Let me tell you a short backstory about myself. I am 27, M, from Romania, a country in Europe but with a 3rd world country economy, prices are western european and salaries are SHIT.
I have been working since i was 16 in the marketing field, internships, agencies, corporations, you name it. I have started in 2015 with a salary of 400 USD per month as an intern marketing specialist as title said, but in reality, i was an assistant manager doing chores like mowing the company's lawn.
The biggest salary/position in my career i reached 3 years ago, 1200 USD per month as a MARKETING MANAGER for a big 4 corporation in Romania. Imagine getting 1200 USD per month and managing a team of 12, i felt miserable.
I started by freelancing on Upwork on PPC, i was really good at it, i started earning 2000 USD per month from upwork besides my salary, that's when the thought that i could be earning more and enjoying life more kicked in.
I started my own PPC agency two years ago, started small and reached out to people on linkedin telling them about my services, in 6 months i went from 0 to 15 clients paying me between 650 and 1500 USD per month. It felt like heaven.
I was earning 10 times more than my previous position as a marketing manager. I had clients from the US, UK, Romania and rest of Europe.
Now, i have 25 clients, most of them from the beginning because i have a great retention rate as i deliver great results in terms of PPC. I mostly serve e-comm stores and multiply their ROAS in the first months.(i don't want to brag about how good i am, this is not the purpose of this post)
So, now to get to the point, 1 year ago i started seeing lots of guru's on youtube and instagram. Iman Gandhzi, Neil Patel, you name it. All of them telling young people how easy it is to build your own marketing agency and get millions fast.
Now, the market is fucked. There are tons of "marketing agencies" that started overnight, with people with 0 experience. I'm auditing potential clients ad accounts and everything is fucked there, results are below 0 and it's easy for me to get them on the right path and get profit on their account, but….
Clients don't trust agencies anymore, because of the bad experiences they have with all these shitty agencies its been getting harder and harder to sign clients.
So, guys, before "STARTING YOUR OWN SMMA AND EARNING MILLIONS" please learn some fucking marketing in the first place, you're ruining the market and client expectations.
i’Ve gOt nO eXpErIeNcE, cAn i sTaRt aN aGeNcY? OPEN YOUR EYES, kids!
byu/dbrzeu inEntrepreneur
Posted by dbrzeu
11 Comments
I don’t work in marketing, per se, but this inflow of digital marketers that are taking a fee without providing a return has been making my job easier to pick up new work.
I also learned from your post that I can get exceptional talent in romania, who speak English natively, for cheap, so thank you for that.
True, my last company one of the first dudes ended up being a fucking idiot pretending he was hot shit.
Revenue share agreement, 20% of any revenue generated by his “agency’s” adds was their fee, and he bombed hard, ended up wasting our money by dialling FB and Instagram adds up on shitty adds that ended up being reworking of our own older adds…
So many people reaching out including people trying to sell us a new website.. not even having taken the time to research if we have one or what it is about.
I understand “the hustle and grind” but damn it people, 4 minutes of research and they’d know enough to at least seem competent.
Preach!
A few years back, I knew a person who left her corporate gig to start her own social media marketing business. I gave her a shot and all the things she was suggesting (like timing when to post, etc) were things that just about anyone can google.
Posts were low effort Canva compositions, she couldn’t follow proper design principles (like proper line spacing, etc) and actually resulted in a drop in followers.
This person, along with so many others, have been convinced by all these online gurus that since the all the resources are out there, anyone can do it. The only difference is one’s ambition. But no, as you articulated, it isn’t just a matter of drive; you have to be refined by years of actual experience.
Thankfully, I eventually hired a team that had actual qualifications, quoted the same price, and garnered real measurable results.
Totally agree. I clicked on a gurus ad once and now I get swamped on all platforms. It’s like the old affiliate marketing or dropshipping ads. Sad to see so many people jumping on the guru train, even some marketers that I respect.
I just want to congratulate you for how you managed to grow your business.
I’m also from RO but my mistake was to get only clients from RO who are bad payers and always want some work extra contract and with no additional payment.
Totally agree I’m not a pro in marketing I’m just getting in the industry doing a google course rn. so I’m not looking to start an agency but join one and make my way up by learning from them. It would be a side hustle of mine. I am aiming to make monthly 500$ for now as it would be enough to sustain me.
Im starting college soon and I don’t want my daily expenses to be covered by my parents.
Would you have any open positions perchance?
The best advice I can ever give is that people work at a start-up in the field they want to enter before starting their own thing. People want to rush to be an entrepreneur without the requisite skills or reality check of what it’s going to take.
Congrats on your progress! If you notice clients run from keywords like “agency,” you could focus more on your personal brand, you know?
If they trust you, they probably won’t have a problem signing with your agency. And also you can try to use the problems you saw on other clients to market yourself. Like talking about those problems, and how to recover from them. Maybe the potential clients will understand that you know what you’re talking about and gain their trust.
Just curious. WhAt iS tHe reAson foR this TypE of WriTIng?
Absolutely agree. Figures like Iman Gadzhi indeed muddled the market with opportunists who lack real expertise. They promise services they can’t deliver, often outsourcing to inadequate pajeets, creating a frustrating cycle for business owners (and ironically themselves, but that’s on Iman as well). It’s no wonder trust is hard to come by…
Keep delivering tangible results, as you noticed you’ll have clients for life.
I’ve seen people with100k followers on linkedin running marketing agencies but they don’t know about the basic fundamentals. Reposts the same content like, Do these 5 free courses blah blah.
Man, fr is this what you call marketing ? even your content doesn’t align with your Profile.