Are You Ready for Paid Ads? Here's How to Know [Endless Customers Podcast Ep. 144]

This transcript has been generated by AI and not checked for accuracy. 

00:00:00:00 - 00:00:02:23

Tanner Holman

Get a firm understanding of how people are discovering you,

00:00:03:05 - 00:00:11:02

Tanner Holman

Then meet them where they're at. Systematically, you can work your way out from there. How are they becoming aware? How do they become interested? How do they move forward?

00:00:11:04 - 00:00:30:15

Intro

You're listening to the Endless Customers podcasts, brought to you by the team at IMPACT and its customers, is the proven system to become the most known and trusted brand in your market. You can start to learn the principles of Endless Customers and how you can implement them in your business. Pick up a copy of Endless Customers, a national bestseller wherever books are sold.

00:00:30:17 - 00:00:53:14

Intro

Ready to start implementing Endless Customers in your business? Talk to IMPACT about how our coaching program can help you implement Endless Customers to success. And if you want experience Endless Customers in person. Do not miss our upcoming conference. Endless Customers Live in Hartford from October 5th through the 7th, 2026. Registration is now open. And now onto the show. Here's your host, Alex Winter.

00:00:53:16 - 00:01:12:18

Alex Winter

Today's episode is about what it really takes for a company to be ready to run paid ads. We talk a lot about ads as a growth lever, but there's a conversation that doesn't happen enough before the budget gets approved. Are you actually ready? Do you have the numbers, the funnel, the creative, and the internal ownership in place to make ads work?

00:01:12:21 - 00:01:27:14

Alex Winter

Or are you about to spend money on a problem that ads can't fix? To unpack that, I'm joined by Tanner Holman, paid social strategist. In this conversation, we're stepping back from individual campaigns and looking at readiness through a strategist perspective.

00:01:27:20 - 00:01:45:17

Alex Winter

We'll talk about what companies most commonly get wrong before they ever launch, what the numbers infrastructure need to look like. How to know if your funnel and creative are actually ready for paid traffic. And what separates companies that see real returns from those that burn through budget and walk away frustrated?

00:01:45:19 - 00:02:04:04

Alex Winter

We'll also dig into the timeline and budget reality of paid ads. Because one of the most common reason ads don't work is simply that companies don't give them a fair shot. So if you're thinking about running ads this year, or you've tried ads before and didn't see the results you expected, this episode is for you. Let's get into it.

00:02:04:08 - 00:02:06:12

Alex Winter

Tanner. Welcome to the show, my friend.

00:02:06:14 - 00:02:07:17

Tanner Holman

If you back, have a.

00:02:07:17 - 00:02:12:19

Alex Winter

Beer. Yeah. I'm happy to have you here. It has been way too long, my friend. Way too long.

00:02:12:21 - 00:02:17:00

Tanner Holman

Yeah, absolutely. I'm so happy to be back. I think we've got a good conversation about today. We have a.

00:02:17:00 - 00:02:34:10

Alex Winter

Great conversation going today. We have our paid media expert in the house in the building. Well, via via zoom. But you're here. We're doing it. I'm really pumped to talk to you. We get a lot of questions about, ads and about paid and all this stuff. And we're going to get into, you know, we're going to get into the nitty gritty.

00:02:34:10 - 00:02:42:13

Alex Winter

But before we do for people who maybe don't know who you are watching and listening, can you just tell them a little bit about what you do here at IMPACT and with the Swell team and set the stage?

00:02:42:15 - 00:03:01:12

Tanner Holman

Yeah, absolutely. Again, thanks for having me. I'm Tanner, I'm here on the Swell team. One of the teams over here at IMPACT. We're doing really great work with all the folks and inlets, customers, processes, our teams a little bit different than some of the IMPACT teams you may know and love already, where, most teams tend to do a lot of of teaching you guys how to do the fishing.

00:03:01:12 - 00:03:21:19

Tanner Holman

You will help you to track processes, get your people in place, and really build some cool systems. Whereas we tend to to actually do some of the work for you. We run ads, any digital ads platforms, we have our hands on it. The really good time. It's a lot of nerdy stuff, a lot of numbers. But, we like to tie all that back together and help you guys make some meaningful business impact with.

