Why does marketing feel hard?

I used to work for a founder who constantly sent links to share on the company’s social media feed. When it wasn’t done instantly they’d say things like, “It’s only 140 characters, how hard can it be?”

Now if you’ve ever posted something on social media then you know that the answer to that question is, actually pretty hard! Because it’s never just 140 characters, there are about 10 other steps that come with posting on social!

Then multiply that by the number of social platforms that you’re using, factor in the ever changing mystery rules of the algorithm… and and and.

While none of these tasks is particularly difficult, creating one marketing message is actually the culmination of a number of smaller tasks, which stacks up to a lot of work! When you’re running a business on your own, you’re doing all of that on top of all the other things you do to keep lights on - it’s no wonder that marketing always falls to the bottom of the list.

Not to mention we live in a time when attention is at a premium. On any given day we can be exposed to as many as 10,000 ads (while I’m unable to find a source for this number, it seems to be the consensus when googling how many ads do we see in a day?). Of that astronomical number, the number of messages we actually retain is reported to be less than 100.

There’s also our own stuff that gets in the way. For women and non-binary people who have been taught not to take up too much space, not to brag or talk about themselves, marketing can feel like doing something wrong.

Or maybe we’ve experienced trauma around money that makes it uncomfortable to talk about money or charge what we really need or want to thrive.

If you’re working hard to build your business on feminist principles, traditional marketing techniques might not align with your personal or business values which can make it feel really icky.

And at the end of the day, putting yourself out there is just really fucking scary.

So the next time you’re wondering why marketing your business feels so hard, it’s because it is, not because you’re doing something wrong.

—

Thank you to Dr. Becky at Good Inside for offering this sage parenting advice that also applies perfectly for small business marketing!