Why Your Marketing Feels Like It Isn't Working

Marketing can feel like a black hole: you post, you pay, you wait, and somehow nothing changes. We get real about why so many small business owners reach the point of saying, “I don’t think my marketing is working,” and why that feeling is often a signal that the strategy, expectations, or partner relationship is off, not that your business is doomed.

Shelby brings Mattie onto the mic, the teammate behind the b-roll videos and the edits, to talk about what they see in everyday conversations with business owners. We dig into the damage caused when a marketing agency promises outrageously high results and then underdelivers, leaving people skeptical of every “expert” who comes next. We also talk about what trust actually looks like in a healthy agency relationship: clear communication, realistic timelines, measurable deliverables, and a plan that fits a real-world budget.

From there we zoom out to the work itself. Mattie shares the difference between learning digital marketing in school and doing hands-on client work where budgets are tight, doubts are real, and ghosting can happen if the value is not crystal clear. We connect the dots between sales and marketing, why they have to move together, and how the right systems help you stay consistent: analytics, scheduling, CRM tools, content creation resources, and a full team focused on execution.

If you want a practical next step, we also point you to a free SEO audit so you can spot quick wins in your search engine optimization and see how you stack up against competitors. Subscribe for more small business marketing strategy, share this with a friend who feels stuck, and leave a review if it helped. What part of your marketing feels most “not working” right now?

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:27

Hey y'all, what's up? It's Shelby here with the Marketing Happy Hour podcast. I'm here with Maddie. What's up, girl? I'm happy to be here. She's the girl behind the screens, y'all. She does all the b-roll videos that you see. She even edits and publishes all these podcasts. So today I said, Hey, you get to be on the podcast. She's a little nervous, but it's okay.

SPEAKER_01 0:51

I'm excited to be here. Yes. It'll be good. It'll be okay.

Why Marketing Feels Like It Fails

SPEAKER_00 0:53

It'll be okay. So we really want to talk about how marketing doesn't feel like it's not working. I'm sorry, how marketing feels like it's not working. Yeah, that's what we're talking about. Yes. So we sit in conversations every day almost with marketing and business owners that are like, I'm just struggling. I don't think my marketing's working. And there's some truths to that. But then also we kind of come across with a little bit of strategy help with them. But what do you think is like the most that they're struggling with? Like just let's say last week with all of our conversations. What do you think they're struggling with?

SPEAKER_01 1:28

I mean, I think finding somebody that fits best with them was kind of the biggest thing. Like not being able to find a company that is doing what they want to be done, um, and then not being able to see results from that. Like the company they were working with wasn't giving them the results that they wanted to see. And also that they promised them. Yes. They promised them results that were outrageously high and obviously underdelivered.

SPEAKER_00 1:50

Yes. And that's what's really uh like what we're always having to struggle with every day is building the trust that another freaking agency broke. Yes. It's like dating somebody and they like broke your trust, and you're like, I'm a man hater, I don't like anyone ever again.

SPEAKER_01 2:06

Rebuild it. Somebody that's willing and willing to be there. Rebuild.

SPEAKER_00 2:10

Yeah, so let us be your rebound. Like we'll be the rebound. That's our new slogan. The rebound marketing agency. We're here to help you. I mean, we had a conversation with someone that spent$60,000 in, I don't know, probably about a year or so time with a with a marketing agency, and they didn't produce hardly anything for them. And they have to call a 1-800 number. I mean, you guys have like our personal numbers. Like, we're the ones that are sitting here. You can come into our office if you're here local in Little Rock, but I hate to hear other agencies taking advantage of small business owners. I mean, I've been doing this for 10 years. Yeah. And I've never been like, yeah, give me money and then not do anything with it. That's awkward.

Trust After Bad Agency Promises

SPEAKER_01 2:51

I think small businesses in general like struggle now in today's world and today's market as well. So like having marketing agencies that are taking advantage of that is something that makes me mad because I mean, I think we should all be here to help small businesses, and that's kind of why I like doing marketing too, is to be here to help the small businesses.

SPEAKER_00 3:09

So let's talk about you a little bit. Maddie just graduated college. Yeah. Um I know. Oh my gosh. Yeah, a year ago. Um, and so tell us why you decided that you liked marketing. Was it the small business stuff? Like, what exactly?