00:03:21:21 - 00:03:40:02

Alex Winter

Yes, absolutely. And you're good company because I'm. I'm a nerd, too. I love numbers, I love data. I think that's why I love paid so much. And also previously, before I was working at Impac, I came out of traditional advertising and I did a lot of paid work as well, and media buying and placement. So this is definitely something that's close to the heart for me.

00:03:40:02 - 00:04:01:12

Alex Winter

Just because creating content is important, it's extremely important. But also tracking the results is equally maybe if not more important in my opinion. So with that, can we talk a little bit about I feel like we we have this conversation offline a lot, Tanner. But we hear from people and from folks out there that like, I'm paying for ads and I'm spending all this money in paid ads don't work.

00:04:01:12 - 00:04:16:00

Alex Winter

They don't work for me. They don't work for my business. Is that is that a real problem? Is that actually true, or is there usually an underlying problem that that's something else. But that's what the you know, the reaction is because they don't know any better.

00:04:16:02 - 00:04:33:22

Tanner Holman

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you know, there is a real reality where ads may not be working in that moment, but I think just summing it up in that way doesn't really translate to the real problem. Generally, what these companies or people are having problems with is they're not able to translate what they're seeing in platform into a real business result.

00:04:33:22 - 00:04:56:17

Tanner Holman

You know, you know, you don't want to just be paying for it. Impressions, right. You need to be able to track that how people are engaging on the website, how many people are moving into the sales process and becoming customers. And even if you have that process in place and you still don't feel super confident in your ads, there's a really critical piece of of digging into the data and finding next steps to maintain positive momentum.

00:04:56:19 - 00:05:06:09

Tanner Holman

Ads or set it and forget it. There's a lot of iterating out on these processes, and testing and poking holes in what you already have to make sure that you're constantly moving forward.

00:05:06:11 - 00:05:22:08

Alex Winter

Yeah. Now let's get advice. How, in your experience, how often do you see the ad platform that people are using or companies using actually the issue, or is it something that's happening more in the marketing process, like you're saying, and figuring out how to position yourself?

00:05:22:10 - 00:05:44:09

Tanner Holman

Yeah, it very rarely is the issue. The ad platform alone, you know, Google makes a large sum of money off of ads that it makes a ton of money off of ads. They wouldn't be this big if these platforms didn't work. I think we're a lot of people are stuck is they tend to forget where their user or where their audience is at when ads are presented to them.

00:05:44:11 - 00:06:05:14

Tanner Holman

You know, if you look at Google search, people are looking for something very specific and you're able to align very specifically with what they're looking for and position yourself really well. So if you're providing them with the right signals of, you can provide what they're looking for, you understand the pains that they're facing, and they can trust you to be the best decision for them, not just for your sales.

00:06:05:14 - 00:06:26:07

Tanner Holman

Bottom line? You're able to start to bridge that gap, and then let's take a step back even further. And if you look at meta, for example, people didn't go to meta or Facebook or Instagram or friends or whatever system you would call it to look for you or your business. They went there to zone out. They went there to engage with some of their friends or colleagues.

00:06:26:09 - 00:06:47:11

Tanner Holman

So, you know, if you're not visually appealing, you're ignored. If you're saying the same thing over to everyone else is saying you get ignored. Even more importantly, if you don't provide value for where they're at in their journey, you get ignored. If you're just going on to meta and saying sell book appointment by now, you're missing a critical piece because those people aren't ready for that stuff.

00:06:47:12 - 00:06:53:06

Tanner Holman

So you have to start building that relationship and really provide value for them on their terms.

00:06:53:08 - 00:07:13:15

Alex Winter

Yeah, no, that makes sense. I think people forget that sometimes. And it's easy to forget where social media, especially when you talk about like meta and certain platforms, they are more top of the funnel and people are on there not not to find a product or service. Usually they're there to interact with their family, their friends. They're there to decompress a little bit or whatever the case may be.

