r/AskMarketing

I'm currently working with a general contractor whose primarily been focused on commercial projects and is looking to expand into residential. They have a huge operational capacity so the potential is insane here sicne they're going from no marketing to paid ads.

I'm just wondering how to price this specific client. I went back and forth with claude and chat and they both insisted on a monthly retainer + a percentage of each booked job. Wasn't able to find much sifting through reddit and the rest of the internet.

I'm currently leaning towards a "90-day client acquistion pilot" and my scope of services will include a complete rebuild/refinement of their website (because its dogshit right now) focusing on nurturing website visitors to submit a form, building ad creatives and managing their paid ads (meta starting out), and finally I'm taking it one step further and actually offering a complete appointment booking service where I'll be calling leads immediately upon form submission and booking quotation appointments directly into the clients calendar.

So it's a full done for you system where the client has nothing to worry about but to show up at the booked appointment.

I have high confidence in my ability to deliver with both the lead gen and appointment booking but have no idea how to quote this. I'm currently settled on a 1250/mo retainer plus 5% of each completed project but that really does seem like a lot... the whole point of the "90 day pilot" is so that they don't feel stuck or committed; also they'll own all assets after this period (website, ad creatives, etc.)

Any insight is much appreciated. Thanks a lot in advance.

I just got hired as a Brand Protection Specialist at a medium sized ecommerce company. My background is in PR, not PPC. My manager asked me to "figure out who is using our brand name in Google Ads without permission." I do not even know what questions to ask. What tools should I look at? What is the typical workflow? Any advice for a total beginner?

Hello,

I'm a 16 year old going into my Junior year of highschool. I have good enough grades (4.8 weighted, couple dual enrollment classes) but I'm wondering about what things I should start doing from now until college to prepare for the industry, if I choose to go there? Any help is appreciated and if you need more information let me know.

I have been developing a very humble software product (mobile apps and eventually web). It is an app where users create groups of friends that compete against each other by making sports picks every week (mostly just NFL and CFL at this point). The more you get right the more points you get.

This generally known as a "pickems pool", or a sports pool (there are other types of sports pools as well). The market leaders are "RunYourPool" and "Office Pools".

My question is two fold.

1. What is some process, or theory, or best principles that I could be directed to, to help with this naming process.

2. Anyone have ideas for actual names or examples that I could follow for this type app?

Feels weirdly true lately. Someone with the username “toasterguy92” saying “I tested both tools” often feels more trustworthy than a polished corporate blog with perfect branding. Why do you think that is?

With AI-generated content, Google updates, and AI search tools growing fast, do you think AI SEO is a real long-term opportunity or just another hype trend?
Can businesses still rank with AI-assisted content, or will search engines lower its value over time? Curious to know your opinions.

As a complete beginner in digital marketing for selling a digital product through a faceless content strategy, and how to use AI tools in a way that doesn’t look cheap or overdone.

Je cherche un outil, une plateforme ou un endroit où je peux apprendre le marketing digital, sachant que je suis situé en France donc idéalement en français.

Sur quels sujets différents vous me conseilleriez de me former ? Je suis encore assez perdu, donc j’ai hâte d’avoir vos retours d’expérience et de savoir ce que vous avez testé ;)

I went through the list of all the updates for Google Ads and IMO these are the five things that actually matter:

1. Search is changing shape: Ads now appear inside AI Mode responses, not just beside them. New formats are conversational and reasoning-based. If you're not set up for AI Max, you're missing placements that didn't exist six months ago.

2. You can now brief Google AI on your brand: AI Brief is a new tool where you tell Google in plain English what your ads should/shouldn't say, which searches to target or avoid, and how to speak to different audiences. Huge deal for anyone who's had AI Max generate off-brand copy.

3. Measurement is growing up: Qualified Future Conversions, Journey-aware Bidding, and Meridian-powered budgeting in GA360 finally connect upper-funnel spend to actual revenue. Not just form fills and last-click.

4. Commerce is unifying: Universal Commerce Protocol is becoming the checkout standard across Google's AI surfaces. Now expanding to hotel booking and food ordering. Worth paying attention to if you're in those verticals.

