No, I Don't Think You Should Stop Marketing Your Business

What's The Difference Between and Aha Site and Marketing Your Own Site?

I've spent a lot of time explaining what we're building with Aha Sites, and I know some of the questions that are going to come with it.

Why would I build someone else's website instead of my own?

Why wouldn't I just hire an SEO company?

What happens when a customer realizes this isn't my main website?

Isn't this just rank-and-rent?

Why wouldn't my internal marketing team just do this?

They're fair questions.

So let me start with probably the most important thing I can say about Aha:

I don't think you should stop investing in your own business. Seriously.

Build your brand.

Build your primary website.

Invest in your Google Business Profile.

Build reviews.

Create real content.

Film your people.

Develop your sales process.

Build your internal operations.

Track your customers.

Run advertising for your own brand.

Do SEO on your own website.

You should absolutely be doing those things.

Aha Sites isn't supposed to replace your companies existing marketing efforts.

It's supposed to give your company another way to expand.

Aha probably isn't for everyone.

If you're starting a service company tomorrow and don't have your phones figured out, don't know your margins, don't have anybody to answer inquiries, and don't have the operational capacity to take another 20 customers...

You probably don't need five Aha properties.

Build your business first.

The companies I'm really interested in working with tend to understand the economics of their market already.

They know approximately what a customer is worth.

They understand what they're willing to pay to acquire one.

They understand that a $50 lead for one service might be fantastic while a $50 lead for another might make absolutely no sense.

They've probably run Google Ads.

They've probably paid an SEO company.

They've probably had an agency tell them about impressions, clicks and rankings while they sat there thinking:

“Okay... but how much money did we actually make?”

Those are the people I built Aha for.

Because I've been on the other side of that table.

“But we already have a website.”

Good.

You should.

Aha isn't asking you to replace it.

Let's say you're a plumbing company operating across Chicagoland.

Your primary website is your company.

That's where your brand lives.

Your history.

Your reviews.

Your team.

Your careers.

Your full service offering.

Your story.

Keep building it.

But now let's say you decide:

“Water heater replacement is incredibly profitable for us, and we want more of those jobs in Geneva.”

That's a different question.

Now we're talking about acquiring market share for a specific service in a specific geography.

That's where an Aha property can come into the picture.

Your website doesn't disappear.

Your marketing department doesn't disappear.

Your brand doesn't disappear.

You've simply added another digital property capable of capturing demand in a market you care about.

“We have an in-house web developer.”

Awesome.

Keep them.

Aha isn't built around convincing you that nobody else knows how to make a website.

There are plenty of talented developers.

There are plenty of good SEO people.

There are plenty of good marketing departments.

What we're saying is:

This particular thing is our job.

We research these properties.

We acquire them.

We build them.

We structure them.

We maintain them.

We work on getting them found.

We test them.

We track them.

And increasingly, we're building technology and processes specifically around operating them as a portfolio.

Could your company recreate everything we're doing internally?

Probably.

The better question is:

Do you want to?

Because your team's time has a cost.

My job isn't to teach your company how to become Aha Sites.

My job is to make sure you have more opportunities sitting in your pipeline.

And at some point I have a pretty unsophisticated way of looking at that:

Who gives a shit how the sausage is made if it tastes good?

A customer is not thinking "I need my plumber to teach me how he replaces the water heater."

They're thinking, "I need hot water."

You don't necessarily need to become an expert in how we're developing and maintaining an entire portfolio of digital properties.

You need customers.

We're going to obsess over our part. You obsess over yours.

And the reverse is equally important.

“Okay, but won't consumers think it's weird?”

This was something I wondered about too.

So I tested it by running ads to one of our portfolio sites using my own money.

We got leads.

And what I've learned from years of running search campaigns and now from testing the Aha concept is that consumers searching for a service tend to be remarkably practical.

Someone has a broken water heater.

They go to Google.

They search.

They look at the top results.

They click something relevant.

They evaluate what they see.

They call or request information.

They're trying to solve a problem.

They're not conducting a forensic investigation into the corporate ownership structure of every domain in the search results.

That's especially true when someone is collecting estimates.

If your company is the exclusive provider behind an Aha property, we can clearly represent the provider relationship on the property, including using your branding where appropriate.

And if somebody asks?

Tell them.

“That's one of the websites we use to market this service.”

There's nothing particularly mysterious about it.

The important part is that we represent the relationship accurately and don't mislead someone about who will actually provide the service.

And this concept is much bigger than Aha.

Aha's particular structure is our own, but the broader idea of building digital properties and marketplaces that capture consumer demand and connect it with service providers is already well established.

Look at QuinStreet.

QuinStreet operates performance marketplaces across several high-value industries, including home services, insurance and financial services. The company describes its model as matching consumers who are researching products and services with relevant brands and providers.

Its Modernize Home Services business has operated across categories including roofing, HVAC, windows, solar, siding, bathrooms and kitchens. When QuinStreet acquired Modernize in 2020, it reported that the combined businesses had connected more than 3 million homeowners with home-service professionals during the preceding 12 months.

And in January 2026, QuinStreet completed its acquisition of HomeBuddy, another home-services demand-generation platform focused on connecting homeowners with service professionals.

Those aren't the same business model as Aha Sites.

But they demonstrate something important:

Consumers already use independently operated digital properties and marketplaces to find companies that can solve their problems.

We're approaching that opportunity differently.

So who is Aha actually for?

I think it's the company that already understands this conversation.

You don't need me to convince you that marketing matters.

You already know.

You don't need me to explain that Google Ads costs money.

You've probably spent plenty.

You don't need another SEO agency promising that they'll “10X your organic visibility” if you sign a 24-month agreement.

You've heard it.

You're looking at your market more strategically.

Maybe you want to enter another city.

Maybe you want to dominate one particularly profitable service.

Maybe you're acquiring another company and expanding the territory.

Maybe you already have great operations and simply need more demand.

Maybe your primary website is doing well, and you want another asset working alongside it.

Or maybe you look at our available properties and think:

“If you can get that thing producing opportunities in my market, I'll take them.”

That's who I want to work with.

You build your company. We'll build the property.

That's really the relationship.

Keep investing in your brand.

Keep building your own website.

Keep hiring good people.

Keep improving operations.

Keep doing the marketing that's already working.

Aha doesn't need to replace any of that.

We're another asset in the portfolio.

And if one property works?

Maybe we build another.

If that market works?

Maybe we expand to five surrounding cities.

If one service performs exceptionally well?

Maybe we build an entire Market Takeover around it.

And because we can layer Aha Tracking onto those properties, we can increasingly measure what actually happens after those opportunities enter your business.

That's ultimately how I want this relationship to work.

Not:

“Fire your marketing team and give us all your money.”

More like:

“You know your business. We know ours. Tell us where you want to grow.”

Then let's go build something there.