00:07:13:15 - 00:07:30:08

Alex Winter

So you have to meet them where they are and in the right headspace that they're in versus trying to be like, click here now and buy this now. That old traditional stuff doesn't really hit the same way that that it once did in the past, at least on these platforms. So, I guess this is a segway into like, so if I'm an executive, right?

00:07:30:08 - 00:07:42:19

Alex Winter

And I'm like, hey, Tanner, we're thinking about running ads and I have a budget. What what do you say to them? Or how do you get them, like ready or determine if they're ready to to actually do paid ads?

00:07:42:21 - 00:08:03:06

Tanner Holman

Yeah. The first step is always starting with goals. What are you trying to make happen for the goals reasonable. Are they specific enough to iterate out on. And I think even bigger is do you have the right people and tools to achieve those goals? If you're not running ads and you say, okay, I want roof replacement leads for $10 right out the gig, probably isn't very realistic.

00:08:03:09 - 00:08:20:04

Tanner Holman

You know, you need to start somewhere and achieve the data that you already have. How much is it costing you to acquire a customer now without paid ads? You know you can't expect that to be lower when you're adding ads into the equation. You'd like to beat it and work towards lowering that and then that test first mindset.

00:08:20:06 - 00:08:37:12

Tanner Holman

Your ads aren't going to achieve the goal right out of the gate, but you have to set the pace for where you want to go. So then you have measurable, measurable steps along the way to help you get there. And you hit on a good one, which is budget, right? Everyone wants to know how much money can they spend, or even more importantly, how little can they spend and get the results that they want.

00:08:37:13 - 00:08:54:15

Tanner Holman

But you're to take a really real look at this and say, how consistent can you be with this budget before that starts impacting the cash flow of your business? If you have a budget that gets you a month, in a month and a half in, you probably better off saving that money and waiting until you have a bit more runway.

00:08:54:15 - 00:08:57:01

Tanner Holman

So you can look at this in the long term.

00:08:57:03 - 00:09:17:00

Alex Winter

Yeah, it's it's really sound and great advice that you're giving because I've heard this time and time again when people are like, it's so expensive to run these ads, and we're spending all this money week over week, month over month, and they might not look at it until the end of the month when the bill comes in. And then that stuff adds up and it can be really, like a sticker shock sort of effect that happens.

00:09:17:00 - 00:09:17:13

Alex Winter

Right? So

00:09:17:17 - 00:09:29:10

Alex Winter

from from like the standpoint of specifically numbers and metrics, what should leadership teams understand or like, how do you set the stage for them to be thinking about the right metrics and like how to

00:09:29:12 - 00:09:37:00

Alex Winter

think about their budget strategically versus just like, let's throw let's throw dollars at it or give them get them to a place where they have sticker shock, almost.

00:09:37:01 - 00:09:55:13

Tanner Holman

Yeah, you can throw money at these platforms day in, day out and they'll happily take it. But you have to make sure that what you're measuring is your next steps from what you're measuring or align with what you're trying to achieve. So when people say metrics, they're expecting things like impressions, click through rate conversions, cost per conversion, those are all super important.

00:09:55:15 - 00:10:12:23

Tanner Holman

But to me the most important piece is the relationship to each other. So if you look at your ads account for the ads that you're running, it's, oh man, we're getting a ton of impressions, but we're not getting enough clicks. Okay, you probably have an ad creative or a targeting issue. You know, you make sure that what you're saying is aligning with who you're talking to.

00:10:13:01 - 00:10:42:03

Tanner Holman

Let's take it a step further, okay? You're getting a ton of clicks to your website, but they're not actually taking the action. You want the conversion, then you probably need to take a look at your landing page and say, how can we be more efficient? Are we saying the same thing? Their ad is saying, if you're driving an ad, it's talking about learning more about a process or a product, and then you send me straight to a page for request a demo or get a quote, you've got misaligned expectations there, and you're going to lose people very quickly where it starts to get more fun.

00:10:42:06 - 00:10:59:14

Tanner Holman

And really, the world that we live in over here is okay. You're getting conversions, but I think it's too expensive. So this is where you have to start looking at everything and say, are spending too much? Are we getting in front of the right people? We're showing up in the right places. Are we sending people to the right spot on our landing page or on our website?

