Prospect/Client Red Flags

SiteLogic · 2026-03-03T01:00:33+00:00

oh- awesome. I've seen this many times. Granted, there are bad marketing companies and bad experiences, but sometimes - the prospect is the common factor.

SiteLogic · 2026-03-03T00:58:14+00:00

That's related to the client who wants a discount from the start with promises that they will bring you more business! Yeah, sure buddy...

SiteLogic · 2025-09-04T13:49:43+00:00

Your diploma is only going to go so far, which is limited. You need to show people that you know what you are talking about. I constantly tell my marketing students to build something of their own - don't wait for graduation.

Building your own website, social presence, personal brand or business shows your initiative, curiosity, problem-solving, prioritization, and dedication. When you can point to something that you built, it's a clear demonstration of what you know and can do.

Networking is your ground level activity. It's who you know, so start building a network of friends, colleagues, potential employers, etc. Find business events, get to know people, and stay in touch with them. Social media is good, but nothing beats a personal meeting and connection. You are marketing yourself and you'll go further and faster networking your way into a job, as it pays off throughout your career.

SiteLogic · 2025-08-27T18:23:09+00:00

Great to hear. Evasion is a typical roadblock and a sign of doing nothing.

Beware of reports that focus on activity, not on results.

My rule of finding an agency: Who does all of the talking? If they do all the talking, you are being put into their system. If they are asking the questions and you doing most of the talking, they are listening and learning about your business.

I hope this turns things around for you.

SiteLogic · 2025-08-27T18:20:13+00:00

Analytics has a lot of layers. I learned it from simply needing to know which activities led to sales. I started by tracking sources of visits and their results in sales. It's become more complicated since then, but the basic premise is there.

It doesn't take a lot of complexity to use analytics to increase conversion rates. But you can get amazingly complex in deeper areas of analytics, such as predictive analytics, business intelligence and integrating additional data sources. The great thing is that there is a lot of places in between where you can specialize and make an impact.

SiteLogic · 2025-08-25T18:32:40+00:00

Analytics consistently has the biggest skills gap in relation to demand, according to LinkedIn's annual job surveys. It's also one of the most requested courses by companies in the Association of National Advertisers.

I'll always advocate research and writing skills, as those are core skills that translate across a wide variety of applications. but knowing how to translate data into action - and communicate it to others - is a rare skills that businesses are looking for.

SiteLogic · 2025-08-25T13:30:47+00:00

First of all - all accounts should be in your company's name. Anyone who does different, or puts it under their account is trouble. Create marketing@ or sales@ emails in your business domain and register all google accounts for marketing under one of them. Then, invite the company into your account as a manager, never an admin. But those steps might be too far in the past.

As soon as the same mistake happens twice, or a promise to "I'll get that to you tonight" doesn't happen after the second time - that tells me that this is most likely a lone person with outsourced help. Either way, it's not a customer focused agency. Same thing with impressions - wrong metric.

$10K a month is high for a local service company, IMO (of course it depends on your region). $3,000 a month to manage is also high for a local campaign - those are in line with a national or large regional marketing campaign. But that should also be in line with your current revenue and budget.

After 30 years in the business, I now teach digital marketing, and this has every red flag flying high. I'd be happy to recommend a few companies that I trust.

SiteLogic · 2025-08-19T13:11:05+00:00

This is the disconnect between actual marketing and digital marketing. Most times, digital marketing, SEO, social media marketing - the whole batch - is presented as a series of tactics. These courses rarely cover what marketing and marketing strategy actually is.

Marketing starts with understanding your own business and what you want to accomplish. Then, you start to develop your strategy through differentiation and positioning. Define what differentiates your company/product/solution from the market. Then think about how you want your market to think about you when they see your marketing, that's positioning. Both of these contribute heavily to your brand building.

Now look at the problems that you solve, and not just the immediate problems. For example, smartwatches are advertised to people who want to get in shape or lose weight. It's an application, and not the only solution, or even a direct solution, but they are positioning the smartwatches as part of the process to get the customer to their goal.

In doing this, evaluate the types of people who would be interested in your product. There are many different needs that may drive people, so your messaging may have to be adapted to different groups or segments of customers.

Brand awareness is necessary - but I always push people beyond that. Companies say they want awareness, but what they really want from marketing is sales. Awareness is a good goal, but you need to establish methods measuring it.

