The DIY Marketing Myth: Why Most Business Owners Struggle (And How to Finally Make It Work)

If you've ever thought "DIY marketing just doesn't work for me," or felt like you're failing at marketing while everyone else seems to make it look easy, this episode is going to completely change your perspective.

The truth is, DIY marketing absolutely can work—but not the way most people are doing it. There's a massive gap between what you think DIY marketing means and what it actually requires to succeed. And that gap is exactly why you're struggling.

Most business owners believe DIY marketing means doing literally everything yourself with no help, no investment, and no strategy—just figuring it out through trial and error while copying what successful businesses do. That's not DIY marketing. That's marketing on hard mode, and it's setting you up for failure.

In this episode, I'm breaking down the real reasons most business owners struggle with DIY marketing, what they're actually getting wrong, and the seven essential requirements that make DIY marketing finally work.

DIY marketing can work. You just need to stop doing it wrong. This episode shows you how.

Tools & resources mentioned:

• MailerLite
• Momentum Marketing Playbook
• Marketing Momentum Membership

Connect with me

Website: www.newschoolofmarketing.com
Facebook: @newschoolofmarketing
Instagram: @bianca_mckenzie

Work with me:

🟠 SALES ACCELERATOR: a no-fluff, personalised marketing review where you get expert eyes on your website, offers, funnels, or socials—plus a clear, actionable video walkthrough so you know exactly what to improve to start making more sales, faster.
https://newschoolofmarketing.com/accelerate

🔵 MARKETING MOMENTUM: a 6-week 1:1 mentoring package designed to get your marketing unstuck. With three strategy-packed sessions and personalised support, you’ll gain clarity, confidence, and a plan that actually moves your business forward—no more guesswork or going it alone.
https://newschoolofmarketing.com/mentoring

Love the New School of Marketing Podcast?

Let’s be honest and upfront, because you know that’s what I’m all about. Podcast reviews are super important to iTunes and the more reviews we rece...

Transcript

Hey. Welcome to the new School of Marketing podcast. I'm Bianca McKenzie, and this is the place where we break down marketing strategies that actually work without the overwhelm.

Now, before we dive in, I want to acknowledge the traditional owners of the land I live and work on, the Palawa people of Lutruwita. I pay my respects to elders past and present and acknowledge the deep connection they have to this land, culture and community.

Now let's dive in and make marketing work for you.

If you've ever thought DIY marketing just doesn't work for me, or maybe you've tried to really do all of your own marketing and felt like you're failing while everyone else seems to make it look easy.

Or if you're wondering whether you should just give up and hire someone to do it all for you,

this episode is going to change your perspective completely.

Going to be talking about the DIY marketing myth,

why most business owners struggle with doing their own marketing, and what they're actually getting wrong,

and how to finally make DIY marketing work for your business.

Because here's the truth.

DIY marketing absolutely can work,

but not the way most people are doing it.

There's a gap between what you think DIY marketing means and what it actually requires.

And that gap is why you're struggling.

Let's start by busting the biggest myth about DIY marketing,

that it means doing literally everything yourself, with no help,

no investment, and no strategy.

I come across a lot of people that seem to think that DIY marketing means, like, figuring everything out on your own through trial and error,

spending nothing on tools or education or help to copy what successful businesses are doing, then, you know, hoping that it works.

I also come across people that think that posting on every platform is, you know, DIY marketing and learning every skill,

like doing the design, doing the copywriting, video editing, analytics, all of that.

Do it all in your spare time.

So there's a lot of myths around DIY marketing.

I want you to know that when DIY marketing is done well and when it works,

here's what it looks like.

You're the strategist and the decision maker.

Even if you get help with the execution,

DIY Marketing.

It doesn't necessarily mean that you have to do everything yourself.

It means that you invest strategically in tools, in education,

and maybe you get some expert help. Every so often.

You build systems based on what works for your specific business.

You focus on one to two platforms where your audience actually is.

You lean into your strengths and you outsource your weaknesses.

DIY marketing doesn't mean that you cannot outsource or you cannot have help.

It means that you're not taking on like a full time team.

And also you treat marketing as a core business activity and not as an afterthought.

See the difference?

