Hi there,
Thanks for reaching out!
That's a really common question, and it's a good place to be in. Getting decent sales on your own is a great start, and better than a lot of people manage. I'm happy to give you some initial thoughts and a bit of a look 'behind the curtain' at what a professional approach looks like, so you can decide what's right for you. It's less about secret tools and more about a completely different way of thinking about growth.
TLDR;
- The biggest difference isn't access to secret tools, it's a rigorous, repeatable system for testing and scaling campaigns based on a full-funnel strategy (which we'll break down).
- Experts think about your customer's 'nightmare problem' first, not their demographics. This changes everything from your ad copy to your targeting.
- At your current spend, the focus should be on perfecting your offer and proving what works at a small scale. An agency might be premature, but the right strategic advice could save you thousands in wasted spend.
- The most important piece of advice is that your results are dictated more by your offer than by your ads. A weak offer can't be saved by brilliant advertising.
- This letter includes an interactive calculator to help you figure out your Customer Lifetime Value (LTV), which is the single most important metric for understanding how much you can really afford to spend to get a new customer.
We'll need to look at what agents *actually* do differently...
First off, let's bust the biggest myth. Do agencies have access to secret tools or a special 'back door' to Facebook? Absolutely not. We use the same Ads Manager you do. The difference isn't the toolkit; it's the methodology and the sheer volume of experience we can draw on from managing millions in ad spend across dozens of accounts.
When you're running ads yourself, it's easy to get stuck in what I call the 'single campaign mindset'. You create a sales campaign, you target some interests that seem right, you put up a few ads, and you hope for the best. When it works, you might increase the budget a bit. When it stops working, you panic and start changing everything at once. Sound familiar?
A professional approach is completely different. It's about building a predictable, scalable machine. We don't see it as one campaign; we see it as a full-funnel system designed to move a complete stranger from "who are you?" to "take my money" in a structured way. For one of our ecommerce clients, a women's apparel brand, we generated a 691% return. That didn't come from finding one 'magic' audience. It came from building a system that nurtures potential customers at every stage of their journey.
Think of it like dating. You wouldn't ask someone to marry you on the first date, right? You build a relationship first. Ads work the same way. A professional structure looks something like this:
- Top of Funnel (ToFu): This is the 'first date'. We're reaching cold audiences—people who've never heard of you. The goal here isn't necessarily to make a sale on the first click. It's to introduce your brand, show off your most appealing products, and get them to your website. We're building an audience pool for the next stage.
- Middle of Funnel (MoFu): These people have been on a 'first date' with you. They've visited your site, watched a video, or engaged with your page. They're interested, but not ready to commit. Now we show them different ads—maybe some customer testimonials, user-generated content (UGC), or a blog post about how your products are made. We're building trust and keeping your brand top of mind.
- Bottom of Funnel (BoFu): This is the 'proposal'. These people are hot leads. They've added a product to their cart or started the checkout process. Now we hit them with very direct ads using Dynamic Product Ads (DPA) to show them the exact item they left behind, maybe with an offer like free shipping to push them over the edge.
Running this kind of multi-layered system is far more complex than a single campaign, but it's how you build sustainable growth instead of just getting lucky with a few sales here and there. It smooths out your performance and allows you to scale your budget without your cost per purchase going through the roof.
Top of Funnel (ToFu)
Goal: Awareness
Audience: Cold Interests, Lookalikes
Message: Introduce the Brand
Middle of Funnel (MoFu)
Goal: Consideration
Audience: Website Visitors, Engagers
Message: Build Trust & Desire
Bottom of Funnel (BoFu)
Goal: Conversion
Audience: Cart Abandoners
Message: Close the Sale
I'd say your ICP is a Nightmare, Not a Demographic...
Another huge difference is how we think about your customer. You're probably targeting based on demographics and interests, right? "Women, aged 25-40, interested in sustainable fashion and online shopping". It's logical, but it's incredibly superficial and leads to generic ads that dont really connect with anyone.
We start by defining the Ideal Customer Profile (ICP) based on their pain. What is the specific, urgent, frustrating 'nightmare' in their life that your product solves? Your customer isn't just a demographic; she's in a problem state. Let's make up an example. Say you sell high-quality, comfortable work-from-home loungewear.
