Episode 50 - Delegation Is Important

Having a standard that's, you know, comparing yourself and especially your business to somebody else is just going to make you like that business. And that, you know, that's of no value to your company. It's all about, you know, being unique and every business has their unique position, right? So when you, you take that advice and you strive to be just better than you were yesterday or, you know, more effective than you were yesterday in your marketing strategy, that's where, that's where the real magic happens. That's when you start seeing improvement.

So here we are, Milestone Episode 50. It's a long way to, I guess, in any series of podcasts, you know, usually once you get into that, you know, double-digit numbers and you're consistently doing, you're going to start to see some, some traction happening. And I'm excited for us to hit 50. I look forward to us hitting 100 and beyond. And today we want to talk about delegating. So tell me, what do you mean by delegating? Because this was your topic for today's episode.

Yeah, so delegating specifically in terms of marketing, right? So, you know, business owners, their most valuable resource is time. Anybody will tell you that. So marketing is oftentimes the thing that comes top of mind when you talk about delegating to people, because if you don't have a background in it, it can be really challenging and even more time-consuming than it should be. Because you just don't really know what the heck you're doing. So just kind of talking about that, the do's and don'ts, and how to manage those expectations, because a lot of clients come in with the, the wrong idea and either, you know, micromanaging things or the complete opposite of wanting to completely outsource it and be hands-off, be absent from it. And, you know, that neither one of those are gonna be effective.

Yeah, absolutely. And the best type of relationship, especially, you know, for us, but But also as a business owner, I would think that, you know, if you're not familiar with marketing and you hire an agency that is going to work with you, that's a huge opportunity for you to learn. So your attitude going into it, your willingness to want to learn, ask questions, is a great way to do it. Because, you know, my view in this, and my view for many years has been, I would rather teach people to be able to effectively end up doing it themselves, because that's the best type of marketing is when you are the voice, the brand, and you're in control of it. And so we're more of an incubator in there and helping you get going that way.

Absolutely. And, you know, I like that you mentioned that you're, you know, the voice of it or the person behind it. And I think that's the very first thing I'd want to touch on. You know, so when we get those clients who want to be completely hands-off and are like, you know, I'm so overwhelmed, I have so much to do, I can't play any part in this, that's immediately a red flag and an expectation that we really have to knock down because at the end of the day, we can do our very best, we can do everything possible to make sure that we're communicating your brand effectively, but if you're not playing any part in that whatsoever, it's never gonna happen. We're never going to be able to do that in a way that's going to have an effective impact on your business. And that's the whole point of marketing. Is to be able to communicate a message to your customers and to people who you want to, who want to become your customers. That's the literally the, you know, raw definition of marketing and it's all about that communication of that message and, you know, in order to do that we have to, we know the communication part, that's where we come in, but it's the message that we will never understand as well as you do as the business owner who has literally come up with this brand, like this business is your baby. So, you know, you can't just hand it off to somebody and expect it to, you know, turn out exactly how you want it to.

And I would add to that that marketing, more specifically even in social marketing, is storytelling. It's telling the story, it's creating that experience. So just going through the motions of having somebody just post generic content just to put it out there you might as well not even do it because people are just going to gloss over it. It's not impactful that way. You know, you will see, and I would even like bet with anyone that if you had generic stuff going out and then you start to post stuff with you in it, story stuff, things that people connect to and relate, you will see higher engagement on those ones that are personal.

Yeah, absolutely. And you know, something that I always tell my clients because I just think that it, it really truly gets that message across is Social media, when you think about it at its very core, it started as a personal platform for friends and family and even strangers to be able to communicate and know each other's story and see the highlights of their life. So obviously it blew up and now businesses would be silly not to jump on that, but you have to think about it as if your brand or your business was a person. And that's their social media. And how are they going to, you know, engage with, um, with people and your customers? And how are they going to make it— make their life or, you know, their existence interesting to draw people in? Because again, like, social media without that engagement aspect is just media. It's, it's not social. So you need to have that, that identity behind it, right?

And you You know, you're driven to naturally think, okay, this is an avenue for me to grow my business, to me to sell, you know, and you'll go into it saying, okay, I need to talk about the products, the service, and I need to make sales and make people want to call and do that. But let's look at it through the eyes of the person that's using that platform, and you hit it right on the head where it started, right? It was a personal platform, and to this day it still is from the user's experience, right? Nobody, you know, Facebook does not say, okay, join Facebook because it's a place to get business ads, right? It's a place to connect with people. So we've, as a society, have become, you know, just numb to these ads that keep coming out and you gloss over it. And when, you know, we strive very hard from a business sense to make the content seem personal, right? So it would be like something coming from, you know, a friend or family members. And that's why, you know, taking photos with your phone that aren't Photoshopped, that aren't polished, and that kind of stuff are going to be noticeable more so than something that's, you know, done, looks like a cover of a newspaper ad.