Most people set themselves up for failure by trying to be completely self sufficient with zero resources.

That is not DIY marketing.

That's just marketing on hard mode.

You don't need to figure out everything yourself through trial and error and not using anything. It doesn't mean DIY does not mean do everything yourself.

Without any tools or help.

You can outsource things.

So let's talk honestly about why DIY marketing feels so hard for most business owners. It's not because you're not smart enough or not capable enough.

It's because you are missing key pieces that nobody told you about.

So your struggle, number one, is that you're trying to learn everything at once.

You think you need to master social media, email marketing, SEO, content creation, graphic design, video editing, copywriting,

analytics, paid ads, all at the same time.

It's like trying to, you know, learn to be a surgeon, a lawyer, an accountant and chef all at the same time.

It's overwhelming.

Super overwhelming.

It's almost impossible.

And I know why it happens.

Marketing content makes it seem like you need all of these skills. And I know that like the gurus are trying to like, you know,

all sell their courses on their specialty.

They all make it sound essential.

So you feel like you need to learn everything. You're like, oh, I need to learn how to do reels and I need, you know, email marketing and oh, I need take a deep breath.

Here's the reality. You need to be competent at two to three core marketing activities and just adequate at a few others. That's it. You don't need to be an expert at everything.

You really don't struggle. Number two is that you have no strategy, just tactics.

You're posting on social media because you know you should air quotes, should.

You're sending occasional emails because you heard email marketing is important.

I know I tell you that email marketing is important, but I know you're trying to do all the things you try Doing reels because someone said they work.

But you actually have no idea how any of these tactics fit together or what they're supposed to achieve beyond, you know, just getting your name out there.

And here's why it happens.

Most marketing advice focuses on tactics.

So you know how to write a good caption or how to edit a reel, all of that. But they don't teach you strategy.

They don't actually go into the why you're doing it and what the outcome is that you're trying to achieve. And all of us are trying to achieve sales.

But there still needs to be more to your strategy to just say, buy my thing, because we all know that doesn't work, right?

So we need the strategy, not just the tactics,

because that's just busy work.

You need to understand a journey that you are taking people on, from being a stranger to.

To a customer, and choose tactics that support that journey.

And I don't want you to be scared of the word marketing strategy,

because literally all it is is the journey that you're taking people on.

Like, how do you lead them from being a stranger to finding you to eventually buying from you?

The pieces that fill that in, that. That is your marketing strategy.

All right, struggle number three is that you're comparing your beginning to someone else's middle.

Especially when you follow people online,

you see established businesses with, like, you know, all this polished marketing, and you think that what. That's what yours should look like right now.

You don't actually see their first year when everything was rough around the edges.

We all start at zero,

our brands. Everything looks different the more you move on.

And I know social media shows everyone's highlight reel.

You see the current success, not the years of, you know, going through iterations that it took to get there.

Everyone's first attempts at marketing are rough.

Even for someone who's done marketing professionally for a long time,

you are working things out.

The difference between people who succeed and people who quit is that the successful ones kept going and they kept improving.

They don't quit.

But if you look back at their old marketing,

you'll see how much they've improved.

And I guess. I guess looking at Instagram is now kind of cool. You can actually scroll back a long way so you can see the improvement.

All right, Struggle number four is that you're trying to do it in leftover time.

You're squeezing marketing into whatever time it's left after client work, admin, life, all the things.

And that sometimes means that you know,

you're doing it late at Night when you're exhausted, or rushed on the weekends when you should be resting.

I know. I know why it happens. Because client work pays the bills,

so it gets priority.

Here's the thing, though.

Marketing will pay the bills in three months.

I know it feels less urgent,

but marketing needs dedicated, focused time when your brain is fresh,

because leftover time gets leftover results.

It's that simple.

And yes, client work pays the bills today,

but marketing will pay the bills in three months.

Struggle number five is that you have no feedback loop.

You basically put content out there,

but you don't know if it's working. You don't, you know, track your metrics. You don't ask for feedback. You don't test different approaches.

So you're probably doing the thing, the same things over and over and you're wondering why you're not getting any different results.

You are so focused on just getting content out there that you never stop to evaluate whether it's actually effective.

Here's the thing, though. Marketing without measurement, like, it's just hope.

