Do This When Your Digital Marketing Projects Aren’t Getting Great Results

I like to do the occasional house project. One of my favorites was building the entertainment center for the TV, VCR, and other things.

But this time I had gone too far.

I went to the home store to buy a wallpaper removal scoring tool. Yes, I can do this. I’m going to remove the wallpaper in a small bathroom. At least, it wasn’t a big job like the kitchen.

Besides, wouldn’t it be fun to do wax on, wax off with a scoring tool?

Wrong.

I did my noisy wax on and wax off impression with the scoring tool for hours.

The wallpaper stayed put.

I threw in the towel and called the pros.

They removed the wallpaper and did the painting. All within a few hours. I spent more time with the scoring tool than they did for the entire project.

Get exactly what you need with outsourcing

Sometimes you have to outsource the job.

No question. I’m biased because clients hire me to work on their digital marketing projects.

You may think it’s easier and cheaper to get your own employees to do it. After all, everyone who went to school learned how to write.

And many companies do that. However, they may not be getting the biggest bang for their buck.

For one thing, this splits the employees’ focus. Doing extra work in which they’re not experienced can affect the work you hired them to do.

The other problem is quality. The sales pro may create content that try to make the sale too soon in the process. Those mistakes can prove costly.

Some jobs don’t call for a full-timer. Instead, you find someone you trust that you can call in whenever you need content or email marketing.

The $50, $75, or $100 an hour rate sounds like a budget drain?

It’s still cheaper than a full-time employee with benefits. Plus, you get that person’s experience and 100 percent focus on the task. What takes the employee four hours to do most likely takes the freelancer, contractor, or agency only an hour or two. Your employees keep those hours doing what they do well.

And you won’t have to spend $4,129 to hire a new employee or wait an average of 42 days to bring someone on board. That’s how long it takes to fill a position according to the 2016 Human Capital Report from the Society for Human Resource Management.

Save more with outside help

Author Dan Ariely told the story of a locksmith. When he first started his business, the locksmith spent the entire banging and futzing with the door lock. He even broke it, but he’d deliver … eventually. It took him all day to replace the lock.

As he did more jobs, he got faster. He wouldn’t break a sweat or make all that noise like he did when he first started out. And best of all, it only took him an hour or so.

Yet his tips shrunk.

People were willing to pay more when they saw him working hard, banging away all day than when it looked like a breeze. Customers had no problem paying top dollar when he took hours to finish the job. And they balked at the same rate when he completed the job in less time.

When you hire a freelancer or contractor, you’re paying for that person’s experience. They’ve already done the trial by fire. Freelancers, contractors, and agencies know the most effective way to get the job done.

It could cost about $60K per year to employ a full-time, 40-hour week marketer with digital marketing experience.

However, some tasks and projects may call for investing someone to work 40 hours a week for 50 weeks a year. (Subtracted two weeks for paid vacation.) This translates to $1,154 per week or $28 per hour. We haven’t even touched benefits, such as paid vacation, sick days, health insurance and 401K.

Let’s say you need digital marketing services about an average of 10 hours a week. You bring on a qualified marketer who charges $50 an hour. It only costs $25K per year and zero for benefits. This is more than half the cost of a full-time employee with benefits.

A $100 per hour rate is still cheaper than a full-time employee.

No more DIY wallpaper projects

I have not done another DIY wallpaper tear-down project since that last one. It’s most certainly worth paying a pro to do it. And I use the time to do more client work or with my family. Casino, anyone?

Casino is a card game I played with my grandmother when I was six years old. I had forgotten how to play. Then, when my kids went to visit my mom, she taught them. And they refreshed my memory. And we played it a lot during our last winter break.

If you need help with digital marketing, please drop me a line.