00:10:59:16 - 00:11:10:07

Tanner Holman

How can we start to adjust this flow of users and where they're going and what they're engaging with to help influence that bottom line result, which is large opportunities and achievable cost?

00:11:10:09 - 00:11:26:18

Alex Winter

Yeah, yeah. And you make some excellent points. I think that's something that we, we don't talk about enough is the buyer's journey. Right. So and I think what you're so good at Tanner and I love working with you because you think this way and you always ask these, these questions, even if they're tough. That's like from end to end, from start to finish.

00:11:26:18 - 00:11:42:22

Alex Winter

What is the buyer's journey? Because there are so many touch points in the paid ad as part of it. But then if the ad is supposed to take them to your website and the landing page is an optimized or there is no landing page, the links broken, there's all these different layers that if you don't think through those pieces, it can cause a break in the chain.

00:11:42:22 - 00:11:57:23

Alex Winter

And then it's very easy to to blame meta and go, oh, the ads aren't working. And it's like, no, the ads are working, but there's a broken piece somewhere else. And one of the many steps that, your buyer's trying to take on their journey. So I think that's, I know some of the people really need to think about.

00:11:57:23 - 00:12:07:05

Alex Winter

And you guys do a great job with that. Do you find that that's something you, you work on more so than than actually the ads themselves? Or is it a mix of both?

00:12:07:07 - 00:12:29:19

Tanner Holman

It's a mix of both. It it depends on the circumstance. I think once you get a process for setting a creative, iterating out on new creative, that becomes on second nature, so that I find that that's typically the front end, right? We can make data look good in the dashboards and get the results, but it's that follow up process where it's constantly iterating out and repeating on areas for improvement.

00:12:29:21 - 00:12:50:23

Tanner Holman

Or things also change throughout the journey, right? Just because something worked in January of last year doesn't mean it's going to work in May of 2026. There's there's always an evolution to not only how people are engaging, but just where people are at in their in the buying process to, always have to be making changes and monitoring these things to, to get that end end result.

00:12:51:01 - 00:13:06:21

Alex Winter

Yeah. That makes sense for our viewers and our listeners out there. What are some warning signs. Right. Maybe they're ready to buy or they're ready to place as they have a budget. They're ready to go. What are some warning signs that you see that maybe their offer isn't ready or their site isn't ready, or the creative isn't ready?

00:13:07:01 - 00:13:13:09

Alex Winter

And how do you how do you approach or like, bridge those situations before you turn on the ads?

00:13:13:11 - 00:13:34:00

Tanner Holman

Yeah, that's a really great question. And and there is no perfect starting place. But what has to be true is the ability to get there. So if you don't have a clear process for creating and iterating on new content, you're already behind. Because as soon as something starts to fail on meta, you need to have something ready to move and continue testing and driving forward.

00:13:34:02 - 00:13:55:22

Tanner Holman

If you don't have the technical expertise or the tools for adequate tracking for the platform, for your website into the CRM to be able to follow that journey, it'll never be 1 to 1. But you can. You can at least start to track that journey at a very close pace. And then you say, okay, you know, what can we expect from our other traffic sources?

00:13:56:04 - 00:14:15:06

Tanner Holman

You need to be able to say, how do organic traffic convert to direct traffic? Any other sources that you're running from your organic social? These things are all true and not just relevant to ads. So you have to really set that foundation early for ads to be successful. Ads are really an amplification of of what you already have.

00:14:15:06 - 00:14:20:05

Tanner Holman

And if what you already have is working, tighten those bolts first before you start pouring money.

00:14:20:07 - 00:14:36:16

Alex Winter

Yeah, yeah, process is a huge piece and I think too, this is something I'm going to I'm going to like let everyone peek back behind the curtain here because at IMPACT we run ads with you. We, have had some really great campaigns and success working with, you and the small team. But we've also talked a lot about ad fatigue.

00:14:36:18 - 00:14:50:22

Alex Winter

And that's something that if you're processes and dialed in, even if you have a budget, even if you have, you know, the website, all the all the layers are set up correctly. Sometimes ads, even though you think they're going to work or they may go, you may think they're going to go this way. They don't always do that.