You're just crossing your fingers.

You actually need data to know what's working and what to adjust.

And we all sometimes struggle with data or are afraid of the data because it will tell us what's happening. And it's pretty scary. It can be confronting,

but it can also be enlightening,

knowing what the numbers are telling you and how you can improve things.

Struggle number six is that you're doing everything from scratch.

Every post is created from a blank page,

every email is written fresh, every graphic is designed from nothing. And it's just everything just takes three times longer than it should.

So you're constantly reinventing the wheel because you don't have templates, systems, processes, or maybe some haphazard. I've seen behind the scenes of clients Canva accounts, and every time they make a post, they create a new Canva document, or whatever you want to call it,

like,

it's a mess.

Successful DIY marketers have templates. They have swipe files, they have processes that make content creation and creation of anything faster and consistent. This is often a lot of the work that I do with some of my clients is, let me make you a template for your socials so you're not starting from scratch all the time.

And it also looks like,

excuse me, but a dog's breakfast.

Like, there's no consistency, there's no brand recognition.

Anyway, I digress.

Templates, swipe files. It's going to make everything much faster and more consistent.

Struggle number seven is being isolated and not having accountability,

you're doing this alone.

And when you skip posting for a week, nobody notices, really.

And when you give up on a strategy too early,

nobody's there to tell you to stick with it a bit longer.

You're just going to change it. And I know DIY sometimes feels like it,

you're doing everything in isolation.

But even DIY marketers need community and accountability.

The most successful DIY marketers have some form of support.

A community, an accountability partner, a coach to actually help them stay on track.

Right?

So if most people are doing DIY marketing wrong, what does doing it right actually look like?

So here's what you need.

You need a clear strategy and as you know, no tactics strategy.

You need to know who you're trying to reach and be super specific.

Like really so specific.

You need to know what transformation you're offering them,

what does working with you actually get them, what is that transformation?

You also need to know what journey they need to take from stranger to customer. And it's, you know, map it all out.

You need to know which one to two platforms make sense for reaching them, where do they spend their time,

and also where do you enjoy creating content?

And then what is your core message across all the channels?

And this strategy,

it becomes your filter for every marketing decision.

If a tactic doesn't serve this strategy,

you don't do it even if it's trendy,

because there's no point in wasting your time.

So here's what you do.

You block out two to three hours to work through a strategic framework.

And this isn't something that you figure out on the fly.

You can definitely use my Marketing Momentum playbook or you can hire a strategist for a few hours or take a course or join my Marketing Momentum membership.

You don't have to do this by yourself and it's probably only going to cost you time and possibly some money if you want to actually get some help.

But what you walk away with is actually a plan that you can execute consistently.

The second thing that you need is skills in your strengths and you need help with your weaknesses.

You don't need to be good at everything.

You need to be excellent at your strengths and you need to get help with your weaknesses.

So if you love writing but you hate design, then use Canva templates and maybe pay a designer $200 to get create branded templates you can use if you are great on video but you're terrible at editing the videos.

You can maybe use simple editing apps like Capcut or you can pay I don't know. $50 for basic video editing.

If you are really good at strategy, but you're slow at its execution,

then batch your content creation and use scheduling tools to really execute your strategy.

So do an honest audit of your skills.

What do you genuinely enjoy and do well?

What drains you or really just the results are just lackluster?

And then invest in help and in tools or templates for your weak areas.

It's okay to invest some money or time into what you're not that good at,

because what's going to happen is your marketing is going to look more professional and you're not like exhausted from doing all the things that you're actually not that good at.

All right? The next one is dedicated time blocks.

DIY marketing works when you treat it like the important business activity that it is and not just something that, you know, squeeze in between other tasks.

So you really want to focus on it like two to four hours twice a month to do content batching.

Depending on what your content is, you might need more time, less time.

20 to 30 minutes daily for engagement and relationship building. And that's just you going in, answering comments,

answering people's questions, going into, you know, other places where people ask questions,

and then 30 to 60 minutes every month to review your metrics and to do your planning.

That's like six to ten hours a month of focused marketing time.

If you can carve that out,

DIY can work.

If not, you need to either adjust your business model or, or think about hiring help.

