Running a business, the most hated question I had from any marketing company was "What's your budget". Often these were one of the first words they ever said to me when they learned that my business was just starting, which for me was like being washed down with a bucket of dirty water, putting out any possible flame of engagement, and tainting the relationship immediately. Focused on what’s in it for them, the naïve business owner has no clue whatsoever in how to answer that question. To them, it’s like saying how much money have you got to the marketing company to gamble with, and potentially lose, with not even a hint of taking any ownership or responsibility for success from the marketing company. Put onto the back foot as somehow being financially accountable to this company, often implying to have the success of my company in their hands alone, I looked or life's certainties, and soon realised that most of marketing is far simpler, and much of what was being talked about to me was little more than smoke and mirrors. It also became clear to me that marketing appears to be the only business, other than perhaps a casino or other gambling establishment, where the expectation by marketing companies to be given potentially large sums of money is matched without the promise of any return. The challenge for any small business is to be known, and to create desire for their products. It is true that the 'art' of being seen is called marketing, yet I could not believe that there was not a 'science' too in how to turn a marketing investment into a tangible return.   So What Really is Marketing: Marketing is a combination of a wide variety of skills, consolidated into a selected range of effective strategies, implemented using a wide variety of technologies. It became clear that much of this can be done as a ‘formula’. What started as an investigation, soon evolved, creating a formula for short, medium and long term exposure and growth, for any company with a valued product or service, with the basis for tangible results.   Everyone Does Marketing: It's true. You can't go to a single networking event without a fair number of the attendees being 'in marketing'. With so many to choose from, how is a small business supposed to know the good ones? Do they pick on the most expensive, and hope that cost is a reflection of quality? Do they choose the cheapest one, hoping to reduce the marketing spend? Do they focus on someone who appears to understand their product, and maybe has past experience of something similar? What about selecting a business simply because you like the person. With my own long consulting track record, it is clear that anyone can brand themselves as expensive with no correlation whatsoever to their quality or results. The cheapest one could be a reflection of their level of desperation, which could mean eagerness to please and do a great job, or it could be a reflection of their lack of experience. Someone with past experience is unlikely to tell the full story of at what point they engaged with that company, and how successful it already was at that time, with a success years ago not necessarily having any connection to the probability of success today. Reputation seemed like a good reference point, yet it also occurred to me that any testimonials are going to be from companies who have attributed some of their success to the work of that marketing business. They may be friends. They may have taken over from one of the many 'bad' marketing companies that yielded no results and came it at the right time. They may have been a lucky 'right time-right place' situation. There had to be a better way to tell. It occurred to me that the answer of what was the best indicator to select was based on probability of success. But how could this be reasonably attained.