Marry, hook up, or kill?
Every channel on your budget is in a relationship with you. Some deserve a ring, some are a fling you should stop calling a strategy, and some the math already buried. Six questions per channel settles which is which.
- Marry: commit budget and headcount for quarters
- Hook up: extract value, cap the spend, no promises
- Kill: stop paying for the funeral
channels on the table 6
questions per verdict 1
exec argument, settled
The three verdicts, translated
It compounds
Owned by someone senior, builds assets that appreciate, and the math improves with scale. Commit for quarters, staff it properly, stop flirting with alternatives.
It works, it won't grow old with you
Real value today, no compounding tomorrow. Keep it, cap it, and never let it into the long-term plan. The mistake isn't using it; it's proposing to it.
The math already decided
Unowned, unmeasured, or underwater on every dollar. Every month it survives costs the budget that a living channel deserves. Write the cause of death, reallocate, move on.
Fair questions
Isn't this a bit flippant for budget decisions?
The framing is playful; the rubric isn't. Ownership, compounding, marginal efficiency, and buyer fit are exactly what I test in paid engagements. The joke is the delivery mechanism for a conversation most teams keep postponing.
What if a channel gets "kill" but I know it works?
Then your answers and your conviction disagree, which is worth knowing. Re-answer with data open instead of memory. If it still says kill, the channel isn't working; the story about it is.
Can I run all nine channels?
Yes, and the statuses stack up on the board as you go. Most teams find their budget is married to a channel that graded "hook up" and ghosting one that deserved the ring.
What happens with my email?
You get the full autopsy report: your verdicts, the reasoning, and the reallocation sequence I'd run. One email, no drip.