00:14:50:22 - 00:15:03:13

Alex Winter

And you have to be ready to adjust. And you have to listen to your end users because they might be sick of an ad, and you have to have new content that's ready to go behind it. And if these processes aren't in place, you end up scrambling. You definitely do.

00:15:03:15 - 00:15:22:12

Tanner Holman

It. And it's a fine line, right? Because if your ad gets seen once, it's probably not going to be as effective as it could be. You had seen 4 or 5 times in a couple weeks or a month. It's pretty good sign. Once you start hitting, you know, 10 to 15 times in a two week or a month window, people are probably just going to start tuning you out.

00:15:22:12 - 00:15:31:23

Tanner Holman

And I think everyone listening to this can probably picture this, an ad like, oh man, I've seen this so many times. And it starts almost having the opposite effect of what you initially intended.

00:15:32:01 - 00:15:57:09

Alex Winter

Yeah, I think we can all relate to that. There's been ads that I've seen on, on Facebook and Instagram that I've seen one too many times, and I'm like, how do I how do I block this? How do I stop this from happening? Yeah. So we can we can relate. And I think that's important too, to as a business owner, as you're embarking on your paid ad journey, you have to think about the end user and how that feels and avoid making making sure that you avoid, making people feel that way.

00:15:57:10 - 00:16:16:16

Alex Winter

That's just something you don't want to do. So good advice there. I have a question here. This is a good one. I've been I've been, like, curious and excited to ask you this one. So for companies with sales teams and specifically sales folks out there that have longer sales cycles, how does readiness look different? And what happens when ads drive leads?

00:16:16:16 - 00:16:23:18

Alex Winter

But the post click experience breaks down. So like going from these ads to the sales team and like actual conversions.

00:16:23:20 - 00:16:53:01

Tanner Holman

Yep. Yeah. So like we just said. Right. And to amplify what you already have, if you're getting leads and your sales team is unable to adequately keep up with them, then you're wasting money on leads they're going to be able to take care of. So, you know, if we talk with businesses that have a longer sales cycle and you're always racing to the bottom of, that last event for submission, phone call, then you've already lost a lot of people because they're not ready for you yet.

00:16:53:03 - 00:17:16:00

Tanner Holman

Or let's talk more specifically about that post click experience. Right. So you have to be really honest with yourself. How fast are you getting back to them? Is your sales team aligned with what you're presenting to this audience in the ad that made them initially respond? And then are you actually providing them with value and focusing on their needs, or are you just trying to close the deal as fast as possible?

00:17:16:02 - 00:17:37:06

Tanner Holman

Some of these decisions that these customers have to make take time. You know, you always expect a say close or even a one touch point close. There's so many pieces in between that you have the opportunity to build trust and create a customer for life, as opposed to just getting that short term revenue or even rushing to fast to the point where you kind of scare them off.

00:17:37:08 - 00:17:38:01

Tanner Holman

Yeah.

00:17:38:03 - 00:17:53:02

Alex Winter

Yeah. Very true. We don't want to scare people off. That's it. And I think it comes back to the endless customer system where we're trying to build trust here. So if it comes off like you're just trying to make a quick sale or you don't really care, that's a that's problematic. That really is and that's not going to build trust.

00:17:53:02 - 00:18:16:19

Alex Winter

And ultimately, if you don't build trust, people are going to go somewhere else to find the answers that they seek. How about from a creative standpoint? So for the content teams out there, the content managers, the videographers, the the writers, what is what advice would you give when it comes to ad creative AB testing, setting the hook like what have you seen work well versus not work well are so like tips and tricks.

00:18:16:21 - 00:18:41:00

Tanner Holman

Yeah, I wish there was like a magic formula to to give everyone out there like, oh man, just do XYZ and you'll win. It's just not that easy. It's it's typically estimated now that any given person is going to see between 4000 and 10,000 ads each day, that's not to scare anybody. That's just to be very real with if you're not saying the right things, you get lost very quickly.

