This article is a multi-month experiment. It is regularly updated and supplemented with data.

At the beginning of the year, I realized I had completely abandoned promoting my services. Furthermore, business conditions in the country (taxes, blockages, internet quality) had significantly worsened, leading to a decline in my client base. So, I decided to systematically promote my services, do it regularly for several months, record and analyze the results to understand whether I'm making progress. By the way, my own services include website creation and maintenance, promotion and client acquisition, and content development (just so you know who I am).

I started writing this article one month after I started.

This month, I received 7 applications, spending a total of 151 rubles on promotion.

A strategy is built on hypotheses (actions) that either work or don't. Essentially, one hypothesis is the choice of a promotion channel and the method of interacting with it.

Promotion Channels in 2026 - Which Work and Which Don't?

1. Social Media. I publish text articles and short videos. Most often, the topic is the same in both, the only difference is the format - text + photo or video.

Reels on Instagram + repost on Facebook (+ another duplicate to a new Instagram account)
Shorts on YouTube
And videos on TikTok

Article on VK
Also on Telegram
And also in a special section for short news on the website.

Publications 3 times a week - Tuesday, Thursday, Sunday.

Sometimes I also post something in Stories in a live format. When inspired, I might post something in threads.

2. Useful and Hype Projects
They attract attention to me and can become new services for clients.

Messenger - I created a small anonymous messenger that can't be blocked and doesn't require any backdoors to access. The project is fun and creative for me.

Blog in 3 Days - I started working on creating a blog-style website that can be launched for a client in just 3 days. Imagine you're looking for a new source to promote your services and in a super short time, you have a fully functional website, where you can publish articles for your clients.

3. Avito + Olx
Classified sites are never a bad idea. The second service cost me 151 rubles.

4. SEO articles for the website - client pain points and training, experiments, ideas

5. Activity in Telegram groups

6. Facebook and VKontakte advertising - free and expands your audience

7. Statistics management to understand progress

8. Testing new platforms - Habr and vc.ru

9. Finding new hypotheses and testing them

10. Partnership - compiled a list of web studios and offered them a collaboration.

What else is important!
I've set the goals I'm working towards and chosen a duration – the first cutoff is at the end of May. That's about three months from the start. I want to see if my efforts are yielding results, and if so, then that means I'm on the right track and it makes sense to continue.

Progress - which promotion channels are working and which aren't in 2026?

February 25, 2026 - start date

March 29, 2026 - creation of this article
Observations: Views on short videos have started to increase, I think this is due to their quality and regularity. 7 applications in a month, while in the previous two there were zero. Views of text posts on VK have also started to increase. However, several people have unsubscribed from the Telegram channel. Traffic on the site has also dropped, and someone has also deployed bots, which are degrading SEO, but I'm combating them. I think it's competitors' work, triggered by my activity. Overall, their fear is a good sign for me. The other hypotheses are unclear, as there's not enough data.

I'll continue to publish new data and interesting incidents here.

. . .

Follow us on social media
Inst - @zvandrei
So I don't lose track of my experiments. And if you need help with promotion, please contact me:
innovative-business@mail.ru