Greetings from Athens,
Where philosophy and Greek mythology meet good friends and amazing food.

I’ve taken a few days to walk the streets of Athens, brainstorming some new ideas.

I’m currently listening to a book, The Last Kings of Shanghai. It tells the story of the rival Jewish families who controlled the economy and politics in China for over 175 years.

In today’s Storyletter:

• Spend more money on marketing

• Building in public update

• Fun stuff – trailers and music
  

Don’t be so organic

It’s time your brand gave more thought to its ongoing marketing plan and more than that, to its paid plan. If it works, why not scale it with budgets?

I recently heard a few interviews where people, some I personally know, have said they got success without spending a dime. Everything was organic. No ad spend, no promoted posts, no paid interviews, no billboards or TV ads. That’s great, but what if?

Why are people so proud of having a zero marketing budget? If you could reach more, why not? If you spent a dollar and got two or three, why not keep scaling? Why not become a well-known brand?

Your brand has two options: thrive or die. Everything in the middle is just more of the same.

And if that’s the case, your marketing should always scale and guide your growth. More leads, more sales, or better leads and higher ticket sales,that’s up to you. But if you want to succeed, aim to create more brand awareness.

Just had dinner with a good friend, a design agency owner, and he told me the market is crap. I replied that with over 100,000 potential customers, maybe only 100 know his agency exists. If he doesn’t put his name out there, he will crash and burn.

And many of you are reading this and saying, but I don’t want to scale. There are three reasons you should consider this:

🔹 Freedom – Strong brand awareness creates freedom. Freedom to choose your clients, how much you charge, and how you want to scale your business.

🔹 Work on the business, not in the business – You need to think about improving your business, bringing more value to your clients not worrying about how to cover salaries.

🔹 Marketing should be done when times are good – Most people make this horrible mistake. They start marketing when things are rough, when money is tight and they’re not at their best.

Marketing should be a constant in your business and something you derive confidence from, not a means to survive another month. And I’m guilty of this, over several years. We used to run ads to get leads when things weren’t always at their peak.

My suggestion to you is to use your budget in three ways:

🔸 Testing – Run ads on various creative pieces to see what works. No point planning on organic that reaches no one.

🔸 Good creative – If it works, keep pushing the content and strike while it’s hot.

🔸 Evergreen – Find evergreen content: an article, a good podcast, a lead magnet to capture emails.

Start thinking about building an ongoing funnel. Need 10 clients a year? Great plan for 50–70 leads a year. Work your way back from your CAC (cost of acquisition) and understand your budget and how to improve it.

The goal is to make money from your marketing budget and keep adding more money into testing your assumptions.

Found this episode you might find interesting:
🎥https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hifa6ka3SKc&ab_channel=OmarEltakrori

Building in public

When I’m good, I write. When I’m lost, I write. But sometimes I forget to write. When I’m not sure, or uncomfortable, I don’t write.
That happened to me last week, not knowing where I’m staying, moving, or flying to. It’s not easy to keep creating when your ground is shaking.
So I booked a hotel, found an office, and decided to stay put in the same city.
When things feel lost, fix one small thing, the rest will follow.

Website update – We are struggling to fix and update the website. A decision has been made to scrap it and build a new one. After the malware incident, too much is broken.

Brand stretch – I’m working on some color changes to fit the new direction I’m going with. So much has changed. I’ve changed. Let’s adapt and grow, make it feel more comfortable. I want my new look to represent what I stand for and how I look at things.

Client work – It’s been a hectic week with several new projects coming in. And we’re crushing it with some clients getting more sales done, scaling through customer journey improvements. I’m excited about what’s to come.

Marketing effort – We’re going to start implementing some AI agents and more automation with the hope of building a new top of the funnel for my work, and maybe for my talks (2025 is already booked with flights and events, so we’ll see).

Life changes when your mindset changes. Keep pushing.
Let me know if I can help you in any way.

Join me on my journey

Feeling very grateful for this community and this journey. Let’s keep learning, building, and improving together. 💡
My YouTube channel. Subscribe and support.

About Building in Public

Sharing the journey in an open, unfiltered way,the good, the bad, and the behind-the-scenes of scaling my next idea.

Just for Fun

Enjoy your weekend

🎧 Music
This week’s newsletter was created while listening to The Spy Who Chilled Me.
Listen here

🎬 The Phoenician Scheme – Wes Anderson
I’m a huge Anderson fan, and this movie brings more of that same quirky vibe. Love it.
Watch the trailer

🍿 A six-minute trailer? Why not.
Wednesday Addams is back, and Netflix kicks things off with the first few minutes.
Check it out