- Amateur approach: Target women aged 30-50 interested in "loungewear" and "working from home".
- Professional approach: Identify the nightmare. "I've been working from home for two years in the same faded pyjamas. I feel unproductive and unprofessional, but I refuse to wear stiff office clothes just to sit at my kitchen table. I have a surprise Zoom call with my boss in 10 minutes and I look a mess. I need something that feels as comfortable as pyjamas but looks polished and put-together."
See the difference? That nightmare is rich with emotion and specific language. It gives us everything we need for powerful ad copy. Suddenly, we're not selling "loungewear". We're selling "The confidence to crush your Zoom presentation, even on 5 minutes' notice" or "Look professional, feel like you're in pyjamas".
This "nightmare first" approach dictates our entire strategy. We find podcasts this person listens to, newsletters they read, influencers they follow, and competitor brands they already buy from. This creates a targeting strategy that's a hundred times more effective than just clicking on broad interests in Ads Manager. You stop wasting money showing your ads to irrelevant people.
You'll need a message they can't ignore...
Once you know their nightmare, you can craft a message that they simply can't ignore. Most DIY ads just describe the product. "Check out our new summer collection. Made from 100% organic cotton. Available in 5 colours." It's boring, and it sounds like every other ad in their feed.
We use proven copywriting frameworks to structure our ads for maximum impact. A classic one for e-commerce is the Before-After-Bridge.
Before: You paint a picture of their life with the problem. You show them you understand their nightmare.
"Tired of that 'what do I wear?' panic every morning? Staring into a closet full of clothes but feeling like none of them make you feel good?"
After: You show them the dream outcome. Life without the problem, thanks to your product.
"Imagine opening your wardrobe and effortlessly pulling out an outfit that's comfortable, stylish, and makes you feel instantly put-together and ready for anything."
Bridge: You introduce your product as the bridge to get them from the 'Before' state to the 'After' state.
"That's what our customers experience every day. Our 'Effortless Style' capsule collection is designed to mix and match, giving you dozens of stunning outfits with just 5 core pieces. Click here to see the collection and simplify your mornings for good."
This structure is psychologically powerful. It focuses on the transformation the customer desires, not just the features of the product. An agency or expert will systematically test dozens of variations of these messages. We'll test different 'Before' pain points, different 'After' dreams, and various product images and videos to find the combinations that deliver the lowest cost per purchase. You simply can't do that level of rigorous testing when you're also trying to run every other part of your business.
We'll need to calculate what you can *afford* to spend...
This is probably the most important part, and it directly addresses your question about whether paying fees is "worth it". Right now, you're probably thinking about your ad spend in terms of "how low can I get my cost per purchase?". That's the wrong question. The right question is "how *high* a cost per purchase can I afford while remaining wildly profitable?"
The answer lies in a metric most store owners never calculate: Customer Lifetime Value (LTV). This tells you how much profit a single customer is worth to you over their entire relationship with your brand. Once you know this, everything changes.
Let's walk through a simplified calculation:
- Average Order Value (AOV): What's the average amount a customer spends in a single transaction? (e.g., £70)
- Purchase Frequency (per year): How many times does an average customer buy from you in a year? (e.g., 2.5 times)
- Customer Lifetime (in years): How long does the average customer stick with you? (e.g., 2 years)
- Gross Margin %: What's your profit margin after the cost of goods is taken out? (e.g., 60%)
The calculation is:
LTV = (AOV * Purchase Frequency * Customer Lifetime) * Gross Margin %
Using our example numbers:
LTV = (£70 * 2.5 * 2) * 0.60
LTV = £350 * 0.60 = £210
This means every new customer you acquire is worth £210 in pure profit to your business. Now we can talk about your Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC). A healthy business model aims for an LTV:CAC ratio of at least 3:1. This means you can afford to spend up to £70 (£210 / 3) to acquire a single new customer and still have a fantastic, scalable business.
Suddenly, that £25 cost per purchase you were worrying about doesn't seem so bad, does it? It looks like a bargain! This is the maths that unlocks scale. When you know your numbers this well, you can confidently pour money into ads, knowing you're printing money on the back end. An agency's first job is to help you understand these unit economics, because without them, you're just guessing.