You need to schedule marketing time in your calendar like you'd schedule client meetings. And you need to protect this time. Don't, you know, cancel on yourself?

You want to batch when your brain is fresh and not when you're exhausted.

All right, the next one is systems and templates.

DIY marketing become sustainable when you have repeatable systems.

So content creation systems have a documented process for creating your content.

It's also super useful for when you actually are ready to outsource it.

An email system so you have a welcome sequence, your regular newsletter structure,

promotional email templates like use what you already have or create something that you can reuse and use all the time.

Design templates, so branded templates for all your regular content types,

engagement routine so specific times each day to respond to comments and dms,

and having a tracking system like a simple spreadsheet just to put in your leads, your sales, what's working.

And literally all it takes is to just invest one month in building your systems,

creating templates, document processes set up Your tools,

then maintaining it. It's going to save time every single month after that,

really, your marketing is going to take half as much time, and it's going to look way more consistent.

The next one is education.

DIY doesn't mean figuring everything out through trial and error. That's expensive and slow.

So you want to invest in education,

but do it strategically.

So maybe one comprehensive course on your primary marketing channel that could get you up to speed.

Maybe books or podcasts on marketing strategy.

And I know a good one. You're listening to it right now.

Maybe you need to do some workshops on just specific skills you need. But really, you need to be. I'm just. This is with a bit of a warning. You don't want to do all of the things and fall into the trap of, oh, I need to learn that, and I need to learn that and be strategic about it.

And maybe just a few hours with a coach or a consultant to review your strategy.

So don't buy every course.

Pick one to two resources that teach you what you actually need right now,

and you want to implement it before you buy any other courses,

because really, you want to be learning from other people's mistakes instead of making them all yourself. It's going to be a long journey, and you probably actually give up if you constantly do the trial and error thing.

All right, what else? Feedback and measurement.

You need to know what's working,

and for that you need, you know,

tracking, simple metrics. So your leads, your sales sources, your email open rates, your engagement quality.

You need to do monthly reviews of what's working and what's not.

You also need to start talking to your customers and ask them how they found you. Like, how did you first find out about me?

And once you've looked at all your data, you want to test different approaches and then compare results.

So set up a basic tracking system.

Spend 30 minutes at the end of each month looking at all the data,

and then based on the data,

you make decisions.

So you're not just guessing, you're actually looking at what the data is telling you.

And what this means is that you're going to improve systematically instead of randomly.

And I feel like a lot of us,

we're just pivoting and changing and throwing spaghetti at the wall to see what sticks. Look at the data. The data doesn't lie.

All right, next is community or accountability.

Every DIY marketer needs support, and that could be a paid community or a membership. It could be an accountability partner. You know, maybe another business owner,

maybe a monthly Checking with a coach or a mastermind group.

It's just so that someone notices when you fall off track.

People that actually celebrate your wins and can help you problem solve.

Because all of us are kind of in the same boat. We're all building businesses.

I have accountability buddies. I am in a mastermind.

We need that.

So join a community that is aligned with your business model.

Find an accountability partner.

Or maybe just come and join my marketing momentum membership.

I will definitely hold you accountable, not in a nasty way. And I'll be there to celebrate your wins too.

And really,

I know it is a little bit of investment.

You can find free accountability partners.

You can join a membership or a mastermind. You know, depending on what you do, there is some investment,

but you're gonna be more consistent with your marketing and you're not gonna have that temptation of giving up when it's hard because someone's in your corner cheering you on, helping you.

That sounding bored is so important.

So here's something important to understand.

DIY marketing isn't binary.

There's a spectrum.

And every different stage of business needs different levels of support.

So when you're at your first level,

I love it. I think about is levels like computer games.

So level one,

like completely diy. So when you're starting out and this is going to work, if your business is brand new, when you have like very limited budget,

you know,

when you're in that learning phase,

so what do you do?

You're going to do everything yourself. You're going to be doing strategy, creation, execution.

Here's what you invest in. You invest in basic tools.

And that could be like, I don't know, 50 to $100 a month. You probably will have to invest some money,

maybe some education,

and your time for your marketing is probably going to be eight to 12 hours a week.

When do you move beyond this?