00:18:41:02 - 00:19:04:17

Tanner Holman

Everyone listening or watching this can probably think of more bad ads than good ones. Or even more realistically, you can probably not even think of a thousand ads that they saw today. So each of these ads is going to mark the first experience that these people have with you. If if it's not a high quality ad, then that's going to make you immediately question the quality of the business itself.

00:19:04:19 - 00:19:25:18

Tanner Holman

And I think there's an important distinction on quality between quality, as in like highly produced super high end versus quality of of matching to where that person is actually at in the journey and speaking to them in a way that matters to them. If you need like a really good reference point to start from, you need the ability to test creative.

00:19:25:18 - 00:19:48:17

Tanner Holman

And that's a dream to tell you what works. You know, sometimes it's video, sometimes it's images. There will be times when they're both winning or one is very clear winner over the other. In terms of concepts from what we see time and time again to our clients is a really great reference. Point is the big five, which sounds very simple, but you'd be surprised how how difficult it can be at times to really iterate on this properly.

00:19:48:19 - 00:20:10:23

Tanner Holman

So can you give people a clear understanding of cost and price? Where are some areas where they could go wrong and how you help them avoid it? Yeah. What are people telling you? Are you getting good reviews and testimonials? Do people have statements that show a very clear impact into what you helped them? Comparisons in Before and afters are super critical.

00:20:10:23 - 00:20:35:23

Tanner Holman

If someone can visualize where they're at now and where they want to be, that's going to be a critical piece to helping people really see themselves in the shoes of your customers, in the, what you guys can help with. Yeah. And then where I think it differs a little bit is a slightly different take on best in class, where what makes you different and better than others in your category, and then how can you show them your different rather than just say it?

00:20:36:01 - 00:20:46:17

Tanner Holman

I could say I'm the best window replacement company in this state, but if you can't actually show them that, then they're probably going to scroll right by because it doesn't matter.

00:20:46:19 - 00:21:05:08

Alex Winter

Yeah, who cares. Exactly. Yeah. Best of content is great when you're doing like comparisons. But if you just say that you're the best and you don't prove it visually or in some way, shape or form, that's exciting for people to see, they're not going to believe you because everyone says they're the best. That's, that's a really great point that you make.

00:21:05:08 - 00:21:29:00

Alex Winter

Yeah. So I know it's different for every business. Right. And for B2B, B2C, there's like there's so many different angles or ways you can skin a cat. But I'm curious from almost like a backlog standpoint. So I think strategically about creative in the sense that like you don't want to just like make one ad, launch it and then while that's out, start making the next ad and then hope you get it out in time.

00:21:29:00 - 00:21:48:11

Alex Winter

And maybe there's fatigue, like, what's a good setup or what would you recommend for people out there that are like, okay, we want to do ads. How do we plan accordingly so that we have enough content that's already done? And then we also have creative in the Hopper that we can start working on. So you can basically create this content train for the ad specifically.

00:21:48:13 - 00:22:07:07

Tanner Holman

Yeah. It's super important to make sure that you're not waiting for something to to fatigue before you start creating. What is your next step? We typically launch with 3 or 4 different concepts at one time, and then we have theories of what our winners will be, and we'll we'll put a plan in place to start building out those creatives.

00:22:07:07 - 00:22:24:22

Tanner Holman

And the data tells you where to go. Right? So if let's just go back to comparisons. Best in class social proof. You launched three concepts, right? Okay. Maybe social proof is one and great. How can you ever get out on that and make more and then you know that let's say comparisons aren't the best thing in the market right now.

00:22:24:22 - 00:22:45:09

Tanner Holman

So what else can you introduce in there to to replace that lower performer. Or maybe there's areas you can improve on that lower performer. And it's such a rinse and repeat process where, okay, we're launching after 30 days, we're going to have this data. What can we work on in the middle to start building that process and have something ready and continue testing your theories?

00:22:45:09 - 00:23:04:12

Tanner Holman

Is it a hook? Are you not getting people to watch your content long enough? Is it the call to action and how do you get them to engage? Every ad has so many different pieces that you can test that it's so rare for anyone to that, oh man, we tested or this is what works. This is what we're going to do because it's always changing.

