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If marketing keeps sliding down your to do list, you’re not imagining it.
It’s not that you don’t know it matters. It’s that every time you look at your to do list, marketing is sitting there competing with things that feel far more immediate. Things with consequences if they don’t get done today.
So marketing becomes the thing you’ll “get to”. And somehow, there’s always a reason it doesn’t quite happen.
What makes this tricky is that marketing isn’t a one off task you can tick off and move on from. Marketing needs ongoing attention. Which feels wildly impractical when your days are already full.
In my last blog, Common marketing challenges and how to fix them, I talked about some of the most common marketing challenges for business owners, and why marketing so often falls down the list in the first place. This is the follow on to that conversation.
How do you actually prioritise marketing when you’re busy?
First, let’s start with understanding …
Why consistent marketing actually matters (and what it’s really doing)
One of the easiest ways to spot inconsistent marketing is how surprised people are when enquiries don’t magically appear.
And I don’t say that to be snarky. It’s just what happens when we forget how people actually make decisions.
Most people don’t go from never hearing of you to becoming a client in one neat step. There’s a whole journey in between. This is where the brand ramp (often talked about as a marketing funnel) comes in.
At the bottom of the ramp, people don’t know you at all. They’ve never heard of your business. You don’t exist in their world yet.
Then they start to become aware of you. They’ve heard your name somewhere. Seen a post. Maybe someone mentioned you. They still don’t really know what you do, but you’re no longer a stranger.
With consistency, they move into consideration. They understand what you offer. They can roughly explain what you do. And when they’re thinking about a problem you solve, your name starts popping into their head.
From there, preference builds. When the timing is right, you’re the one they’re leaning towards. Not because you shouted the loudest, but because you’re familiar and make sense to them.
And at the top of the ramp, they become a client. And if the experience is good, they become an advocate. They refer you. They talk about you. They come back.
Here’s the important bit.
Consistent marketing is what moves people up that ramp.
Not one post. Not one campaign. Not one busy burst of activity when things are quiet.
It’s the repeated exposure over time that shifts someone from “I’ve heard of them” to “they’re who I should talk to”.
For example, someone might follow you on Instagram months before they ever need your service. Or read a blog and think, “That makes sense,” then forget about it. Or see your name come up in a couple of different places and slowly connect the dots.
Then one day, something changes. A problem pops up. A decision needs to be made. And suddenly, you’re the obvious option.
That’s not luck. That’s consistency doing its job.
This is also why stop start marketing is so frustrating and one of the most common marketing challenges for business owners. Every time marketing drops off, you’re not just pausing activity. You’re slowing people’s progress up the ramp. And when you start again, you’re often picking up from further back than you realise.
Consistency doesn’t mean being everywhere or posting constantly. It means showing up often enough that people don’t forget you exist or have to re-learn who you are every time they see you.
Which brings us back to prioritising marketing when you’re busy.
Because marketing that’s set up to keep moving, even at a steady pace, will always outperform marketing that only shows up when you’re worried about leads.
And this is exactly why consistency matters. Not because it looks good on paper, but because it’s how people actually move from not knowing you to choosing you.
So, how do you become consistent with your marketing? Here are five ways:
1. Stop trying to prioritise everything
One of the biggest reasons marketing feels hard to prioritise is because it’s usually framed as a pile of tasks.
- Post this
- Update that
- Try this new thing
- Keep up with whatever the algorithm is doing this week
When marketing looks like a never ending list, it doesn’t stand a chance. There will always be something more urgent. Something with a clearer consequence if it doesn’t get done today.
A more useful approach is deciding what your marketing actually needs to do for you right now.
- Not what it could do if you had more time
- Not what everyone else seems to be doing
- Just what it needs to support at this point in your business
In 2026, prioritising your marketing matters more than ever. There are more platforms, more tools, more AI generated content, and more noise than there was even a year ago. Which means unfocused marketing doesn’t just feel messy, it actively wastes time.
For some businesses, marketing needs to keep them visible while work is busy so enquiries don’t dry up later. That might look like staying present on one platform where your ideal clients already spend time, rather than trying to be everywhere.
For others, it’s about making what they do clearer. Tightening up website messaging, updating service descriptions, or creating content that answers the same questions clients keep asking before they enquire. Not flashy, but incredibly effective.
And for many, marketing needs to smooth out the peaks and troughs. Less panic marketing when things slow down. Less scrambling for leads. More steady, predictable enquiry patterns.
Once you’re clear on that role, marketing becomes much easier to prioritise. Because you’re no longer trying to do all the marketing things. You’re choosing the few things that actually support your goal.
That’s also where decision making gets faster. You can look at a new idea, a new platform, or a new trend and quickly decide whether it helps or not. If it doesn’t support what marketing needs to do right now, it’s a no. Simple.
This is what turns marketing from something that constantly gets bumped down the list into something that actually earns its place there.
2. Make marketing smaller, not bigger
When time is tight, most people assume they need to do more marketing to make progress.
- More posts
- More platforms
- More effort packed into whatever gaps you can find
- More squirrels to chase, aka new shiny marketing things
Usually the opposite is true.
Marketing becomes easier to prioritise when it’s built to match your actual capacity. Not the imaginary version of you who has quiet weeks and endless energy, but the version of you who is running a business day in, day out.
In 2026, doing less marketing on purpose is often the smartest move you can make, especially if you’re dealing with the same common marketing challenges for business owners I see every day.
That might mean committing to one main channel instead of trying to keep up with three or four. Showing up properly in one place will almost always do more for your business than being half present everywhere.