Well,

you move beyond this when your time is worth more than the cost of getting help.

Okay, then we have level two. This is strategic diy. So this is going to really work for people who have established businesses, they have growing revenue,

but they still want control.

And things that,

if you're in a stage that you want to do yourself are your strategy, your core content creation. And you make the decisions. But you can get help.

And you get help with things like design templates,

maybe the occasional expert input and maybe specific weak areas.

So you invest in tools, templates, strategic coaching, maybe small outsourcing.

And you can move beyond this when you're hitting a revenue ceiling.

So that's when you get to level three, which is your leverage diy.

And this is going to work for profitable businesses, businesses that want to scale and that value their time.

So there are still things that you DIY and that is strategy,

high level content and relationship building.

But you get help with things like execution,

design,

scheduling,

analytics,

ads, management.

So you want to probably invest in someone like a VA or a part time marketing help or specialist contractors, like paid ads managers.

And this is often a tricky stage because you can move beyond this when you really need full time marketing help.

So then you go to level four,

which is fully supported. And this is working for businesses that are established, that have high revenue, that are scaling fast,

that need specialized expertise.

Doesn't mean that you don't still do things yourself.

The DIY part is the brand vision,

the final approvals and those key relationships. There's always going to be some piece of doing marketing, even when you move to like CEO level.

So what do you get help with? You can help with things like strategy, execution, management,

maybe even management of a team marketing team.

So this is the place where you probably have a marketing manager.

Maybe you're working with an agency or you're working with an in house team and when you get there, you're not really DIY anymore,

but you started diy.

Most business owners should be operating stage two, really that strategic DIY piece.

You're the strategist, the core creator,

but you get help with execution and weak spots.

You don't have to do everything yourself.

So how do you actually make it work?

I'm going to give you a step by step plan to fix your DIY marketing and hopefully you won't be doing everything yourself anymore. So step number one is get strategic.

Stop all your marketing for one week.

And I want you to use that time to firstly define your ideal customer. Specifically,

I want you to go back to your messaging, so clarify your core message and your offer.

Choose your primary platform.

One. Just one,

not two, not three. One primary platform.

I want you to map your simple customer journey and then decide on three to five content buckets that you can rotate through.

Write all of this down. This is your strategy document.

Step number two.

Still in week one,

I want you to audit your skills and resources.

Make two lists. List one marketing task you're good at or that you enjoy and the other one is marketing tasks that you hate or you don't do very well.

Be honest because this is going to tell you where to focus your energy and where to get help.

So what do you enjoy and what you're good at and what do you hate you're not good at?

Literally.

Step number three and this is week two and three, set up your systems. So I want you to create content templates for your regular posts content batching process.

So come up with something that is going to help you create content and do it faster.

I want you to have an email welcome sequence,

even like a simple three email one, ideally five to seven, but come up with an email welcome sequence if you don't already have this.

Also a tracking spreadsheet for leads and for metrics and your engagement routine.

Yes, it takes time upfront, but it's going to save you hours over the next year.

So set up your systems.

Then week three to four.

Step number four is you get strategic help where you need it.

So based on your skills audit,

you need to hire a designer to create templates if your design or if design is your weakness. If you're not good at design,

get templates created.

Maybe you need to take a course on your primary platform if you need some tactical knowledge,

join a community if you need accountability and book a strategy session if you're unsure about your direction.

Small investments here are going to pay off massively.

Step number five is to create your first month of content using your templates and your systems.

Batch your first month of content,

get it scheduled because this is going to give you momentum and confidence.

Then step number six is I want you to execute.

Show up according to your plan,

post on schedule, engage daily,

send emails weekly, track your metrics,

don't change your strategy yet. You need at least 90 days, at least 90 days of consistent execution before you can even see what's working and make changes.

So do that.

Then you've got step number seven, which is the end of month three.

This is where you review. When you optimize,

this is where you look at your data. So you got your 90 days.

What content performed best? And I'm mostly talking from shares, saves and comments, not likes.

So what content performed best?

Where did your leads come from?

Also what felt sustainable and what was exhausting and then what's working that you could do more of.

So make small changes for the next 90 days. Don't blow everything up, just refine it.

