Our marketing spend is not working
Here is how to work out why.

The short answer

Most marketing that "does not work" is spend on a channel that cannot reach the buyer, measured in a way that cannot tell.

Two different failures produce the same complaint. The channel genuinely does not reach your buyer, in which case more budget makes it worse. Or it does and you cannot see it, in which case the spend is being judged by a measurement system that does not track the path your buyer actually takes.

Separating them is a measurement question first. If cost per acquisition cannot be computed by channel, no amount of creative or targeting work will settle the argument, and the budget will be allocated by whoever is most confident.

The second question is payback rather than volume. A channel that acquires expensively but pays back inside a quarter is fundable; one that acquires cheaply and pays back in three years is not, whatever the cost per lead says.

How to tell this is actually your problem

These three together are the signature. One on its own usually points somewhere else.

✓ Cost per acquisition cannot be stated by channel
✓ Spend is defended by impressions, clicks or leads rather than by customers
✓ The best-performing channel changes depending on who reports it

The move that usually makes it worse. Optimising creative and targeting before fixing measurement, which produces a year of confident decisions on unreliable numbers.

Who this is not for

Percision is the wrong tool if you already know the answer and only need execution capacity, or if the business is pre-revenue — then the constraint is evidence about the market, not analysis of your own figures. Percision is not a lawyer, tax advisor, auditor, licensed appraiser, clinical or regulatory filer, or an AI implementation shop. It does not do HR casework, creative-only brand work, or impersonate a named consulting firm. It is a strategy analysis engine — not a template library. Also wrong if you need facilitation, politics, or someone to sit with a lender or buyer. Those are human jobs.

Percision is not a lawyer, tax advisor, auditor, licensed appraiser, clinical or regulatory filer, or an AI implementation shop. It does not do HR casework, creative-only brand work, or impersonate a named consulting firm. It is a strategy analysis engine — not a template library.

What it looks like in your industry

The diagnosis changes with the shape of the business. Each of these works the same question through one industry's actual economics, with an excerpt from a real analysis run on a company of that type.

What the engine does with this question

It routes to Go-to-Market & Commercial Strategy (catalog id t9), one of 29 engagements. The output is a sequence with a stopping rule — which move first, what it funds next, and the observation that would say it is not working — rather than a list of things you could consider.

Read a complete report before deciding whether it is worth your time.

Published sample run

The figures an engine can cite for this question come from a completed run on Aldergate Partners, a sample profile (professional services, $88M revenue, 310 people), not a customer. Several industry variants currently republish the same excerpt — they are not different datasets.

Addressable proof excerpt — $85K diagnostic → $410K implementation, 25% of diagnostic-eligible opportunities diverted to T&M, $700K / 3.4× / NPV $2.4M, kill criteria as published.

Questions people ask about this

What is a good customer acquisition cost?

The only meaningful test is against lifetime value and payback period, both of which are business-specific. A cost that is excellent in one model is ruinous in another with the same revenue.

How long before I judge a channel?

Long enough to cover your sales cycle plus one payback period, and no longer. Judging early kills channels that work slowly; judging late funds channels that never will.

Should I cut marketing when cash is tight?

Cut the channels you cannot measure first — that is where the risk is concentrated. Cutting uniformly removes the channel that was working alongside the ones that were not.

When is Percision the wrong tool?

Percision is the wrong tool if you already know the answer and only need execution capacity, or if the business is pre-revenue — then the constraint is evidence about the market, not analysis of your own figures. Percision is not a lawyer, tax advisor, auditor, licensed appraiser, clinical or regulatory filer, or an AI implementation shop. It does not do HR casework, creative-only brand work, or impersonate a named consulting firm. It is a strategy analysis engine — not a template library. Also wrong if you need facilitation, politics, or someone to sit with a lender or buyer. Those are human jobs.

Does Percision replace a lawyer, tax advisor, auditor, or AI implementation team?

Percision is not a lawyer, tax advisor, auditor, licensed appraiser, clinical or regulatory filer, or an AI implementation shop. It does not do HR casework, creative-only brand work, or impersonate a named consulting firm. It is a strategy analysis engine — not a template library.