00:23:04:14 - 00:23:24:04

Tanner Holman

You've always got new audiences you can test and try to align these messages with to where there's so much potential. And once you find those pieces that work really well, now you to find fresh takes and how to keep it from fatiguing. Yeah. And it's, it's really looked at and we tend to look at 14 day and 30 day window.

00:23:24:04 - 00:23:27:14

Tanner Holman

It's to just make sure that we're always staying up with those trends.

00:23:27:16 - 00:23:42:03

Alex Winter

That's a good that's a good note right there 14 day and 30 day windows. And we we practice that here at IMPACT, I think that's a good a good benchmark for at least trying to set set the the schedule around like when you're going to need to refresh your content or at least hit it from a different angle.

00:23:42:04 - 00:23:58:08

Alex Winter

So I have a I have a question in talking about all this is really got me thinking. So anybody can just go put a paid push behind a post, especially when you're on like business profiles on social platforms. They they're always like, hey, boost this post for X amount of dollars and see how many more people you can hit, right?

00:23:58:13 - 00:24:15:00

Alex Winter

So anyone can really do this. But when it comes to strategically doing it and optimizing it, when is it the right time to consider bringing in an outside agency, like, like the swell team, to assist or to help optimize these sort of campaigns when you're ready to go.

00:24:15:02 - 00:24:35:19

Tanner Holman

There to, to for agency to make sense. It has a couple of things have to be true. You know, back to the start. You have a really clear understanding of what you're trying to accomplish. You have to have the funds for it to make sense. So if you're if you're paying an agency $10,000 and your budget is $1,000, you know, you just tripled the cost of your cost per acquisition there.

00:24:35:21 - 00:25:03:10

Tanner Holman

You have to be able to commit to it for long term. If you're looking at this in a 60 day window, if that's your make or break for success, then you're probably not going to be very successful, and you'll find yourself bouncing around and never really happy with the results. You know, if you have clear processes for creating and iterating content on a regular basis, that's a really good sign, because there is no better spokesperson for your business than the people in your business or your customers in certain situations.

00:25:03:10 - 00:25:27:03

Tanner Holman

Yeah. And then again, back to the tech stack. If you can't track users journey and measure where you're most effective and where you need to improve, then probably not time to start diving into ads. Now. If all of those things are true, you have a clear understanding what you want to do. You have the funds and willingness to commit to a long term plan, and you have clear processes for content, and you have the tech, then great.

00:25:27:03 - 00:25:45:00

Tanner Holman

You have all of the steps in place to to bring in someone who is an expert in these platforms, knows their ins and outs, and can actually help guide you on where you need to improve and then challenge themselves on where they need to improve the system. I think there's a few things that you need to look out for when you're hiring agency studio.

00:25:45:02 - 00:26:02:09

Tanner Holman

If you're looking for an onsite partner that requires that they own the accounts or the tools, that's a really big red flag, right? We talk with with companies all the time who want to move on to a different agency or even bring things in-house, but they can't because it turns out they don't actually own the tools or the accounts.

00:26:02:09 - 00:26:06:00

Tanner Holman

And they leave. They left with nothing, over from scratch.

00:26:06:00 - 00:26:14:06

Alex Winter

Like they don't have access. So the agency, almost like they're beholden to the agency because they don't have the. Oh, wow. That's exactly. Yeah, that's not a good spot to be in.

00:26:14:08 - 00:26:32:06

Tanner Holman

And, you know, you also have to be able to commit to making the necessary adjustments, right? Yeah. You have to be able to make changes on the website. You have to be able to adjust your sales process. And if you know, if you're marketing and sales aren't lockstep together, then you're going to be speaking different languages and it's gonna be so much harder for you to succeed.

00:26:32:08 - 00:26:48:12

Alex Winter

Yeah. Those are good points. Very good points. Make sure you're taking notes. Tanner is dropping some truth bombs here, and it's important. No, it's it's really important because I think I do think people think that they can just do it themselves. And it's. I think it's worth trying it yourself so you can understand and start to get.

