If you are an entrepreneur, you have probably spent more time than you would like to admit wondering why your marketing isn’t working. You are posting on social media, you are sending the emails, you are showing up to the networking events—but the sales just aren’t matching the effort. In Episode 118 of The Fully Expressed Podcast, we sat down with Mari Milenkovic, a serial entrepreneur and marketing strategist who has helped thousands of female founders grow their businesses. Mari is here to tell you the hard truth: You are probably doing it wrong, but it’s fixable.
The Myth of the “Silver Bullet”
We live in an era of “hacks” and “secrets.” We see successful entrepreneurs and assume that if we just copy their exact strategy, we will get their exact results. But as Mari explains, marketing is iterative. It stacks on itself. When you see someone have a massive launch, you aren’t seeing the years of building blocks that came before it. You are seeing the switch flip, not the wiring being laid.
Mari emphasizes that there is no “one-size-fits-all” in marketing. What works for a massive brand with millions in ad spend will not work for a founder who is “marketing in the middle”—too big to DIY, but too small for a CMO. You cannot market like Coca-Cola when you are a team of one (or five). You have to market like you.
Flipping the Funnel: A Radical Approach
Most of us build our marketing strategies from the top down: Get more eyeballs, get more leads, hope they buy. Mari suggests flipping the funnel completely. Instead of obsessing over visibility (the top of the funnel), start at the bottom: Retention.
- Retention: Do you have product-market fit? Are people coming back for more? If not, no amount of Instagram followers will save you.
- Sales: Are people actually converting when they get to your offer? If your close rate is low, you have a sales problem, not a visibility problem.
- Nurture: Are you building trust? Remember, less than 2% of people buy on the first touchpoint. You need 8-12 touchpoints to convert a warm lead.
By fixing the bottlenecks at the bottom of the funnel first, you ensure that when you do turn on the visibility hose, you aren’t just pouring water into a leaky bucket.
Designing a Business That Supports Your Life
One of the most refreshing parts of this conversation was Mari’s insistence on building a business that aligns with your life. After living as a nomad for four years and selling her first business, Her Brand & Co., Mari realized that she craved depth over breadth. She restructured her entire business model for 2026 to serve fewer clients more deeply because the old way wasn’t sustainable for her energy.
This is a permission slip for every founder listening: You are allowed to change your mind. You are allowed to pivot. You are allowed to build a marketing strategy that doesn’t require you to be on social media if it drains your soul (Mari built her second business for 10 months completely off social media!).
The Bottom Line
Marketing isn’t about tricking people into buying from you. It’s about building a relationship. It’s about understanding your customer so deeply that you can serve them exactly what they need. And most importantly, it’s about building a system that allows you to show up as your fully expressed self—quirks and all.
Listen to the full episode now to learn how to flip your funnel and finally make your marketing work for you.
Listen to Episode #118: Building a Marketing Strategy That Actually Aligns with Mari Milenkovic