Learn from your data and then step number eight is to continue batch monthly,

execute consistently, review it quarterly and then optimize based on the data. And this is how DIY marketing actually works.

You do it consistently. Like you batch it, you do it, you review and you optimize.

Now let's be honest about what successful DIY marketing actually costs, because I think that you're either under investing or over worrying about costs.

I think the absolute minimum to make DIY work is tools.

So things like email, platform,

scheduling tools, canva,

some of it is free, or you can start free. I mean you can use the Meta business suite for scheduling,

free,

I use that and it works just fine.

Email platform, you can start free on things like mailerlite, which is my preferred email marketing platform.

Canva, you can start a free account.

You do want to, if you like upgrades. For example, in canva you can do templates, brand templates. You can upload your brand and all that kind of thing if you pay.

So it will speed things up.

Also, at a minimum, education,

one good course or a few books is just you need to invest in something and it might just be, I don't know, 200 to 500 a year.

You can join the membership. At the moment, for founding members, it's $70 a month.

So some education and then maybe some occasional help like you know, a designer for templates or maybe a coaching session.

That's what,

a thousand to $2,000 per year.

That is, I would say that is like your minimum to make DIY work.

But for better results,

you know, a reasonable investment would be like better email platform or you know, upgraded. So I pay for my mailer light. It's amazing. You definitely get way, way more features.

It's not very expensive either.

Maybe design tools or some tracking tools. So invest in some tools. Education again, courses, memberships, books.

Don't do too many things, don't get all of the things. Because if you're not actually going to complete it and implement it, then what's the point,

right?

It's just not gonna do anything.

And then maybe you wanna get some regular help, maybe some design help, maybe a VA for scheduling,

having an accountability coach,

there's so much to save for like a free accountability buddy.

But it goes next level. When you actually pay someone,

you are way more invested in it, trust me. So,

and look, that is what, three to seven thousand dollars a year.

If you compare this to like a marketing agency, which tends to be like 3 to $10,000 a month. So 3,36,000 to 120,000 per year or maybe a full time marketing hire again,

50,000 to 80,000.

That's like beginner so.

Or if you think about like diying everything so your time at your hourly rate times the amount of time you spend.

If you think about,

you know, that three to seven thousand dollars per year to make DIY marketing actually work. It's pretty reasonable, right? I mean,

it's definitely a lot more affordable than outsourcing it to an agency or hiring someone in house.

But I hear this a lot.

I hear people say I'm doing DIY because I can't afford to pay for help.

But here's the question.

Can you afford not to?

If your marketing isn't working because you're trying to do everything yourself with no support,

you are losing revenue every month.

And that lost revenue is costing you far more than the, you know, 100 to $300 a month that it would take to get strategic help.

Let's do some maths. And that's not my strong point, so I had to do this up front.

So you're struggling with DIY and you are getting two clients per month at $2,000 each. So that's $4,000 per month.

Now,

what about you invest $200 a month in tools and in help.

You implement proper DIY and get four clients per month.

Now, you're making $8,000 a month.

So your investment is $200,

but your return is $4,000 in additional revenue,

which means that your return on investment is 2000%.

So the real question isn't, can I afford help? It's can I afford to keep struggling without help?

Let's be clear about when DIY stops making sense, and you should hire help.

You really want to hire help when your time is worth more than the cost.

If you bill at $200 an hour and design takes you five hours,

that is $1,000 of opportunity cost.

Honestly, pay a $200.

Pay a designer $200 instead, because really, like, what's the point?

You've maxed out what you can achieve. Diy,

you're executing well, but you're hitting a ceiling that requires specialized expertise,

like advanced ads management. Yeah, maybe you've done okay with your ads so far,

but it's like, next level now.

Are you going to spend all of that time managing your own ads, or are you better at actually outsourcing that piece?

Also, you want to hire help when marketing's preventing you from serving clients.

If doing your marketing means that you can't take on more client work,

it might be time to get some help with your marketing.

Also,

get some help when you genuinely hate it and it's making you miserable.

Life is too short to be miserable.

Like,

marketing is essential.

It's going to drive your business forward. But if you hate doing it,

then,

yeah, don't.

And you also want to hire help win when you have the revenue to support it.