SPEAKER_01 3:23

It was definitely the small business stuff. Like I've always kind of been interested in that kind of thing, entrepreneurship, and then also like the creative art side. I've always been super into art and super into the creative part of it as well. Um, so I think that's also kind of what drew me in that direction was the ability to kind of follow my own path and do what I needed to and help people in the process.

How Maddie Got Into Marketing

SPEAKER_00 3:42

So I love that. So you've been with me like almost four months-ish now, something like that. Um, so what do you think like your expectations going into like marketing versus like what we do every day? Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 3:54

I think through my classes and stuff, it was very like generalized. Like, I mean, we learned all the things, but it was never hands-on. Um, and so seeing it hands-on and seeing it with real clients and what the clients are actually struggling with versus like my professor being like, All right, this is what we're doing. Like, this is this is what we're doing. These people have$500, yes, but they have no colleges. Yes, so it is it's definitely different being on the hands-on side, and I think of definitely learning a lot more from that part as well.

Sales Reality And Client Ghosting

SPEAKER_00 4:21

So yeah, and it's interesting because just to hear from your perspective being in college and like people can get social media degrees. Yes, you know, and it's like, okay, you can get social media management degrees, but what kind of strategy experience do you have? You know, like how can you actually help the client? And so I think it's interesting to be like one of those hard knock life, you know, people like learning from experience versus a professor going, these people have$500. But those people that have$500, they also have a conscience and they also have a personality and they also have doubts about everything or you know, things that have really burned them. And so it's just trying to get that back over, you know, and win them back for sure. Yeah. Because we deal with a lot of ghosting. Yeah, we deal with a lot of how do you think about the sales? Like, what do you think about that part of it?

SPEAKER_01 5:07

I mean, I think I took some sales classes as well, so I kind of like knew that ghosting was obviously gonna be a part of it. Um, but it is hard to see, especially like marketing is important, and obviously, like your clients come in wanting marketing, right? But they don't always know the importance of it as well, which is why they ghost a bunch of the time, which is kind of frustrating. Um, but I mean, sales and marketing go hand in hand, and you kind of have to push with the sales side to get to the marketing side.

SPEAKER_00 5:33

So absolutely. And if you're trying to sell something but you don't market it, yeah, nobody knows what you're selling. Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 5:38

Marketing is just as important as sales.

Strategy Plus Tools Plus A Team

SPEAKER_00 5:41

Oh, that sounds so familiar. They should check out last week's episode um talk about sales and how that's very important into marketing for sure. So the real reason, let's get back to what we were talking about, why marketing doesn't feel like it's working, it's because maybe you don't have a strategy, maybe you don't have that right partner, maybe you're looking for someone to really help you push you over the edge. And if you are a content creator, you're like, I want to do everything myself, absolutely, I think you should do that. But we have resources. Tell them about all the things we have.

SPEAKER_01 6:10

I mean, we have all the all the back-end things. I mean, we obviously do Canva, but we have that like the paid version of that. Yeah. We have the paid version of AI. We have all of our like CRMs and all the stuff for um scheduling out and those things, um, all the analytics things. Yep. Um, and then obviously a full team of marketing people. That's the best part.

Free SEO Audit And Farewell

SPEAKER_00 6:29

And you guys don't have to pay them. I pay them. That's the best part. You get Maddie, but she's on my payroll, and you just pay us a monthly fee, right? And we're not really trying to sell you, but also we're like the best in like the nation, right? I mean, the marketing broker is the best. But if you are frustrated, we have a free SEO audit that you can run on our website. So go to the mktgbroker.com and it's a tab at the top, a free SEO report. Just run it and it'll tell you the things that you can do on your own to actually um increase your search engine optimization for your business and how you um compare to some of your competitors. In fact, I'm number two in my area and I'm a little salty about it. I'm not gonna lie. When I ran that yeah, I'm like, okay, I'm gonna need to do a little bit extra over here to be the best marketing agency in Little Rock, Arkansas. And I promise you, let's say a month from now, I'm gonna be there. I think so. So okay, guys, you met Maddie. Say goodbye. Do you want to end our podcast? Sure.

SPEAKER_01 7:28

Thanks for listening to the Marketing Happy Hour podcast. Uh, tune in next week for the episode. Thanks, guys. Bye.