Every week I talk to founders who balk at marketing fees. “Can’t we find someone cheaper?” “That agency charges a fraction of this.” Or the classic: “Your costs are too high.” But here’s the truth no one wants to say out loud: If your first question is price, you’re probably bleeding money somewhere else.
You think you’re saving. You’re actually stalling.
Inexpensive marketing help feels like a win—until the campaigns fall flat, your customer acquisition costs explode, and you’re six months behind on growth goals you should’ve hit by now. This isn’t theoretical. I’ve seen brands tank because they picked the “affordable” option that couldn’t scale strategy, couldn’t read the data, and couldn’t pivot when performance dropped.
You didn’t save $10K. You lost $1M in upside.
A good marketer doesn’t just pull levers. They prioritize with surgical precision. They know when to press, when to pause, and more importantly, what not to do. That instinct doesn’t come cheap. It’s built from reps, mistakes, high-stakes decisions, and measurable wins. You’re not paying for time. You’re paying for time not wasted.
THE HIDDEN COSTS OF A CHEAP PARTNER
Let’s look at what “cheap” really costs:
- Wasted ad spend: A bad strategist will burn your budget on impressions and clicks that never convert. They’ll test in circles. They’ll guess. And when you ask for results? Crickets.
- Brand erosion: Every off-brand ad, tone-deaf email, or janky landing page chips away at your trust. You worked hard to earn attention—why let a $40/hour freelancer flush it?
- Missed compounding: Great marketing compounds. One smart decision builds on another. Bad campaigns don’t just fail. They set you back quarters.If you’re thinking, “We’ll fix it later,” just know: Later always costs more.
YOU’RE NOT BUYING TIME, YOU’RE BUYING ACCELERATION
Founders love to ask, “How many hours are you giving me?” The better question is: “What outcomes are you accountable for?”
Great agencies don’t bill for hours. They build leverage. They give you the equivalent of five hires in one team. They’ve made the mistakes already—so you don’t have to. They can out-market your competitors because they’ve already out-marketed theirs.
When you pay more for a top-tier marketing partner, you’re not buying time. You’re buying decision velocity, strategic clarity, and executional confidence.
IF IT’S WORKING IT’S NOT EXPENSIVE
Our best clients rarely talk about price. They talk about performance. They ask, “How do we double down?” That’s the difference.
The founders who say they “can’t afford” expert marketing usually end up paying for it anyway—just in the form of missed revenue, slow growth, and a pile of “lessons learned” they could’ve avoided.
The ones who invest in quality early? They scale faster. They raise more confidently. They hit their milestones. And they stop asking questions about hours because they see the outcomes.
Cheap marketing is the most expensive line on your P&L because it eats away at your two most valuable assets: time and trust. Once you lose those, no spreadsheet will save you.
WHAT YOU SHOULD DO INSTEAD
If you’re a founder, CMO, or operator making budget calls right now, here’s what I’d challenge you to do: Stop comparing hourly rates. Compare results, retention, and real case studies. Audit your last 12 months of marketing. What should you have done sooner? Start thinking in quarters, not weeks. Great marketing is a flywheel, not a slot machine. Ask your team: Are we marketing defensively or offensively? One protects egos. The other builds empires.
Here’s the bottom line: You get what you pay for. And if you want to pay less in the long run, the smartest move is to pay more for someone who knows exactly what they’re doing.
Because great marketing partners don’t cost you money. They make you money—and time, and trust, and momentum.
The rest? They just make you pay twice.
CEO & Founder Erik Huberman launched Hawke Media in 2014 with a mission to make great marketing accessible to all businesses. As Your Outsourced CMO®, Hawke Media has helped scale thousands of brands with its flexible and data-driven marketing solutions, making it one of the fastest-growing marketing consultancy agencies in the United States.
