Lessons About Digital Marketing From Renovating a 1960s Property
Since moving into a 60-year-old beachfront house that’s much in need of love, I’ve found myself elbow deep in home renovations. While tinkering with light fittings and praying over plumbing repairs, I noticed some interesting synchronicities between home renovations and digital marketing. Specifically, the synchronicity of wondering:
“Do I need to hire a professional?”
And then…
“How can I best do this myself?” OR “How can I best work with a professional?”
The deeper you dig, the more synchronicities appear. I think it’s due to both tasks having these same qualities:
You’re tweaking on the fly (I’m living in my home as I improve it, your audience are experiencing your campaigns as you improve them)
Costs can escalate (the small job that ends up taking a week and has knock-on effects on other tasks, meaning delays and expenses that can quickly snowball)
Complex problems with interdependent factors (plumbing, electrics, architecture | audience, platform, creative)
Trust issues/Cowboy builders (the complexity of the tasks leaves so much room for obfuscation of the truth of what’s really necessary)
Given those similarities, here are five lessons inspired by my home renovation to help you work with a digital marketing agency in 2024.
1. Delegate, Don't Abdicate.
Your kitchen sink is not draining. Should you attempt to fix this alone, or give the task to someone else and go on holiday until it’s fixed? Either one could result in a different disaster… leaking water or leaking money. But what if there’s a middle ground?
Rather than completely taking over a project, or completely giving it away, I’d recommend intelligent delegation as the ‘best of both’ approach. Discuss the required work with the expert until you understand it, and then have them do the parts that you cannot reliably do, leaving perhaps the initial sourcing of materials and the finishing touches on the grouting to you.
The better you can delegate, the more you understand what's going on, and the more you save.
2. What Are You Really Worth?
Put down the screwdriver, Bezos. Have you ever worked out your actual hourly rate as an entrepreneur? Here’s a handy calculator to work it out. For most entrepreneurs I work with, their time is more valuable than mine (poor me). This means your time is likely better spent on running your business, leaving the grunt work to Bob the Builder and Frits Arkema. Such is life.
So remember, just because you can do it, that doesn’t mean you should do it.
3. Quality & Speed of Work
If you have all the time in the world to do it, and an interest to learn more, then go ahead. But don't be embarrassed when the tiler working in the other room finishes before you’ve even gotten halfway. And when the job is done, don’t be surprised when his perfectly parallel lines make yours look a bit crooked.
The fact is, a typical tiler will have laid around 5,000,000 tiles throughout their career (yes, I did the math). Your typical DIYer might’ve laid 50. I’ve lost count of the number of ads I’ve run for clients. There’s something to be said for that weight of experience.
Even if you’ve got the time, the ability, and the will to do a task - a specialist will do a better job, and faster. So when speed and quality are a priority, use a professional.
4. Coach or Agency?
If you’re fortunate enough to have a builder in your circle, consult them! Likewise for digital marketing. Provided that they’re happy to guide you, having a professional mentoring you through a job might empower you to do a better job than you could do alone.
The downsides here are that your coach will still want compensation, and the lines are quite blurred around exactly how much support you’ll receive. But it works for those reluctant to hand over their work to an agency.
5. Don’t Get Stuck Under The Sink.
Whether it’s your home or your brand, the stakes are high. The object is precious to you. Mistakes can be costly, and hard to avoid. Often I’ve seen clients persevering alone with tools they’re not familiar with, and making disastrous mistakes.
Here are some common ones to avoid:
Calibrating the budget for the wrong time-frame
Pumping money into two campaigns that compete against each other
Forgetting to properly curate the product feed resulting in wasteful ads
So, if you can’t afford to make these mistakes, seek a professional. Don’t get “stuck under the sink” trying to stem the flow of the mistake you fear might ruin your property.
6. Don’t forget to crack open a cold one when the job’s done.
Most important of all, when the job is done and you’re standing alongside your hired help, arms crossed and admiring your work, don’t forget to crack open a cold beer to celebrate the achievement. Carlton, preferably.
