Breaking news: I’m now certified in  Ads.

I spent the past two weeks studying keywords and search ads strategies.

I learned how to organize product pages, structure campaigns, pick the right keywords.

I invested time understanding how the conversion funnel actually works:

Impressions → Taps → Downloads → Conversion.

Also what each benchmark means, what good looks like.

But the whole time, something felt off.

There was this persistent feeling of not being productive. Like I wasn’t generating real value because I wasn’t producing code.

The Dopamine Problem

We, developers, get a high when coding.

We enter a flow state that feels good.

It has to do with our dopamine reward system: our brains love the anticipation of a task working. When you code, you get dopamine hits fast at every small iteration.

Compile. Run. Test. Fix. Repeat.

Hit after hit after hit. A fast feedback cycle.

But when you’re doing something equally important that you’re not skilled at?

It sucks.

You dread it. You’re slow. You don’t get the same high. And because you’ve associated the high with coding, you feel like you’re not being productive.

I felt like this the entire time I was launching my Search Ads campaigns.

I thought to myself: “I am just clicking buttons”.

But that is the work, whether it feels like it or not.

Relearning What Progress Feels Like

Developer, you need to relearn how to reward yourself for doing work that doesn’t involve writing code. Because it is work too.

It will also help you not to indulge in long sessions of polishing something that was not shipped.

The path in the journey of a Maker is learning to be bad at things and being okay with that. Getting used to learning curves that slow you down in the beginning.

The work still needs doing, whether you get in a flow state or not.

It helps to remind yourself: you’re still making progress.

Even when it doesn’t feel like it.

What’s Next

I have a new strategy for Search Ads that I started running yesterday.

If you want a guide on what I learned about that, leave a comment. I think I know enough now to create a playbook.

Let’s see what happens.

Leave a comment

— Thiago Ricieri

X.com @makingofamaker
Instagram @thgvr or @makingofamaker
Threads @thgvr or @makingofamaker
LinkedIn @thiagoricieri
Substack Making of a Maker written by @thgvr