What hits the card today (0 if none).
Ads, briefings, checking work, fire drills.
Status, feedback, asset chasing — not zero even with a good agency.
Placeholder range for operator tooling.
Judgment, creative direction, approvals — we don’t pretend zero.
If you keep humans for brains only.
—
—
Illustrative model for operators. Not accounting advice. Hybrid is often the adult answer.
What “smart” means here
- Separates invoice cost from your time cost.
- Models coordination load from stores × channels (not a flat guess only).
- Adjusts when the agency is strategy-heavy vs execution grunt.
- Shows three paths side by side + software price break-even vs full agency path.