Using google adwords to target them.

Adwords is a different story.Buy Rick some business cards and flyers to post on doors, you supply the materials and the unique phone tracking and URL, he does all the leg work.

I've done some work for a local investor and it seems very hard to compete without AdWords.

Some simple tasks include:Logo/Image Resizing - Adwords - Analytics - On/Off-Site SEO - Small Video Editing (transcript words under video)Help, Please. 

I mean a select few of adwords nerds clients are "happy".

SEO, PPC, Adwords are great for my other businesses selling consumer products but I definitely think they worked better when this whole investing bubble started 2009-2014.  

Google Adwords tighten it up with your keywords - and you can compete with the big boys even with only $500-$1,000 a mo.

Thanks @Landon Bates:I think people get frustrated because they see Adwords and FB/Instagram/Snap all as the same thing (PPC), since they compete for our same ad dollars.

I'd have to either buy ad-words or PPC or write my own posts for SEO purposes right?  

Good luck. ps. the one thing people do that seems to be a money pit in the beginning is google ad words, if you know you can pay 20$ for a good lead its ok but first you have to have a good page ( i know a great way to build one).