Use the calculator below to get a rough idea of your own numbers.
Estimated Customer Lifetime Value (LTV)
Recommended Max Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC)
(for a 3:1 LTV:CAC Ratio)
So, when *does* it actually make sense to outsource?
This brings us to your final, and most important, question. At $900/month, are you too small?
Tbh, for most full-service agencies, yes. The fees would likely eat up too much of your total budget. However, that doesn't mean you can't benefit from expert help. The real question isn't about budget size, but about readiness. It makes sense to outsource when:
- You have proven Product-Market Fit: You have a product that people genuinely want, and you're getting consistent organic sales and positive feedback. An agency is there to amplify what's already working; we can't fix a product nobody wants to buy.
- You have a 'Control' Offer: You have a baseline understanding of what offer converts. You know your best-selling product, you have a price point that works, and you have some ad creative that has shown promise, even if its not perfect. We need a starting point to improve upon.
- You are the Bottleneck: The single biggest reason to hire an expert is when YOU have become the bottleneck to your own growth. You're spending so much time tinkering in Ads Manager that you're neglecting product development, customer service, and overall business strategy. Your time is better spent being the CEO, not a junior media buyer.
- You're Ready to Invest in Scale: You understand the LTV:CAC maths we just went through, and you have the cashflow and confidence to significantly increase your ad spend once a profitable system is proven. The real value of an agency isn't just optimising a $900 budget; it's building a system that can profitably spend $9,000, and then $90,000 per month.
At your stage, you're likely still proving points 1 and 2. My honest advice would be to focus on that first. Use the principles I've outlined—the full-funnel approach, defining the customer nightmare, crafting better messages—to improve your own results. Nail the fundamentals. Then, when you've hit a ceiling and you know you're leaving money on the table, that's the perfect time to bring in a professional to take you to the next level.
The difference between a DIY approach and a professional one can be stark, as you can see below.
I've detailed my main recommendations for you below:
| Area of Focus | Typical DIY Approach | Professional Approach (What we'd do) |
|---|---|---|
| Campaign Structure | One or two sales campaigns targeting cold interests. Maybe a separate retargeting ad set. | A full-funnel structure (ToFu, MoFu, BoFu) with seperate campaigns and budgets for prospecting, nurturing, and retargeting to guide users systematically towards a purchase. |
| Audience Targeting | Guessing broad interests based on demographics (e.g., "yoga", "dresses"). | Starts with a deep ICP analysis based on pain points. Targets niche interests, competitor audiences, and builds a prioritised stack of lookalike audiences from high-intent actions (purchasers, initiated checkouts). |
| Creative & Copy | Product-focused images and copy. "Buy our new dress, it's great". | Uses copywriting frameworks (e.g., Before-After-Bridge) to focus on customer transformation. Systematically tests dozens of ad angles, formats (video, carousel, UGC), and headlines. |
| Measurement | Focuses on surface-level metrics like ROAS or Cost Per Purchase for that day. | Focuses on LTV:CAC ratio. Understands blended ROAS across the entire funnel and makes decisions based on long-term profitability, not short-term fluctuations. |
| Optimisation & Scaling | Reactively turns ads on/off based on daily performance. Increases budget on a whim and hopes it works. | Follows strict data-driven rules for optimisation (e.g., kill an ad after spending 1.5x target CPA with no sale). Scales horizontally (new audiences) and vertically (budget increases) in a controlled manner to maintain profitability. |
Getting these systems right from the start can be the difference between a store that struggles along and one that achieves explosive growth. It's not magic, it's just a rigorous process executed with discipline and expertise. Doing it wrong means a lot of wasted time and, more importantly, a lot of wasted money that you could be using to grow your business.
If you'd like a professional pair of eyes to look over your current campaigns and give you some specific, actionable advice on where your biggest opportunities are, we offer a completely free, no-obligation strategy session. We can jump on a quick call, share screens, and I can show you exactly what I'd do to improve your results. It's a great way to get a taste of the expertise we bring to the table.
Hope that helps give you some clarity!
Regards,
Team @ Lukas Holschuh