00:26:48:17 - 00:27:08:20

Alex Winter

The best way to learn for me is to just get my hands dirty. But ultimately, there's some, some really important, points that you're making, especially the agency piece, and not not being held hostage by your agency, making sure you at least have access to your, to your content. So next question here. What what's one thing that companies underestimate?

00:27:08:22 - 00:27:25:05

Alex Winter

As far as, like how long ads actually take to work? Because I think a lot of people go, I'm going to throw some money at this. We're going to turn on ads, and then clients are just going to come flying through the door, and we're going to make all this money. It's going to be awesome. And the reality is that this stuff takes time to ramp up and you have to test.

00:27:25:05 - 00:27:36:22

Alex Winter

And so what do you again, loaded question, but what do you typically see or recommend is like, an expectation to set the bar for like how long it takes before you start seeing, you know, meaningful results?

00:27:37:00 - 00:27:59:16

Tanner Holman

Yeah, we we typically talk internally here about really a 90 day window. And depending on the business and category and the sales cycle, that 90 day window may not be 100% success, but you should at least be looking in at a quarterly basis of, a 90 day testing plan without risking the bottom line or cash flow of your business to start giving you the steps that you need to take.

00:27:59:16 - 00:28:18:23

Tanner Holman

To have a clear idea is to improve and get you to that end goal. So is your creative working awesome that you're targeting where it needs to be or you getting in front of the right people? Awesome. Conversion rate optimization on the website is such a critical piece that gets overlooked. And if you can't measure these in longer windows, then you're operating off of a very limited set of data, right?

00:28:18:23 - 00:28:36:18

Tanner Holman

You don't have enough volume on these these data points to be able to tell you if the changes you've made are working or if you need to keep going, or if you need to start testing at different stages of this journey. You know, budget is a big one, right? Everyone wants to know, how much do I actually need to spend for this to be effective?

00:28:36:20 - 00:29:05:18

Tanner Holman

Your local business? This could be 5 to 10 K a month. It all depends on on your market, the area you're trying to reach and estimates start to scale from there. Depending on your total addressable market and the impact you're trying to make. If you're trying to be the number one business in your category, ads will probably require that you spend like it to stay in front of your audience and be super relevant, whereas, you know you can't get away with a $500 a month campaign.

00:29:05:20 - 00:29:25:15

Alex Winter

Yeah, absolutely. I hope you're taking notes. People are taking notes. This has been a really great conversation. Tanner and I, I always love talking with you, and I love geeking out over. It's just the wealth of knowledge that you have. And for everybody there watching, listening. If you want to talk to the swell team or have any questions for Tanner, we'll make sure to drop his info so you can connect with him.

00:29:25:18 - 00:29:44:03

Alex Winter

But before we go, I want to ask one last question here. If you could give like the top three things people should be thinking about, you know, they want to start paying for as they want to start putting themselves out there on social and on different platforms. What are the top three things that they should take away from our conversation today in order?

00:29:44:04 - 00:30:13:08

Tanner Holman

I would say get a firm understanding of how people are discovering you, not just how they're coming to convert, but how they're discovering you. Then meet them where they're at. Systematically, you can work your way out from there. How are they become aware? How do they become interested? How do they move forward? Then you have to have to have to have a process for continuously creating and publishing content that resonates with the buyers, not just the ones that are already looking to take your services and run with them right now and then.

00:30:13:10 - 00:30:22:08

Tanner Holman

As with any ads, website conversion optimization, if you don't have the tools to measure and improve your website, then you shouldn't be paying to bring people to.

00:30:22:10 - 00:30:31:01

Alex Winter

Tanner, thank you so much for being on the show today and for sharing all this knowledge about pay media and paid ads. It's been an awesome conversation and I just love talking with you, man.

00:30:31:03 - 00:30:33:08

Tanner Holman

Yeah, thanks for having me, Alex. It's been it's been a great time.

00:30:33:11 - 00:30:48:12

Alex Winter

Yeah, well, for everyone out there watching and listening, I hope you learned a lot today. If you have any questions, we're going to drop Tanner's info so you can hit up, the paid team for any other questions that you may have. But in the meantime, this is endless. Customers. Thanks for checking out the show. I'm your host, Alex Winter, and we will see you on the next episode.