, and dashboards - that agencies need to scale past $1M. See if we're a fit.
Related reading: