A Marketer Goes Looking for a Marketer: Tactics vs Strategy

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A Marketer Goes Looking for a Marketer. It Goes About as Well as You Expect.

I am a marketer who is currently vetting other marketers for a project. This isn’t a request for proposals; this is an outline of everything that is wrong with our industry. (And if you pitch me after reading this, I’m going to add a paragraph dedicated very specifically to critiquing your approach.)

I have been in marketing for over 20 years. I have also been an independent marketer since 2010. My digital footprint is Internet Elder status. My current website was originally built in 2018. It has been lovingly maintained and updated regularly — by me — since I built it. Because I’m also a retired WordPress developer.

In its current iteration, the front end of my site looks simple and lightweight: just the core pages and a (rather outdated) blog. But the backend is an ecosystem of my entire catalog of offerings. Courses, digital products, sales funnels, CRM integrations, quiz funnels, pages waiting for updates, courses waiting for a refresh, blog posts waiting to be published, and products waiting to be launched.

The Technical Problem: Ancient Bones, Solid Foundation

The problem that needs solving is that since my site was built in 2018, in the pre-blocks era, the tech has changed a lot. The quickest and easiest way to fix this is a fresh, from-the-ground-up rebuild. The bones of my website are fragile; the stuff the bones are holding up is fine.

I don’t want — or need — a redesign. I want the same site, on the same domain I’ve had for 8 years, with new bones. A bone transplant.

So I set about looking for someone to do the rebuild for me. I could do it myself (and I may have to after this experience), but I don’t want to. I’m done being the bottleneck to my own growth.

I know that my expertise lies in strategy, not doing. I am the thinker, the project manager, and the piece-connector. If I’m doing, then I get lost in the sauce and it’s too easy to deviate from the strategy. My strategy is developed, mapped, and clear. I just need someone to do the executing so that I can stay focused on the strategy.

Putting Out the Call: What Happened Next

So I put out a call on my favorite local Women in Business group.

I knew what I was getting myself into. I did web dev for almost a decade. It’s cutthroat, especially in a group setting, so I was prepared to be inundated.

But I was also VERY clear:

  • Branding is done. Page flow is done.

  • Established Internet Elder presence.

  • I do not have a simple site. I have legacy lifetime licenses with premium tools.

  • The tools & tech stay.

  • Need an experienced dev to rebuild from the ground up using my existing tools & tech, leaving me with the SAME site, just with a stronger, modern skeleton.

  • I only want to work with women (because I am 100% in my “Burn Down the Patriarchy” era).

The Initial Onslaught

  • The first person to DM me was a man.

  • The second was a woman promoting her husband.

  • The third was a woman who sent nothing more than “I can do this for you. Here’s my calendar link to book a call.” No context, no experience, nothing.

  • Two more men tried to connect with me. Instant block.

When the comments finally came, there were the typical hand-raisers, but what I was waiting for were recommendations, or people who took the time to look at my site before jumping in. I did not receive many of those. What I received was a bunch of vultures circling prey.

Ignored Specs and Unwanted Opinions

The number of women who came in hot without taking a single breath to learn WHY my tech stack is important was astounding:

  1. One told me my page builder (which I’ve used since 2014) is obsolete. (It’s absolutely not; they have a active roadmap.)

  2. Another told me my LMS was bloating my site and I should drop it. (Uh, no. It hosts 100+ hours of education that pays my bills. The LMS stays.)

  3. Others told me I should switch to Shopify, Square, Wix, or GoHighLevel.

I left the post up for roughly half an hour before deleting it. In that time, I received 15 DMs and 20–25 comments. Almost no one took two minutes to read and process what I asked for.

If this is overwhelming for a seasoned web dev and marketer, can you imagine what that experience feels like for a new business owner? It’s no wonder so many businesses end up with broken websites and predatory marketing packages.

The Pitch Problem: Tactics Are Not Strategy

Once I shortlisted 4 experienced, refined developers and gave them a specific list of what needed to be done, I ran into an even bigger problem.

I was prepared to pay a $10K+ minimum starting point for this architectural rebuild. The price tag wasn’t the issue—respecting my strategy was. And that is where all but one failed.

Not a single person asked about my strategy. Not even when I explicitly stated that I had a clear map of all the tactics involved.

Instead, they all pitched the exact same standard menu of services:

  • Redesigned Website

  • SEO

  • Email Marketing

  • Paid Ads

  • Content Creation

Why the Marketing Industry Must Do Better

Now, as a marketer, I know these things are useful. They are the backbone of many businesses. But none of these were what I asked for, and more importantly, none of it is strategy.

They’re tactics.

While they are common tactics, they aren’t tactics I asked for because I either already have them running smoothly (like email marketing) or they don’t align with my lead generation strategy (like paid ads).

The four I shortlisted are genuinely good marketers, but as an industry, we have to do better:

  • Marketing is not one-size-fits-all.

  • Operating with the same strategy as everyone else means no one succeeds.

  • We have to LISTEN.

We have to HEAR, and we have to be okay with saying to a prospective client: “I might not be the best person for this job.”