5. Creative production is being compressed: One brief → text, images, and video campaign assets. Powered by Gemini and Veo. The cost of creative variety just dropped significantly.

Would love to everyone's thoughts on this and open to questions here if anyone wants to dig into specific features.

six months ago i was convinced that throwing money at better data would fix my outbound problem. i was so, so wrong about where the actual problem was.

quick background - im the founder of a dev tools startup, 7 people, $30k MRR, and i do all the outbound myself because we cant afford a dedicated SDR yet. every dollar i spend on sales tools is a dollar i cant spend on engineering, and that math haunts me constantly.

so back in january i signed a ZoomInfo contract. $4k. annual. i thought ok this is the investment that gets us to the next level, real enterprise data, real contact info, the works. i had been scraping together leads from Apollo free tier and enriching emails through Prospeo which honestly was working fine, bounce rate was under 2% on those lists. but i convinced myself that ZoomInfo would unlock some premium tier of prospect data that would change everything.

it did not change everything.

first month i pulled like 3,000 contacts from ZoomInfo. loaded them into Instantly, sent campaigns. reply rate was 0.8%. worse than what i was getting before. i figured ok maybe my copy sucks, tested new angles, new subject lines. still nothing. second month same story. i was getting better results from the janky Apollo + Prospeo workflow i had before, which cost me maybe $120/mo total.

the thing nobody warned me about is that ZoomInfo data for dev tools buyers is... not great? like the titles are wrong, people have moved companies, and the email addresses bounce at like 6-7% even after running them through Bouncer. meanwhile my old process of finding people on LinkedIn, enriching through Prospeo, verifying with Bouncer - that was getting me 82-85% valid email rates and my campaigns were landing 2.5-3% reply rates.

i spent $4k to make my outbound worse. thats like 2 months of a part time contractor who could be writing code for us.

the other thing i got completely wrong was thinking that more data = more pipeline. i was blasting 150 emails a day across 3 inboxes thinking volume was the answer. turns out when youre selling to engineering leaders they can smell a mass email from a mile away. i cut down to 40 sends per day, way more personalized, and my reply rate jumped to 4.2% basically overnight. less sends, better results, and i wasnt burning through inboxes.

nobody warned me about inbox reputation either. i was using cheap google workspace accounts and wondering why my deliverability kept tanking. switched to Inframail for dedicated sending domains, set up proper warmup through Instantly for 3 weeks before sending anything. that alone probably mattered more than any data source.

my stack now costs about $280/mo total. Instantly for sending ($97), Prospeo for enrichment ($39 i think, whatever the starter plan is), Bouncer for verification (pay as you go, like $20-30/mo at my volume), Inframail for inboxes ($60ish), and Attio for CRM which is free at our size. thats it. thats the whole thing.

if i could go back and talk to january me i would say: the data you already have is fine. your problem isnt data quality its send volume and personalization and inbox setup. stop trying to buy your way out of a process problem. $4k on ZoomInfo when you could have spent $0 extra and just fixed your sending infrastructure.

im still trying to get out of that ZoomInfo contract. they dont make it easy lol.

anyway thats basically where im at. still doing all outbound myself, still wearing too many hats, but at least im not lighting money on fire anymore. i think

Need advice on narrowing my marketing path.

Background: Ex-McKinsey Visual Analyst (~2 years), currently working as a Marketing Coordinator handling brand management, social media, email marketing, workflow/process improvements, stakeholder management and supporting a VP of Marketing.

I enjoy strategy, communication and coordination work. I don't want pure design roles and I'm not interested in heavily data/Excel-focused roles.

Based on this, which direction would you put me in: Brand Marketing, Marketing Operations/Program Management, Product Marketing, or something else?

I am planning for a product to get more exposure opportunities on GOOGLE BUSINESS. Have you used GOOGLE REVIEW cards/STANDS when eating at restaurants or getting beauty treatments at salons? How effective were they? Do you think it's a hassle to tap or scan and leave a review? What are better ways to normally and quickly increase the number of REVIEWS? I don't want to suggest my clients find professional companies to create fake data.