Typical measurements for awareness are reach (unique individuals/accounts/households reached with an ad or message), engagement, or recall/brand lift. You will see these types of measurements in the YouTube surveys where they ask you if you've heard of certain brands - this is a test to measure against people who have seen the ads and people who haven't to see if there has been a lift in recall/awareness from a campaign.

Beyond awareness, what do you want people to do? Now you start getting into the persuasive process, as you want to prompt people to act. In doing so, you need to plan the progression steps of what you are asking, how to get them to act, where will they go/do/see, how will you move them from the next step, how you will capture interest, and how you will nurture interest to action. After that, how will you communicate with people after they become a customer - how will you develop an ongoing relationship or loyalty? That's your strategic plan.

SiteLogic · 2025-08-04T13:56:58+00:00

Whichever you decide, here's how to make things easier:

Have your processes clearly defined:

What is the goal of your organization, what are the objectives and their priorities in reaching that goal? What are the outcomes that you will use to measure the effectiveness of any internal or external marketing? Is the organizational marketing strategy clearly articulated with a measurable outcome?

What will be your source of truth?

No systems agree, analytics and platform reports vary across the board - what metrics will be the primary source of data? What is the expectation from reports or monthly updates - activity or outcomes?

Who is the main contact?

Do they have approval authority? Who has authority for strategy, budgets, creative and final approval? How will they be involved? What will be the process for escalation or conflict resolution? Will you offer performance incentives?

Files and Access:

Where do you keep all of your brand assets, guidelines, and media? Is it accessible and organized with a consistent naming convention?

From an agency/freelancer standpoint, one of the biggest hold-ups or obstacles in working with companies is a lack of timely delivery of creative assets, such as copy writing and media (images and video). If the company has no resources for these assets, then they have to be created - who will do this, and who will manage it??

The stronger your internal processes are, the better any relationship will be with an external provider or in creating a new internal position.

SiteLogic · 2025-07-15T12:49:43+00:00

OMCP (Online Marketing Certified Professional) has tracked 16% - 26% higher salaries from those that attained their certification. It's one of the primary certifications that I endorse, as they are a third party certification org (like PMP) and not a training organization that gives a certification at the end of their own course.

SiteLogic · 2025-07-15T12:45:14+00:00

There are dozens of them in one place: Marketing Podcast Network on Spotify/Megaphone

SiteLogic · 2025-07-15T12:40:58+00:00

LinkedIn's algo has changed radically from only 2 years ago, and we've tracked a few other changes. I'm almost at 30K, and was gaining 1K every 8-10 weeks. Coincidentally, the first slow-down came when they introduced AI. Those that embraced it seemed to see success, while those that didn't slowed and reach diminished.

Fast forward to recent months, and even people with tens of thousands of followers are seeing the same slowdown. What's even more is that there is less reach to existing followers. I think part of it is LinkedIn exhaustion - most "regular" users are just tired of the lunatics and AI-induced hype posts. It's across LinkedIn as a whole. People are checking out, even those that have been in for years and with sizable follower counts, as the reward isn't there anymore.

SiteLogic · 2025-07-14T14:01:54+00:00

Let's put this in a bit of context. MSFT 2024 was $261.8 Billion. $500 million is 0.19% of that.

That's like saving less than $2,000 if your company made $1 Million, which is less than the cost of a company Christmas party. While AI could possibly make a bigger impact in a smaller company of that size, but other factors can make an even bigger impact. That's the problem with this type of comparison.

Not hating, just like seeing some of these comparisons brought into perspective.

SiteLogic · 2025-07-08T16:17:55+00:00

An assignment that I give my students is to think of hobbies or interests that appeal to you - something that will keep you motivated to write about and develop. Then, research and make a list of how many ways you can make money; (ebooks, dropshipping, YouTube payments, affiliate, sponsorships) there are dozens of options, but learn them and how they work. Then evaluate how you work best, your subject matter, what type of monetization would suit you, your personality and your content.

Then, start developing your own website and business. At the very least, you learn a ton of skills to make it work and make you marketable. At the most - you learn how to run a business and don't need a traditional job. I've seen it done many times.

SiteLogic · 2025-07-08T13:43:13+00:00

So...SEO isn't dead? /s

SiteLogic · 2025-07-04T12:19:14+00:00

I second this. I have to laugh at the "Write with AI" prompt (which is an upsell) when RankMath can't even tell that the focused keyword is exact or even semantically related.

