Local business owners are hounded by marketing companies everyday promising the moon. Marketing seems like the great Panacea, but no one is reminding them that going over the top with current customers could potentially create a higher return.

$250/mo on Yelp ads gets a few dozen eyeballs on the business.

$250 in free product every month to regular customers creates Fanatics who tell ever, and could possibly get just as many of their peers eyeballs with a FB/IG post about their experience.

A lot of people forget the basics because it's not being sold.

You might be surprised.

It's fairly trivial to find out where I work during the day but we are representative of the recruitment industry and so much effort is put into attracting and sourcing candidates (generally via expensive job boards). Because the cost tends to be less visible on the ground, there is no realisation around the cost/benefit ratio when compared to keeping existing candidates happy and using them.