Nobody wants to hear this, but the biggest moat in the agency business right now
By Johnghiorso · October 8, 2026 · Curated by George's Blog
Nobody wants to hear this, but the biggest moat in the agency business right now is distribution.
When Orca Pacific was doing $5M in revenue, I refused to post on LinkedIn. I thought it was a waste of time.
My marketing team eventually convinced me to record one video. It got thousands of views and brought in a handful of qualified leads.
Suddenly I was the one saying we HAVE to be doing this every day because it was actually driving business.
Over the next two years, we grew from $5M to $12M. Roughly 70% of that growth came directly from LinkedIn. It was a major factor in the eight-figure exit that followed.
I’m seeing the same pattern at VantaFive. Most of our CEOs first found us through my content.
Jordan Winston, founder of Not Your Dad's Media, the newest company in our portfolio, had been following my posts for months before he reached out.
All of this with about 30,000 followers.
The distinction I missed early on is one I still see agency founders miss: creating content is only part of the work.
Distribution means consistently reaching the people who could become your clients, partners, or next acquisition.
By the time they reach out, they already know how you think. That familiarity can take months to build, and it gives you an advantage that’s hard to replicate.