I Almost Didn’t Reach Out to Courtney From Elevate Marketing Studios, Now We’re Partnering Up.

I almost didn’t reach out to her. I was scrolling Instagram when I found Courtney. She runs a marketing studio for contractors, builders, and trades pros, and she was killing it. Her work looked clean, her voice was clear, and her clients were exactly the people I wanted to be working with. My honest first thought was the ungenerous one: oh god, she’s already doing this, and she’s doing it better than me.

I wrote a post about that moment a few weeks later, because I think every founder has felt it. You build something you’re proud of, you find someone who looks like they’re doing the same thing, and you go straight to “my idea is crap.” Or worse, you decide they’re competition and start watching your back instead of picking up the phone.

I caught myself doing exactly that. Then I remembered the rule I keep repeating to my own clients: collaboration over competition. So I reached out. “Hey, we do similar things. Want to talk?”

We talked, and it turned out we don’t really do the same thing at all.

Two daughters of the trades

Courtney’s dad was a custom home builder, so she grew up on job sites. “I didn’t learn construction from the internet,” she told me. “I grew up around it.” My dad has been a painter for more than 30 years, and he still is. He’s been good at his work my whole life, and like a lot of trades pros, his business has always run on referrals. He never really had marketing. He didn’t need much of it in the 90s, and beyond that, nobody was building marketing made for someone like him. I think about him constantly when I do this work. If my dad had what I know now about marketing, he could have had even more success, not because he wasn’t capable, but because visibility changes the game. That’s why IMW exists. It turns out Courtney built Elevate Marketing Studios from the same place, just pointed at a different part of the problem.

What Courtney does, and what I do

Courtney builds the website. Her templates are made specifically for the trades, they come with clear training and as much hand-holding as a builder needs to actually launch, and most of her clients are live within five to seven days. They own the site from day one. There are no contracts, no hidden fees, and no agency renting them their own marketing.

I build the marketing engine that runs on top of that website. That means strategy, messaging, and lead generation. The Boost is the productized version of it. You give us about three hours, and you walk away with site copy, social posts, leave-behinds, and a positioning conversation that turns your work into words you can use everywhere. When you’re ready for an embedded team, that’s our Fractional CMO work.

So Courtney’s focus is the website itself. Mine is the content machine and the process behind it, which is the part no template can hand you, however good the template is.

So, which service is better for you?

Here’s what I love about how our two offerings line up. When a builder comes to us, you’re choosing what fits your business right now, not signing up for a fixed path. You have two real options. The DIY route is Courtney’s template, which you build yourself using her training and support. The done-for-you route is the Boost, which runs on that same template but puts our team on it alongside you so it gets finished fast. Both are complete solutions, and most builders pick the one that suits them and stay there. If you start with the template and later decide you want the Boost, that’s an easy move, since it’s the same foundation underneath. But it’s a choice you get to make, not a step you’re expected to take.

If you’re just starting out, working out of your truck, doing your own quoting and scheduling and squeezing in social media on the rare night you’re not wiped out, start with Courtney. Real photos, your face on the about page, one clear call to action, and you can have a website up by next Friday.

If you’ve been at this a while and already have a foundation, what you probably need is sharper messaging and a marketing system that runs without your daily input. That’s the Boost. You focus on validation marketing first and paid ads later, and you come away with something that works without you babysitting it.

And if what you need is an embedded marketing team, that’s our Fractional CMO work. We built a visual to make all of this easy to see at a glance

I almost talked myself out of that first message. I’m glad I didn’t. If you’re a builder trying to figure out where to start, find yourself on the path above and pick the option that fits where you are right now.

— Charlotte