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What do you guys think about selling a SMM (Social Media Marketing) service for businesses?

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General JB2006

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I have a feeling a lot of "small" businesses have trouble getting their service/product off the ground and I think selling a Social Media Marketing service to businesses to advertise their products/services on social media platforms such as Instagram, Facebook and etc could be profitable. SMM is very results based and the only thing that you need there is a little bit of budget and a good understanding of marketing on social media, I mean you can find ALL the knowledge that you need about SMM on the internet and budget can be at least 500$ and it can bring in customers to your clients.
 
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Jav100

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there is many companies needing help with this - I'd try it. Its a common service offered by marketing firms so if you can specialize in it thats good
 

MattR82

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What concerns me with getting into selling FB ads as a service is how many people complain about being unfairly shut down for no reason at all. Good to learn though.
 

MitchC

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The way all the social platforms are now creative is so important. Marketing agencies have almost come full circle and gone back to what they were in the Mad Men days. Creative agencies.

If you think you can make good creatives then sure go for it, otherwise google is probably going to be better especially for small businesses.

And if you can make good creatives then why limit yourself to small businesses with small budgets? Makes no sense.

Gone are the days of accurate Facebook targeting where you can show an ad only to the right people and have them convert profitably.

Also, have you ever run ads? What makes you think you can read a few articles online and suddenly be qualified to charge people for ads and spending their budget?
 
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Andy Black

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I have a feeling a lot of "small" businesses have trouble getting their service/product off the ground and I think selling a Social Media Marketing service to businesses to advertise their products/services on social media platforms such as Instagram, Facebook and etc could be profitable. SMM is very results based and the only thing that you need there is a little bit of budget and a good understanding of marketing on social media, I mean you can find ALL the knowledge that you need about SMM on the internet and budget can be at least 500$ and it can bring in customers to your clients.
Why not Google/Bing paid search ads too/instead?
 

andrewhook

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Since the current creators of viral content are young, I would rather trust a 16-year-old to manage my Instagram account than an older person.
Starting your own SMM Company could be a good idea if you take your time to study the market, create an MVP and test it.

There's something I've never understood though.

A marketing agency is a very "stupid" business model and it's also FULL of competitors.

Why would a Marketing Expert with an Entrepreneurial Mindset (which I guess is your case) choose to sell his skills to other companies instead of building his own's?

I worked for a few months for a marketing agency time ago, and I've never understood this.

Wouldn't you rather find a good market niche and build and scale your own company through marketing instead of using it to build other people's companies?

I'm not criticizing, I'm just trying to build a positive and valuable discussion :)
 

Andy Black

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A marketing agency is a very "stupid" business model

Why would a Marketing Expert with an Entrepreneurial Mindset (which I guess is your case) choose to sell his skills to other companies instead of building his own's?
I'll answer this.

I like helping people and have come from a consulting background.

If I have friends who want to get started in business I always recommend they provide a B2B service like marketing.
  • Selling a service is a very quick way to get started.
  • They'll have to learn to sell to business owners, which is a great skill to gain.
  • They'll spend their time dealing with business owners which will help them think, talk, and act like business owners.
  • They'll get paid to get very good at solving a specific type of marketing problem, ideally for a specific type of business. They also get paid to learn using their client's budgets. I've had clients spending €100/mth and €100k/day... I got to learn a lot from those accounts.
  • They'll likely build a network of other freelancers/peers who they can mastermind with and learn from.
  • On the side they can start using their marketing skills and network to start building their own products/services. A simple and obvious one is selling the leads instead of their services.

So growing a small marketing agency could be seen as a way to get great skills, can be scaled to a bigger agency, or be a stepping stone to other things that use the same marketing skills.

Curious if you still think it's a stupid business model...
 
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andrewhook

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I'll answer this.

I like helping people and have come from a consulting background.

If I have friends who want to get started in business I always recommend they provide a B2B service like marketing.
  • Selling a service is a very quick way to get started.
  • They'll have to learn to sell to business owners, which is a great skill to gain.
  • They'll spend their time dealing with business owners which will help them think, talk, and act like business owners.
  • They'll get paid to get very good at solving a specific type of marketing problem, ideally for a specific type of business. They also get paid to learn using their client's budgets. I've had clients spending €100/mth and €100k/day... I got to learn a lot from those accounts.
  • They'll likely build a network of other freelancers/peers who they can mastermind with and learn from.
  • On the side they can start using their marketing skills and network to start building their own products/services. A simple and obvious one is selling the leads instead of their services.

So growing a small marketing agency could be seen as a way to get great skills, can be scaled to a bigger agency, or be a stepping stone to other things that use the same marketing skills.

Curious if you still think it's a stupid business model...
I said "stupid" not because I think people doing it are stupid :)

The reason is it's pretty easy to set up, find some customers and turn the key on. Literally zero entry barriers.

Sure it can teach you a lot (as you said), but don't you think it's a better idea to focus on creating a company following the CENTS rule that you can actually sell someday?

I mean, doing marketing for hundreds/thousands of different companies may bring them some results, but it's incomparable to what you can achieve by going extremely deep into your company's marketing, getting to know every single aspect of your customer etc.

Just my opinion.

Knowing how to grow a company, I would never spend my time growing other companies rather than mine.

However, thank you for giving me your point of view. I rly like hearing other people's opinions!
 

Andy Black

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I said "stupid" not because I think people doing it are stupid :)

The reason is it's pretty easy to set up, find some customers and turn the key on. Literally zero entry barriers.

Sure it can teach you a lot (as you said), but don't you think it's a better idea to focus on creating a company following the CENTS rule that you can actually sell someday?

I mean, doing marketing for hundreds/thousands of different companies may bring them some results, but it's incomparable to what you can achieve by going extremely deep into your company's marketing, getting to know every single aspect of your customer etc.

Just my opinion.

Knowing how to grow a company, I would never spend my time growing other companies rather than mine.

However, thank you for giving me your point of view. I rly like hearing other people's opinions!
Booking(.)com does marketing for thousands of companies. I dare say a lot of lead gen businesses start by doing marketing for other businesses.
 

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