Between political campaigns clogging up prime ad spaces and wrangling expenditures amidst supply issues and inflation, it can be tempting to cut marketing. But if you want to hit your goals, digging into marketing may be your best investment.

In this episode of “Dear Anna,” Art Unlimited CEO Anna Anderson shares not one, but three ideas contractors can use to make sure their campaigns are firing on all cylinders and meeting goals.

“Let’s start at ground zero – you have to have a budget; it’s not something that you can just say, ‘Here’s a big number we’re going to throw at marketing’…it needs to be a little bit more granular than that big picture number.”

Anderson details what such a budget should track and how to break it down further to help your business grow. She says only about a quarter of contractors perform this exercise, meaning those who do will be a step ahead of the competition.

From there, Anderson provides ideas on how to properly allocate that budget to certain “buckets” that can drive business, whether it’s traditional or digital marketing, and just how much of your budget should be going toward marketing efforts. As Anderson noted in a previous episode, this is an election cycle, so contractors should be strategizing how best to tackle their marketing so they’re not lost in a sea of political ads.

Finally, Anderson discusses paid ad campaigns and how contractors can select the best marketing agency to work with when creating digital ads for various platforms, including Google, LinkedIn and Yelp.

“Look at your spend, who you aligning your spend through on these big platforms when it comes to digital campaigns and make sure you’re auditing them,” Anderson said.

Listen to the podcast here, or download it on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.