In this episode of Founders Future, with host Zach Young, we sit down with Bailey Wurzer, the young founder of Surface Marketing and a college student-athlete running his business from his dorm room. Bailey shares his unconventional journey into entrepreneurship, which began with dropshipping in high school while working at Starbucks. He quickly realized that even the best products fail without visibility, which led him down a path of self-education in digital marketing. After a year and a half of intense study, he niched down into SEO and founded Surface Marketing, an agency that now helps small to mid-sized, service-based businesses generate consistent inbound leads through technical SEO, GEO (Generative Engine Optimization), and high-converting website design.

Bailey details his hands-on approach to client acquisition, which relies heavily on personalized cold outreach via email and LinkedIn, emphasizing local connections in his Santa Barbara base. He opens up about the unique challenges of balancing a full college course load, college football, and a growing business, including having to turn away clients due to capacity constraints. Looking ahead, with his football career ending due to an injury, Bailey is focused on a significant growth phase, aiming to 4X his business by expanding his service offerings and mastering paid advertising to systematically fill his calendar and build a scalable agency model.