No, absolutely. And I mean, that's something that I tell a lot of clients as well. They need to get that idea out of their head that everything is going to be professional and perfect because people don't care about professional and perfect. They want to see what's real and authentic. And we keep, you know, in almost every podcast episode where we're talking about this, it always circles back to authenticity. Because it's just so important, and I really do believe, and you know, at Blue Cow too, like our focus is on making that, you know, come across clearly in your marketing.

Absolutely. Now, our topic is delegation, right? So, you know, we initially talked about, you know, being able to delegate and give up that control, which is very hard for a business owner to give up the control, especially if they were doing it. And, you know, what we tend to try to do is to, you know, if we're working with somebody, to delegate, and you can correct me if I'm wrong, delegate some certain tasks. And that's why our process is that we are asking clients to create some content. It doesn't have to be finished polished content because that's where you come in to do that, but we're delegating back to them as well to have that in there. So, you know, we're taking time off your table, right? So you don't have to follow, figure out how to post and do all that and edit and all those kind of things, but we still need that raw content. As well, right?

Yeah.

And, you know, one of the things that I think is very important in delegating, you know, more so than, you know, deadlines and things which are important, is the fact that when you delegate, you need to trust, right? So, you know, if you're in a business and you say, okay, hey, you know, Sally, salesperson, I want you to look after this part of our marketing, right? For you to truly take that off your plate and take that load off, you need to let go of it. And trust that they can do it. And I think people that will start to delegate but then keep micromanaging and micromonitoring, it's more of a burden on you because now you got a worry, worry level, right?

Yeah, and I mean, the whole point of hiring help and, you know, that investment that you're making is to lower that stress and to save time so you can focus on other things that are going to benefit your company. So it's just kind of a bit ironic if, if if you're going in with that mentality.

Um, and you know, like, you're looking at, um, you know, when a business has, has delegated something and you try something, you know, it's not the end of the world if, you know, something— there's a mistake online, there's a typo, there's something like that, right? It happens all the time. And people aren't gonna be like, I'm never gonna do business because they spelled 'they're' wrong in their preference, right? It may like irk some people because little kind of little nuance that they hate, but It happens, you know, or you go down a certain path of like, okay, I'm gonna do a lot of like blogging or writing articles on LinkedIn or whatever it is, and you're not really getting any traction after a couple months, then change your process, right? It's okay to make mistakes.

Yeah, absolutely. And I mean, with delegating too, you know, we're talking about business owners who need to just kind of let go of control, but at the same time, what's gonna help you do that is again that trust. So When you're deciding on a marketing agency or even just a person themselves, you know, make sure they're the type of people who back up what they're saying. You know, we talk about— we did a whole episode on, you know, trusting metrics and data. So, you know, number one thing you should look for is a marketing agency who mentions that, that, you know, they make the decision based off data. Or, you know, like in our monthly meetings, we provide that, uh, social report that's all completely based off the the metrics that we've gathered. So I think in terms of actually implementing that delegation aspect, you know, you also have to have a decent idea of, you know, what it is that makes a marketing agency or a person or marketer, whatever it might be, good at their job.

Absolutely. I'll tell you a story. We work with a client. It's been a long-term client of mine for many years. And we do a lot of metric tracking, and we're tracking, you know, the way that it works is they're running about $12,000 a month in Google Ads to drive people to a quiz. People fill out the quiz and then they're immediately getting a text message with the quiz results, and then a discussion is opening. So we're, we're split testing, you know, the, the initial response that comes back to them by text to see how many people respond to that. So we're tracking that by the amount that were sent and the amount that actually responded. And we started to see that test number 4 had like a, you know, 8% conversion rate from people getting the results to wanting to book a consult. All the other tests were in around 4, somewhere at 3. So we were at test 7 this week when I checked it, and we were at 3.74%. And I looked back and I'm like, okay, test 4, far better, 8.9 or whatever, something like that. So I'm like, okay, to the team members on, you know, at this company, I said Now implement test number 4 as test number 8 again. Let's validate it. And I delegated that, you know, just being able to look at the metrics and say, okay, make this happen, then it all worked, right? So, you know, you just gotta have trust, not only in the metrics, but in the people that are doing that.

