Is Your Marketing Actually Making You Money?
I’ve sat in boardrooms from Fortitude Valley to North Lakes, and I hear the same thing from business owners every single week: "I’m spending thousands on ads, but I have no idea if it’s actually working."
If you feel like you’re throwing money into a black hole, you aren’t alone. Most small business owners in Brisbane are flying blind. They see money go out of the bank account for Google ads or Facebook posts, and they see customers come in, but they can’t connect the two.
In the marketing world, people call this ROI (Return on Investment). In the real world, we call it "not getting ripped off."
If you want to grow your business without losing your shirt, you need to understand exactly how much money you get back for every dollar you spend. This isn't about fancy graphs or "engagement metrics" that don't pay the bills. It’s about cold, hard cash.
Here is how you actually measure if your marketing is working, without needing a degree in mathematics.
The "Napkin Math" Way to Track Profit
Before we get into the weeds, let’s look at the simplest way to see if your marketing is worth it.
You take the total money you made from new customers, subtract what it cost you to do the work (materials, wages, petrol), and then subtract what you spent on the marketing itself. Whatever is left is your profit.
The Formula: (Total Sales - Cost of Goods - Marketing Spend) / Marketing Spend
If you spend $1,000 on ads and you get $5,000 in sales, and it cost you $2,000 to actually do the job, you’ve made $2,000 in profit. That’s a 200% return.
Most business owners stop there, but that’s a mistake. To really grow, you need to know which specific ads or pages are doing the heavy lifting. If you don't know where the leads are coming from, you might be measuring ROI on the wrong things entirely.
Why Most Business Owners Get This Wrong
I’ve seen a lot of "experts" try to complicate this. They’ll talk about brand awareness or impressions. Let me be blunt: you can’t pay your mortgage with impressions.
Here are the three biggest mistakes I see Brisbane business owners making when they try to figure out if their marketing is working:
1. Forgetting the "Cost of Doing Business"
If a digital agency tells you they made you $10,000 in sales from a $2,000 spend, that sounds great. But if your materials and staff costs for those jobs were $9,000, you actually lost $1,000. Always factor in your margins. If you’re a plumber in Coorparoo, you know that a $500 job isn't $500 in your pocket. You’ve got the call-out time, the parts, and the apprentice's wages to pay.2. Not Tracking the Phone
For most local businesses—tradies, lawyers, dentists—the website doesn't make the sale. The phone call does. If you aren't tracking which ads make people pick up the phone, you are guessing. We’ve worked with a landscaper in Samford who thought his ads weren't working because no one was filling out his online form. When we started tracking his phone calls, we found out he was getting 20 calls a week from those ads. He almost turned off his biggest money-maker because he wasn't looking at the right numbers.3. Ignoring the "Long Game"
If a customer costs you $50 to get, but they only spend $40 on their first visit, most people think they’re losing money. But if that customer comes back every month for three years? That $50 investment is the best money you’ve ever spent. You need to look at the total value of a customer over a year, not just the first day. This is why it's so important to keep people coming back rather than always hunting for new ones.Three Levels of Tracking Your Money
Depending on how big your business is and how much time you have, there are three ways to handle this.
Level 1: The "Old School" (Cost: $0)
This is simple: ask every single person who calls, "How did you hear about us?"Write it down in a notebook or a spreadsheet. At the end of the month, tally it up. It’s not perfect—people often say "Google" when they actually clicked a specific ad—but it’s better than nothing. If you see that 80% of your best jobs are coming from a specific local directory, you know where to put your money next month.
Level 2: The "Digital Paper Trail" (Cost: Low)
This involves using basic tools to see what people do on your site. You want to know if they clicked your "Call Now" button or filled out a form. If you can see that 100 people visited your site from a Facebook ad and 5 of them asked for a quote, you’ve got a clear path to follow. If you see people arriving but leaving immediately, you need to stop guessing why and fix the leaks in your bucket.Level 3: The "Pro" Setup (Cost: Moderate)
This is what we do for our clients at Local Marketing Group. We set up "Call Tracking." This means when someone clicks an ad, they see a slightly different phone number. When they dial it, the system records that the call came from that specific ad. It still rings your normal office phone, but you get a report showing exactly which ads are ringing the bell.How Much Should You Be Spending?
This is the million-dollar question. I’d love to give you a single number, but it depends on your industry.
- High-Value Services (Lawyers, Builders, Solar): You might be happy to spend $200 to get one lead, because a single customer could be worth $10,000 to $50,000. - High-Volume Services (Pest Control, Hairdressers, Cafes): You probably want your cost to get a customer down under $20, because they spend less per visit.
As a rule of thumb for Brisbane small businesses, if your marketing spend is more than 10% of the total revenue it brings in, you need to take a very close look at your processes. If it’s under 5%, you should probably be spending more to grow faster.
The Hidden Leaks: Where Your Money is Actually Going
Sometimes, the marketing is working perfectly, but the business is failing the marketing.
I’ve seen businesses spend $5,000 a month on Google ads that work brilliantly. The phone rings off the hook. But the receptionist is grumpy, or no one answers the phone after 4:00 PM, or the quotes take two weeks to get sent out.
In those cases, the "Marketing ROI" looks bad on paper, but the problem isn't the ads. The problem is the "Finish Line." If you’re getting leads but not closing them, you’re throwing money away. You have to ensure you aren't losing people right at the end of the process.
What Should You Do First?
If you’re feeling overwhelmed, don’t try to build a massive tracking system today. Do these three things:
1. Know your margins. Don't just look at total sales. Know how much profit you actually make on an average job after wages and materials. 2. Start asking. Train whoever answers your phone to ask, "How did you find us?" and record the answer properly. 3. Check your website on your phone. Most of your customers are looking for you while they're on the go. If your phone number isn't easy to click and call, you're losing money before you even start.
Is Professional Help Worth the Cost?
You can do a lot of this yourself, but it takes time. As a business owner, your time is usually better spent on the tools or managing your team than staring at spreadsheets.
A good agency shouldn't just send you a report full of jargon. They should be able to tell you: "You gave us $2,000 last month. That generated 45 phone calls. Based on your average job size, that should have resulted in about $15,000 in revenue."
If your current marketing person can't tell you that, they're probably wasting your money.
Real Talk: The Timeline
Marketing isn't a microwave; it's a slow cooker.
If you start tracking your ROI today, you won't have perfect data tomorrow. It usually takes about three months to see the patterns.
- Month 1: You're just collecting data and seeing where the gaps are. - Month 2: You start to see which ads are duds and can turn them off to save money. - Month 3: You double down on what's working and start seeing a real shift in your bank balance.
Most people quit in Month 1 because they don't see an instant result. The ones who win are the ones who stay consistent and keep their eyes on the profit, not the "likes."
Summary: Your Profit Checklist
- Stop caring about 'Likes' and 'Clicks'. Start caring about phone calls and quotes. - Factor in your real costs. Marketing spend is only part of the equation. - Track the source. If you don't know where a customer came from, you can't get more of them. - Watch the long-term value. A customer who returns is worth five times more than a one-off.
At Local Marketing Group, we’re obsessed with these numbers because we know that’s what keeps Brisbane businesses alive. We don't care about awards or looking fancy; we care about making sure your phone rings and your profit grows.
Ready to stop guessing and start growing?
If you want someone to take a look at your current setup and tell you exactly where you’re leaking cash, we can help. We'll skip the jargon and give you the straight talk on what's working and what's a waste of time.
Contact Local Marketing Group today and let’s get your marketing actually paying for itself.