Should You ‘Outsource’ Your Marketing? (Part 3)

Software developer Aziz has built an online training business from “zip-zero-nada” to “part-time job income.”

And since he sees marketing as his main obstacle to growth (smart), he asked me what I’d look for in hiring a marketing manager.

Back the truck up, I said.

Before you run out and hire someone, riddle me this:

What is your plan to scale your business up?

Aziz replied:

1. Improve conversion with copy
2. Scale with partner webinars and special offers
3. Paid traffic -> Facebook traffic, Adwords, Youtube, Taboola, etc.

Now all three of those might be good things to focus on.

And really nailing any one of them would grow his business.

Here’s the problem though when it comes to hiring someone to help with this:

Aziz just described 3 entirely different sub-specialties:

– Copywriter
– Affiliate management
– Paid traffic management

(And you could probably throw “funnel creation” in there for good measure.)

For Aziz at this stage in the game, it’s HIGHLY unlikely that he’s going to find a “Jack of All Trades” who excels in all of those areas.

What’s far more likely is he’ll hire someone with a smattering of knowledge in each area—a person who can eek out some improvements, but not enough to pay their own freight or really grow the business in a meaningful way.

To make matters worse, anyone who IS really good at one of those areas is going to be SPENDY.

For example, most of the good paid traffic guys I know want you to be spending at least $3,000 to $5,000 on paid ads BEFORE they’ll consider taking you on.

And hiring a copywriter with a proven track record will run you thousands per month as well.

To give you some idea, originally my business partner John approached me with an offer similar to what Aziz has in mind.

For compensation John offered to split the business revenue with me 50/50. (At the time that would have amounted to 2-3X Aziz’s total monthly revenue.)

And I said “pass”—the numbers just didn’t work for me to support my family.

It wasn’t until John decided to offer me a healthy monthly retainer plus a 49% stake in the company that it made sense for me to team up with him.

The paradox is:

You need marketing expertise to get your business growing.

But before you can hire the kind of marketing pros who can really move the needle for you, you have to get your business growing to the point where the opportunity looks attractive to them.

Put another way:

Hiring a marketing pro is like slapping a turbo booster on a 320hp engine to increase the speed.

Very rarely will you find someone willing to come in and build an engine for you from scratch.

There are people that can do that, but they’re just too expensive for most small businesses to afford.

And hiring someone of lesser skill is likely to cost more than you can reasonably expect to earn back.

So what’s the next move for Aziz?

I’ll explain more later.