I want to talk to you today about an old school misconception that many old school spreads have in their business and how it can cause damage to their income levels and how much they are able to earn each year. And that belief is I don't need to advertise. I don't need a website. I don't need to have any form of advertising whatsoever. I don't need to be online. I don't even need business cards. I don't need a sign written van. I don't need anything because if you're a good plasterer, and this is the belief, if you're a good plasterer, work will just naturally find you like magic. People will keep putting your name around. And you don't ever need to advertise. And many spreads will wear this as a sort of badge of honour. Like, I don't need to advertise because I'm competent. I'm good. You know, I'm seasoned. I've been in the game a long time. I don't need to advertise. They'll wear it as a badge of honour. Now, this works out okay, this mindset, if you're happy to earn a very low annual income. I've been that person for probably five years in the past, where I had a belief system that I didn't need to do any marketing whatsoever. And all I needed to do was rely on other people talking about me and passing my name around amongst each other. And that would be enough for 12 months of the year for an entire career of 40 years plus. And I won't need to do any kind of advertising because they'll do it for me. I maxed out my earnings pretty quick. And here's why. There's going to be many, many weeks during that 12 month period, right, where the phone won't ring and it will be quiet, especially over wintertime. And if you're just sat at home waiting for Mrs. Smith to recommend you and your business, your little plastering business to her friends at the bus stop or to her work colleagues or to her relatives. And you're just waiting for chance of a chance encounter that somebody you've done a job for will talk about you and say, oh, you's John, you know, he's great. That is basically like licking your finger and holding up to the wind and wishing and waiting for something to happen. It's a passive approach to your business and to your income. When you get to the stage where you have to meet a high income, you ain't got a choice. So you might be in a position where you've took on staff members and now you have to pay them, give them wages. You might be in a position where your wife has said, listen, we need more from you. We need more money. We haven't got enough money coming in. You might be in a position where 25 or 30 grand isn't going to, you know, meet that criteria for you personally, for whatever reasons. You might want more for yourself. Now, I'm not trying to suggest that's a bad thing if you're happy at that money. When I was young, I was happy with that money. But the problem is, as life moves on, as the pressures increase, as the responsibilities grow, as your business may grow and evolve, or you just might want more, you know, from life and the numbers don't cut it anymore, then having this philosophy of I don't need to advertise is where it all goes to shit. And if we look at like Coca-Cola, McDonald's, some of the biggest multi-billion pound companies in the world, that I've been going for decades and decades, if this were true, that companies that are successful and good don't need to advertise, then why do these companies still spend millions and millions of pounds on advertising their business online every single or on media every single day, if that were true? And the truth of it is, if you are not visible, then you're not relevant, then you're not in people's minds. They say out of sight, out of mind. And that's the truth. If no one is finding you when they're searching, they're going to find somebody else and they're going to get the jobs. And another thing to think about when it comes to advertising, if you ever wanted to change lanes in your business or you moved location, you added another skill set to your plastering business, like spray cork or Venetian or micro cement or external EWI, whatever it was, something that your existing customers don't know now that you're going to do, they don't know about it, right? Then how are you going to generate inquiries and job leads for new locations and new products if they don't even know that you live there? They don't even know that you do this product. So to have this attitude that I don't need to advertise, you're low balling. You're playing too small and it's not a sustainable way to move through life year on year, every single year in your plastering business, just waiting for the phone to ring. The truth of it is you've gotten lucky so far if the phone is wrong all year round, 12 months of the year based on just referrals. And another thing I'll say, and this is probably the topic of debate as well, is people will only refer you to their family and their friends if they think you're cheap. And I know that's a bit controversial thing to say, but unless you're working for wealthy people that have a high disposable income and are happy to splurge a bit on luxury items like Venetian plastering or IWI or high spec external render systems, they've got money there to splash. Unless they're mixing in them sort of circles where they're mixing with other high income earners and wealthy types of people, most people that will refer you, they refer you because you're cheap. And that can be a bitter pill to swallow sometimes. And again, I'm only talking from experience from myself when I used to rely only on word of mouth and not do any kind of targeted marketing. And that's the key word, guys, is targeted. When we advertise ourselves online, we're targeting a specific demographic, a specific type of job that is high profit. Line up our ducks over 12 months and think, how many jobs do I need to do in a 12-month period to earn X amount of money? Then we can reverse engineer it. If we're not doing any of this planning and strategising and we're just leaving it to chance and seeing what comes in, this can get extremely dangerous and dicey if you become a father and now your income is feeding your family and you're leaving that income to chance. It's too risky, guys. So I just wanted to talk about that today and challenge that philosophy and that mindset of I don't need to advertise because I'm good because work finds me. It's BS. You're going to be on a very low income throughout the rest of your career on a very particular type of job, like re-skims, for example. It means that you're only ever going to do re-skims for the rest of your career if you're being referred for re-skims. If you're doing floor screed and you're relying on word of mouth, then you're only ever going to be able to do floor screed for the rest of your career because that's all people know you for. If you only ever do sand and cement render and you're relying on just word of mouth, then you're only ever going to be able to do sand and cement render for the rest of your career because that's all people know you for. They don't know you do anything else. So it's food for thought. Have a think on it and let me know what your thoughts are in the comments. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.