If you know hiring a $2,000 a month marketing VA would give you 10 hours back a week and you can afford it,

it might be time.

Don't hire help when you're hoping that they'll figure out your strategy for you.

You need to hire for execution,

not for strategy. Unless you're specifically hiring a strategist.

But you still need to work with that strategist and not just get them to give you everything.

Don't get help when you haven't tried proper DIY yet. So don't actually hire someone to do marketing if you haven't figured it out yourself first. And I know a lot of businesses do this because they hope, you know, they get an agency on board and they hope that that agency is just going to magically solve all of their problems.

No,

I see a lot of businesses actually burn a lot of money like that.

They have all this hope, but the agency doesn't necessarily get it right.

And it's because the business owner doesn't know enough,

doesn't know their messaging and their offer and all of that.

So the agency then takes over.

And yes, they do what they do well,

but they put their spin on it.

So don't hire or you don't get help yet if you haven't tried proper diy.

Also, don't do it if you can't afford it without stress because debt to pay for marketing doesn't work out.

It's just not a good investment.

And don't get help when you're avoiding learning skills that you need as a business owner,

some marketing knowledge is actually essential. Even if you hire help like you don't need to do, you don't need to know all the execution pieces,

but you definitely need to know branding, strategy, all of that.

Okay, so that's a wrap.

Why so many business owners struggle with DIY marketing and how you can actually make it work.

And the key takeaway is this DIY marketing absolutely can work, but not the way most people are doing it.

You need strategy, you need systems,

strategic help in your weak areas,

and dedicated time. And it's not cheating at DIY that is doing DIY properly.

So here's your action.

Pick your stage on the DIY spectrum. Are you completely diy? Are you strategic diy or are you leveraged diy?

You know, what kind of level are you at?

Be honest about where you are and where you need to be.

Then I want you to identify one biggest gap in your current DIY approach. Is it strategy? Is it systems? Is it time? Is it skills? Is it help? Whatever it is, make or one investment this month to address that gap.

Not 10, just one investment.

And if you're realizing that you've been trying to DIY on hard mode and you need support to make it work,

I've got something for you.

My Marketing Momentum membership is designed specifically for business owners who want to DIY their marketing properly, with strategy, with systems, with templates, and with ongoing support so that you're not figuring out everything alone.

So inside you get frameworks, templates to really build your marketing foundation.

You get monthly group coaching to keep you on track,

to answer all your questions. You get a community of other business owners also doing DIY marketing so that you're not isolated and you get accountability to actually execute consistently instead of stopping, starting, stopping, starting.

It is everything that you need to make DIY marketing work without the overwhelm, without the guesswork or the isolation.

You can find out more@newschoolofmarketing.com membership and if you found this episode helpful and you want more honest, practical marketing advice, I have two favors to ask.

First, make sure that you're subscribed to the new School of Marketing podcast so you don't miss any episodes.

We're here every week with strategies that actually work for real businesses.

Second, if this episode helped you see what's been missing in your DIY marketing approach,

could you please leave me a review?

Tell me what clicks for you or what you're going to change.

Your review helps other business owners who are struggling with DIY marketing find this show when they need it most.

I read every single review and I want to say thank you so much. If you leave a review and you send me a screenshot via email or DM on Instagram, I will send you my Marketing Momentum playbook for free.

This isn't just another template. It's the complete strategic framework that I use with my clients to build their marketing foundation from scratch.

You get worksheets,

prompts to write down your goals, your customers, all of the pieces that you need.

It is everything that you need to stop struggling with DIY marketing and to start making it actually work for your business.

So just take a screenshot of your review and send it to me at hello Bianca mckenzie.com or DM me on Instagram @Bianca McKenzie. So it's M C K E N Z I E and I'll get the playbook over you to you straight away.

Now remember, DIY marketing can absolutely work,

but not if you're trying to do it completely alone, with no strategy, no systems, and no support,

give yourself permission to do DIY properly with the help that you actually need.

All right, thank you so much for tuning in to the new School of Marketing podcast. Remember,

DIY doesn't mean doing everything alone. It means being strategic about what you do yourself and where you get help.

I'm Bianca McKenzie, and I'll catch you in the next episode. Until then, keep making marketing work for you.