The 30-minute check most agencies skip

By Eddie Cheng, founder of performance agency Penang Media and co-owner of global footwear brand VIBAe.

A founder got introduced to me last week. Wanted to run paid ads for a new product.

Before I took it further, I spent thirty minutes on a check that killed the project.

Here's the check. Anyone can run it.

Pull two keyword lists.

The first is the problem your customer has. Not your product. The problem. The thing they Google when they're frustrated.

The second is your actual product category. The thing they'd type if they already knew solutions like yours existed.

Look at the volume on both.

If the problem bucket is huge and the product bucket is tiny, don't celebrate yet. Click into the problem-bucket results and see what those searchers are actually being served.

In his case, every top result was a free tool from the customer's existing service provider. Those searchers weren't shopping. They were using something they already had.

Wrong intent. The volume was real. The demand was imaginary.

Then I ran the math on the product-category bucket. Right intent this time, but the search volume was small enough that even at unrealistic conversion rates, the numbers didn't pencil at his price point.

So the picture was: the problem is already owned by bigger players giving the solution away free, and the category itself is too small to support a paid channel.

That's not a paid ads problem. That's a go-to-market problem.

His real opportunity was a partnership with one of those bigger players. Different conversation entirely.

I told him no, here's what I'd actually do, come back when the picture shifts.

The check is simple. The discipline to run it before you sign anything is rare.

Most agencies skip it because the incentive is to sign the retainer. Most founders skip it because a meeting that went well feels like enough.

Nobody runs the diagnostic upfront because it's unsexy. There's no deck. No kickoff call. Just thirty minutes of checking whether the thing you're about to fund is even pointed in the right direction.

It's the cheapest insurance in the business. Almost nobody buys it.

—Eddie