Why Marketing Messes With Our Heads

A humbling reminder about why marketing messes with our heads — and what I'm doing differently this year

I got humble recently. Someone had to remind me of my own advice — the thing I say to clients all the time, which is: it ain't all about you.

Turns out I'm human too, and unopened emails, no-shows, and low engagement can still make you feel discouraged even when you know better.

So this week I'm talking about why marketing messes with our heads, why so much of the advice we're consuming isn't actually built for businesses like ours, and what I'm testing differently for the rest of this year.

If you've ever felt like you're doing everything "right" and still not seeing traction, keep reading, then go listen to the full thing.

The Advice That Snapped Me Out of It

I'd been feeling discouraged, putting things out there and not getting the traction I wanted.

A friend gently asked if I'd tried reaching out one-to-one to remind people about it.

My honest answer was no and that was humbling, because I know from my own experience how effective a genuine, personal nudge is.

When someone reaches out to me directly, I show up, because I feel like a person instead of an invisible name on a list.

It was a reminder that even when you know the advice, it's easy to get a little lazy in the execution especially when you're trying to make something feel sustainable instead of like one more exhausting to-do.

You're Probably Playing the Wrong Game

Here's the trap I keep falling into: taking advice from major online business coaches with massive, established audiences and applying it to a small, locally based business - then wondering why it's not working the same way for me.

Online businesses scale through volume: large email lists, automation, and high visibility that creates conversions simply through sheer numbers.

Local, relationship-based businesses work with a smaller, finite pool of people, and our growth comes through trust - SEO, word-of-mouth, one-to-one relationships.

Those are two completely different games, and applying a high-volume rulebook to a relationship-based business is where a lot of us get stuck feeling like we're failing when really, we're just misapplying strategy.

If you're a service-based or location-based business owner, this is worth sitting with: how to market a local business without a big audience.

Where I'm Redirecting My Energy This Year

Instead of pouring time into content with a 24-hour shelf life, I'm shifting toward things with more relationship-building ROI: personal emails to past clients, thoughtful DMs and comments, coffee dates that are about genuine connection (not "picking my brain"), referrals, and strategic partnerships built on real reciprocity.

At a high level, it breaks down like this: social media builds awareness, email marketing nurtures and deepens trust, and one-to-one conversation is the real conversion accelerator.

I'm not abandoning content - I'm just being more honest about where the highest-impact use of my time actually is.

My take: "Where are you hiding behind creating content?"

Flops Aren't Failures — They're Data

One stat that stopped me in my tracks: only 15% of people who start something actually follow through on it.

That means your real competition shrinks dramatically over time - most people quit before they ever get enough data to know if something worked.

The caution here is important: you need to commit to a strategy for at least three to six months before you have enough real data to evaluate it.

Bailing early just puts you in a loop of false starts. When something doesn't work, it doesn't mean you're bad at business - it means it's time to reassess, pivot, or go deeper instead of wider.

Listen to the Full Episode

In the full episode I walk through specific journal prompts to help you figure out where you're taking things personally that are actually just data, and how to recommit to the one strategy you've been avoiding for the rest of this year.