Yeah, absolutely. And I mean, on the opposite end of that is the people who expect to be completely hands-off. Now, this normally stems from the complete overwhelm with marketing. And, you know, whether that be a time issue, whether that be a knowledge issue, they don't know anything. Like, you know, I've had clients range from, you know, people who are really, really talented with social media marketing, they just don't have the time. Then I've also had people who didn't even know how to log in to Facebook, literally, right? So those people that want to be hands-off though, they have to be open to learning, because with us it's always about collaboration again, because, you know, we need that insight from the brand and the business itself. We need to know about it. We need to know what message we're getting across.

Us.

So, you know, even at the, at the, you know, very basis of it, if you're completely new to this and just looking into hiring somebody or getting some help, think about it as, you know, the marketing, you know, whatever it might be— person, again, agency— that you're bringing in is the messaging. And, you know, what you need to bring to them is the— or sorry, the communication is their side. And what you need to bring to them is the messaging and the content that you want to put out there and that best represents your brand or business.

And they're there to help with the strategy and help guide you so that you're not just shooting in the dark saying, what should I create? We're there to tell you, here's what we feel will work for you, let's make this type of content, right? And then do that. And I think the biggest thing too is when you're figuring out, well, how much do I delegate, is just ask the person, like, this is what I'm needing help with, what are you comfortable with? And then, you know, what would you like to learn more about? So, you know, we're not just throwing you in with like, okay, create videos, do all this kind of stuff if you've never done videos. And we've had clients that have evolved over the months, absolutely, of feeling more confidence in creating videos that have become rock stars on the camera.

Absolutely. And, you know, I have to mention this client that I had just yesterday. Oh my goodness, I was so proud and so impressed because she'd originally started with you, and, you know, obviously, um, She had never been on camera before.

Never did anything digital. And like, just to kind of preface your story, you know, when I first started to work with her, she was like, I want to get better at marketing online. I wanna figure out how to do it. Mm-hmm. And it was initially like, let's do video. And then she was like completely scared. She's like, I don't think I can do this.

Yeah.

And we started very small, very small. Just like, let's hit record. Yeah. Right. And let's do it and let's not post that. I just want you to do it and we'll work through it. And then I eventually, you took over and got more into more strategic in the content once she became comfortable.

Yeah, and you know, a couple weeks ago we got her to the point where she was interviewing somebody, which was completely new for her, and she absolutely killed it and had an awesome response, you know, because finally there was that interaction and that, you know, really natural flow of conversation as opposed to, you know, where at first she really started out scripting and You know, if she messed up on one word, she wanted to re-record. And, um, you know, then just recently this week, um, genuinely her videos brought a tear to my eye because I got her to, um, talk about something that she was a little bit more uncomfortable with. Because, you know, she kind of put on that face for the camera that, you know, everything's perfect, you know, positivity. But, you know, she talked about the negative side of things and, you know, was just very raw and very real. And I just couldn't believe how comfortable and how well the message came across. Like, I was so blown away and it just kind of reinspired me that, like, you know, that's what it's about. That's what we're doing here. And, you know, that's my goal for every client is to finally hit that point where it's like, yes, that's exactly what you need to be getting across.

And I'm just going to throw this in. It's maybe not related to delegating, but I heard this phrase or quote, and I may butcher this. We talked about how, you know, something that she wanted, you know, was uncomfortable with and things like that. And how she puts on this face and, you know, you will fall victim to this if you start looking at what everybody else is doing online. And you'll see this false sense that everything is great and people are awesome at what they're doing. And this quote said, you know, strive to become the better you, or what was it? Strive to become better than you were yesterday than somebody else is today. Yeah, right. And the idea was you're just trying to improve on what you did yesterday a bit more, and don't look at what people are doing now and say, I have to be better than that.

Exactly.

Because you will, if you keep doing that, you know, your yesterday, what you do today, and then tomorrow is today's yes, right? So you will step by step gradually get better at what you're doing.

Exactly. I mean, because, you know, having a standard that's, you know, comparing yourself and especially your business to somebody else is just gonna make you like that business and that, you know, that's of no value to your company. It's all about, you know, being unique and every business has their unique position, right? So when you take that advice and you strive to be just better than you were yesterday or, you know, more effective than you were yesterday in your marketing strategy, that's where the real magic happens. That's when you start seeing improvement.

Excellent. So delegate, it's okay, let it happen. It's going to help you. You will see the success in that. And, you know, this was a great topic to talk about. And next episode, episode 51, we're going to be talking about a topic that I think a lot of people struggle with, you know, especially, you know, if you've got employees, that's another thing too, you know, and you probably can take some learnings from this as well. But if you are running a business where you have clients that you're doing work with, we're going to be talking about how to fire those clients, when to, what's the red flags, the triggers, and we'll cover all that in the next episode.

Oh yeah, it's gonna be juicy stuff.