Be excellent. Then be seen.

Kevin Hohe doesn't love marketing. He'll tell you so himself. And honestly, he made the best case against it we've heard.

"Every day that we focus on marketing is a day we don't focus on being an excellent company, but rather being seen as one."

Sit with that for a second. He's not wrong.

Kevin's warning

Kevin is a fence contractor and the founder of The Honest Builder. His worry is that technology lets some companies look better than they are. As he put it, "tech is almost allowing companies to outrun their headlights."

When asked what the trades should focus on, his answer was simple: "being esteemed professionals and doing what we say we're going to do."

We agree completely. If the work isn't right, no amount of marketing will save you. And it shouldn't.

Kevin's other lesson

But Kevin also told a story that every owner should hear. When Google took over, his company was late. "We were late. We did not get obsessed with Google, and we lost." He watched people with far less experience take the work. "I had people that had a tenth of the experience as we did. They were getting the leads."

That's the painful part. Being excellent and invisible doesn't protect you. Somebody worse at the work, but easier to find, will get the call.

So the answer isn't excellence or visibility. It's excellence, then visibility. In that order.

Splitting the work

Here's how we think about it. Some things only the owner can do, and some things the owner shouldn't have to do.

Our Growth Ladder says it plainly: "The owner's face, the room, the hiring, the hard decisions, and the choice of role stay with the owner at every tier. Nobody can do those for you and nobody should try."

What we build is everything that helps those things survive a busy week:

• The phone that never leaves a lead waiting
• The follow up that never forgets
• The review ask after every job
• The profile and website kept fresh with your real work
• The numbers on one page every Monday
• The playbook, so your crew knows what good looks like

You focus on being excellent. The back office makes sure people can see it.

Why we built Momentum this way

Momentum is the back office for home service businesses. A team in your corner, a playbook you can trust and every step tracked on one scorecard, so you can see exactly what's been done to grow your business and what's next.

We built it for owners like the ones Kevin stands up for. People who are great at their craft, who don't want to become marketers, and who are tired of watching less skilled companies take their calls.

How it should feel

There's a specific kind of frustration in being the best at something and watching someone else get the work. It feels unfair, because it is.

The fix isn't to stop caring about the craft. It's to stop carrying the being seen part by yourself. Do the work you're proud of. Let a team you trust make sure your town knows about it.

Find out which tier your business is on. Our free Growth Ladder assessment is twenty nine questions, about four minutes on your phone, and we'll tell you honestly, even if the answer is that you don't need us yet.

Written by AKFounder of Momentum. Former Executive Sales Coach Lead at Google.