It might mean reusing content in different ways rather than constantly starting from scratch. A blog can become social posts. A conversation you have with clients can become content. You don’t need new ideas every week, you need mileage out of the good ones.
It also means sticking with a small set of core messages.
- The things you want to be known for
- The problems you solve best
- The type of work you want more of
Constantly changing direction just makes marketing harder to maintain and harder for people to remember you.
Small, consistent actions still beat big bursts followed by long gaps.
Also, realistically, if you only have an hour a week for marketing, that’s okay. The goal isn’t to cram everything into that hour. It’s to use it on the things that actually move your ideal clients closer to choosing you, rather than keeping you busy for the sake of it.
3. Let your marketing do more of the work for you
Marketing is much easier to stick with when it’s not completely dependent on you remembering to do it.
If your marketing only exists when you sit down and consciously think, “Right, I need to do some marketing now”, it’s always going to feel hard. Because when you’re busy, that moment just doesn’t come around very often.
This is where marketing needs to start doing some of the work for you.
Take your website, for example. If someone lands on it in 2026 and still can’t quickly work out what you do, who you’re for, or whether you’re the right fit, your marketing has already created more work for you. You end up answering the same questions over and over instead of letting the site do that job once, properly.
Same goes for your messaging. Think about the questions you get asked all the time.
- “How does this work?”
- “Are you the right fit for us?”
- “Do you do X or Y?”
Those questions shouldn’t only be answered in emails and phone calls. They should be showing up in your content, your website copy, your socials. That way, by the time someone reaches out, they’re already half way there.
And content doesn’t need to be clever or new. Some of the best content comes straight out of your week. A conversation you had with a client. A common misunderstanding you had to clear up. Something you wish people understood before they contacted you.
When marketing is built around the real work you’re already doing, it stops feeling like an extra job. You’re not scrambling for ideas or starting from scratch every time. You’re just capturing and sharing what already exists.
This is also where consistency becomes easier. Not because you’re suddenly more motivated, but because marketing is no longer competing with the business. It’s woven into it.
Marketing should make your life easier, not give you another thing to feel guilty about.
4. Decide what you’re not going to do
This part matters more than most people realise.
One of the most useful things you can do for your marketing is decide what you’re not going to do.
This is the part almost no one talks about, but it’s usually where things start to feel manageable.
Because the reason marketing feels overwhelming for a lot of people isn’t that they’re doing nothing. It’s that they’re trying to do too much, badly, and feeling guilty about all of it.
- You don’t need to be on every platform
- You don’t need to jump on every new trend
- You don’t need to say yes to every marketing idea that crosses your path
For example, if your ideal clients are mostly finding you through referrals, Google, or existing networks, you don’t suddenly need to become a full time TikTok creator just because someone on the internet says you should. That’s not strategic. That’s distracting.
Or if LinkedIn is bringing you good conversations and enquiries, you don’t also need to be trying to keep Instagram, Facebook, email, and video all going at once. Pick the thing that’s working and do that properly.
Another common one I see is people constantly changing their messaging. One month it’s all about one service, the next month it’s something else, then suddenly they’re talking to a completely different audience. That makes marketing harder to maintain and harder for people to understand what you actually do.
Most marketing overwhelm isn’t caused by doing too little. It’s caused by trying to keep too many plates spinning at once.
Every extra platform, idea, or “we should probably be doing this too” adds weight. Not just time wise, but mentally. You’re constantly switching gears, second guessing, and feeling like you’re behind before you’ve even started.
Deciding what you’re not going to do is often the moment marketing gets easier.
Because once you stop trying to keep everything going, the few things you’ve chosen actually have room to work. They get more attention. They get done properly. And you stop feeling like marketing is this big unfinished job sitting in the background of your brain.
And yes, it can feel uncomfortable to say ‘no’ at first. Especially if you’re used to feeling like you should be doing more. But it works.
5. When it’s time to outsource your marketing
You know what needs to be done. You’ve got a decent handle on what matters and what doesn’t. The issue is that marketing still depends on you finding the time and headspace to make it happen.
And in 2026, that’s a big ask.
Between client work, staff, systems, admin, and the general running of a business, marketing is competing with a lot. Even when it’s important, it’s still the thing that gets pushed to “later”.
This is often where outsourcing starts to make sense. Not because you don’t understand marketing, and not because you’re giving up control, but because relying on spare time isn’t a strategy.
For example, you might know you should be showing up consistently, reviewing what’s working, and adjusting along the way. But instead, marketing happens in bursts. A few weeks of activity, then nothing. Then a scramble when enquiries slow.
Having a qualified marketing person responsible for making sure your marketing actually happens (shameless plug, like Starfish Marketing) changes that dynamic. The planning gets done. The follow through happens. Things are reviewed and adjusted without you needing to remember to do it (or worry about it).
Marketing keeps moving even when you’re flat out elsewhere. And, for a lot of people (eg, my clients), that’s what finally makes marketing feel manageable.
A more realistic way to think about it
If marketing keeps falling over, it’s usually not because you don’t know what to do.
It’s because it’s still relying on you to remember it, think about it, and squeeze it in between everything else. That works for a while and then it doesn’t.
Once marketing has a clear role and someone responsible for keeping it moving, it stops being this half-finished job in the back of your mind. It just… happens.
And that’s when marketing finally starts earning its keep.
If reading this felt a bit too familiar and you’re thinking, “I just want this sorted,” that’s exactly what I help with.
Working out what actually matters (your marketing strategy), then making sure your marketing happens consistently (your marketing actions).
If that sounds useful, let’s talk.