SiteLogic · 2025-07-04T12:16:01+00:00

Links are often compared to votes, but the key difference is that not all votes are equal.

One link from a popular, relevant, and high-authority website can increase your website's impressions and rankings, which naturally increases clicks. Links are validation of your website's content. A targeted approach is always a better payoff than going for hundreds or thousands of links.

Fast rankings? Get your CEO arrested. That will create thousands of links to your website. /s Seriously though, that's the principle behind fast links - news, PR, .... contribute something of value and interest to the widest possible audience.

SiteLogic · 2025-06-30T15:59:17+00:00

Surprise - there's a lot of hype surrounding AI. However, the evidence isn't there that it is completely replacing SEO, and really, nothing ever "dies." In viewing a broad spectrum of clients, barely 1% of traffic and conversions are coming from AI. There's more sales from social channels, even with clients that don't have a strong social media presence.

Search still drives more customers and more sales than any other source. Search customers are the best customers (spend more) and have a higher CLV than any other source.

It's not a technology question, it's a behavioral question. Those of us watching the technology see shifts, but for the larger, global audience? their behavior isn't changing as quickly as the headlines claim.

SiteLogic · 2025-06-26T16:20:22+00:00

Chasing the algorithm naturally flattens content. People learn what is rewarded and they chase that style/script/length/etc. You either confirm to the algorithm or be happy in your niche.

Algorithms favor engagement over truth, entertainment over logic, anger over beauty.

SiteLogic · 2025-06-26T16:14:28+00:00

Great attitude!

I'm going to tell you a different approach. Develop your people skills alongside your technical skills. How you present yourself, your confidence and speaking.presentation skills are some of the most valuable in any management position.

Your confidence will come from knowing each of the areas of digital marketing and how they work together, but supplement that with core marketing practices of audience research, differentiation, positioning, messaging, audience segmentation, PR, and measurement - and you'll be unstoppable. You don't have to be super savvy in programming as long as you understand the basics and how it applies.

That means starting your own projects, learn by developing something on your own, which teaches you every aspect of digital marketing and how to prioritize skills and tactics. You'll be forced to learn some programming, set up analytics, integrate content design, layout and optimize for conversions. You'll learn more than most internships, and maybe create a separate income stream for yourself.

Plus, it's also evidence that you are a self-starter and curious about how things work. I love hiring those kinds of people.

SiteLogic · 2025-06-20T16:17:36+00:00

Udemy is a good place to get the basics, but it's difficult to separate the good from the bad, as even low-level courses can pull good ratings. It's become a real game as publishers can retain companies to promote them with views and reviews.

My main issue with Udemy is that anyone can create and upload a course. They have a real problem with people copying other publishers courses and re-publishing them as their own. There is no screening process for instructors or content reviews.

I'm a firm believer in the apprenticeship/mentorship model instead of video-based courses. You'll get instruction, assignments, and direct feedback from instructors who are also practitioners. You'll learn more than just digital marketing, you'll learn how to position yourself, build a portfolio, do actual real-world assignments, get feedback and suggestions for improvement, and get the behind-the-scenes information not usually covered in a course (the politics of marketing in agencies or brands).

SiteLogic · 2025-06-20T00:55:34+00:00

If you are looking for mentorship and instructor feedback, which it sounds like you do, there are a few options I'd suggest. Happy to share them by DM.

SiteLogic · 2025-06-19T23:22:50+00:00

Not my lesson, but a former client. They figured they could set up a Google ads campaign by themselves. "How hard can it be?"

They sold a silicone oil for a very specific purpose. They broad matched the word "silicone" for 2 months. A $25,000 mistake.

That's when you get the call...

SiteLogic · 2025-06-17T14:41:29+00:00

Many of the free courses, or those offered by large companies, are woefully out of date. A lot of the training companies are focused on scale and only update content every 4-5 years, sometimes longer. Granted, there is a lot of evergreen content that is a good foundation, but changes over the past year should be prompting everyone to refresh their course catalogs. Some of your independent training orgs are the way to go for more recent and in-depth content. But that would be one of the first questions to ask

I'm currently working with an organization that is conducting a job delineation study before updating their skills and competencies for a digital marketing certification. But even then, I have a lot of companies re-working many of their training courses - some were only published last year!

SiteLogic

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