Not talking about obvious spam tactics, more like strategies that used to work consistently but are slowly losing impact now that people search through ChatGPT, Gemini, Reddit, TikTok, etc instead of only Google. Feels like user behavior is changing way faster than most marketing playbooks right now.

​

Hey'all,

Had some questions to understand the current SMM tools market. Would be great if you'all could provide some help.

What do you actually want a SMM tool to have?

Do the current tools in the market like hootsuite, later, socialbee, sprout social, fulfill those needs?

Do you have any particular dislikes with or irritations with some tools?

Do you want any additional features that these current tools do not provide?

It'll be great if you'all could provide some info regarding this. Thanks for any information. Cheers.

I am searching for AI created content that are ridiculous, I am going to have an workshop and would love to present ridiculous AI created content

Hello,

Came across a tool that generates UGC ads from real phones and humans.

I am sourcing companies who are looking for UGC creators and I am sourcing marketers and creators who are open to me using their voice and face.

I’ll help get brand deals + rev share + performance pay (views and clicks) for you.

Let me know what you think.

Looking for best practices to run reddit ads for my sub-reddit.

Been in marketing for about 10 years and I keep hitting the same wall

I get that the end goal is sales. Revenue, pipeline, whatever the company calls it

But a lot of the work that gets you there doesn't really look like sales at first. Stuff like fixing the dashboard, cleaning up lead handoff, getting sales and marketing to stop working off totally different assumptions

None of that's the goal obviously. But without it, campaigns get messy fast. You're bringing in leads and still don't really know what worked, what sales followed up on, or why half the funnel is a black box

The annoying part is leadership tends to see this as admin work

"Just make a dashboard" "Just align with sales"

Like it's a one week thing

Maybe I'm framing it wrong. But how do you get this kind of system work counted as part of revenue without sounding like you're dodging the number?

I am a recently graduated marketing student. I am sharp, creative, and artistic. I pride myself in bringing creative visions to life through photo, video, painting, and drawing. I have never taken a structured course that helps me hone these skills into something that can really be applicable to some type of creative role. I felt like - in college - I learned the same repetitive marketing strategy structure that honestly, I barely remember and had very little fun doing in school. Rebranding/repositioning companies like Spirit Airlines(rip) or partnering with a small local San Diegan business to rollout a new campaign for a dumb promotion. I have one mentor/friend and I call him that because he does pretty unique odd creative jobs for boutiques and restaurants and has a seemingly steady income job working with a larger artist(painter) who also has a clothing line. He doesn't owe me anything but still critiques my art in a way that gives sometimes helps me get to where I am trying to go. He gives me small pieces of advice and rants to me about the senior level people not knowing what to do and I love that I get that advice from him but in the grand scheme of things - I dont know where to go or what to do.

To get very specific, I turn 24 in a few days. I work at a restaurant that I only makes money in the summer and I am trying to figure out what I can do now to get the ball rolling for myself to eventually be working under a mentor or with a team that gets hired for fashion(my main interest)

I have been reading random Reddits about people who are Art Directors and Creative Directors to get a better understanding about how things work but there is just so much. I know this post is a little all over the place, but thats kind of how I am feeling after being spit out of school with what I feel like is a pretty pointless degree and a lot of ambition but not sure where to focus it.

Pessoal que trabalha com marketing digital, social media, tráfego, copy ou criação de conteúdo:

Mesmo fora do horário de trabalho, vocês também ficam pensando quase o tempo todo em estratégia, campanhas, ideias de posts, análise de marcas, anúncios, comportamento das pessoas, hooks, posicionamento etc.?

Percebi que, diferente de outros trabalhos que já tive, no marketing meu cérebro parece que nunca “desliga” completamente dessa área. Às vezes estou vendo algo aleatório e já penso “isso daria um conteúdo” ou “essa campanha foi inteligente”.

Mais alguém passa por isso ou sou eu que já fui consumida pelo algoritmo? 😭