Beware of Discount Marketers During This Time
During the COVID 19 crisis many businesses are being forced to close their doors. This is 100% just a struggling time for most of us small guys, we are scared, we are anxious, and we are angry. As some businesses flex and offer alternative services there is a push for additional marketing help, lots of people are entering a realm of online buying, live video, and zoom meetings that they just weren’t really comfortable with before, but have to conform to given the new norms.
We are assisting our regular client base at this time to make the best out of the current situation, we’ve set up online purchasing capabilities, we’ve boosted social media presence, we’ve altered Google Adwords and are even doing webinars and virtual consultations! As far as new business we are doing a ton of pro-bono work for those who are struggling most, we are also offering to defer payments for three months on certain projects.
Just like usual though there are marketing professionals (using that word lightly) and agencies that are not blessed with our large funnel of customers and are grasping at straws for new business. Offering a discount is wonderful, but offering discounts so deep that they are too good to be true, that’s a red flag.
Sailor Jerry said it best: “good work ain’t cheap and cheap work ain’t good.”
If you’d like an actual real world example check out this blog post where a real life client of ours used Fiverr to purchase a logo and it is painfully awful to look at.
Beware of marketers that are offering too good to be true discounts to any and all new business. The work you’ll be getting will be what you pay for and I can say without hesitation that you’ll be sorry. $100 a month for social media seems like a great deal, but chances are those posts will be recycled stale content, copy and paste, and not thoughtful for your audience.
I like to use this analogy:
Your dog is sick, and you find out that they need to have a surgery done. You have two options for vets,
An affordable vet with normal/average pricing
A discount vet that is offering to do the surgery for $50
Most people are smart enough to spot that the discount vet might not be good enough for something you care about so deeply, and that is so important to you.
We encourage you to not be sidetracked by super cheap offers for marketing services, take your time and vet each company, talk to them about their experience, read reviews (but be cautious because some may not be real), and choose the company or person who is RIGHT for you, not the cheapest.
Good luck out there small businesses, we are in this together, and HM&D is here for you to offer free advice, just call. We’re also happy to consider you for pro-bono work, just reach out to us and talk to us about the projects you need help with.