As a small or medium-sized business, you need effective marketing to grow your business and achieve your goals.
A majority of small business owners are responsible for more than one function in the organization. They will be in charge of operations, finances, marketing, product development, and human resources, which means there is no time to focus on quality marketing.
This is why you need to work with a qualified marketing agency to ensure your marketing tasks are done faster and efficiently.
What do marketing agencies do?
A marketing agency is a third party responsible for research, analysis, strategy, and promotion of a brand.
There are thousands of marketing agencies that exist to help businesses reach their target audience and achieve their goals. These agencies help companies to create marketing strategies and campaigns, implement marketing plans, and manage all the marketing needs of a business.
They will place your products or services squarely in front of your target audience.
Marketing agencies work hand in hand with a business to develop the best marketing approach. The agencies have a customer-centric perspective that allows them to design an effective marketing campaign to meet the set goals.
At the same time, the agencies work independently from their clients, which enables them to focus on the target audience when implementing marketing campaigns.
The agencies engage in several multi-channel campaigns to reach wider audiences. They specialize in tailoring services and packages for businesses depending on the budget and the business goals.
Some of the services offered by a marketing agency include branding and design, email marketing, product packaging, influencer marketing, search engine optimization, digital advertising and media planning.
When you trust the agency to take care of your marketing needs, you will benefit from increased brand loyalty, increased revenue, and sales.
Why you need to hire a marketing agency instead of a marketing employee
Now that you know what a marketing agency does, you need to determine when to hire an external marketing agency.
Business owners have two choices when setting up a marketing team. You either use an in-house marketing team or hire an external marketing agency.
While some businesses can successfully manage marketing by themselves, there are times when relying on in-house staff is not enough.
A business can choose to hire an external marketing agency based on a variety of factors and signs. Here are some of the signs to look out for:
When nothing gets done
You need an external marketing agency when essential functions in the organization are not getting done. If your business is falling behind its marketing efforts and not delivering according to your expectations, it is a sign to hire the services of a marketing agency to switch things up. The agencies are skilled specialists who can get on the job quickly and ensure operations are running smoothly.
When sales and growth are stagnating
If your business is stalling with stagnation in sales and growth, hire a marketing agency to help you get enough qualified leads.
A digital marketing agency can offer a fresh perspective to your services from a customer's point of view. They will create a relevant and dynamic campaign that represents your mission and values while speaking to your ideal customers. The agency can improve landing pages, come up with custom strategy and leverage key data points to increase your sales and growth.
When you need to reach the next level
If your business has been registering growth and is showing growth potential, it is natural to consider a marketing expert to take you to the next level. Getting the services of a marketing agency can propel your businesses to new heights by offering the technology and skills to reach your target audience.
The digital marketing agency will bring insights into the marketing campaign, identify key performance indicators, and measure the progress of a campaign.
When an existing internal team is tapped out
When your team of employees starts to show signs of burnout, it is a sign to hire an external marketing agency.
In most cases, marketing activities can be time-consuming even for your best employees. Since your employees will have to juggle between marketing and other internal operations, they may get burnt out doing everything manually. You need a marketing agency to provide their resources and technology to the marketing campaign for maximum benefits.
When you need a marketing shakeup
Your business may have a marketing plan but fails to get the desired results. If you find yourself in such circumstances, it is better to work with an experienced marketing agency to help you get the results. The agency can provide their skills and experience needed to shake up your marketing needs and set you on track. It can also guide you to an advantage over your competitors in the market.
Benefits of having a marketing agency
There are benefits of hiring an external marketing agency as opposed to training internal employees for the job. Managing your marketing campaigns can be time-consuming and highly costly, considering the costs of hiring and training your employees.
When you work with an agency partner, you allow them the responsibility of handling all the marketing campaigns. This means you don't fiddle with the technical aspects of marketing technologies that help save time. Here are the many reasons to work with a marketing agency. Here are a few:
Access to experts
Working with a marketing agency allows you access to a team of experts who live and breathe the marketing world.
The reality is that marketing efforts are better handled by experts. They have the experience and skills to manage your marketing campaign effectively. It's important you trust experts versus entry level employees and friends if you truly want to push your brand forward.
A full-service marketing firm offers real-time monitoring of the marketing campaign that is necessary to your success. Since the agency is committed to their area of expertise, they will provide regular updates on the performance of a marketing campaign while making timely adjustments needed for optimal results.
You get more than marketing expertise
An external marketing firm offers more than marketing expertise to elevate your campaigns. When you hire the agency, you get access to several professionals such as graphic designers, social media experts, web design professionals, and SEO experts.
All marketing agencies have a skilled pool of specialists who will handle all of your marketing needs, including promotional strategy and campaigns. The company will step in to help provide continuity to brand messages and help during times of peak demand.
You get access to the latest technology
An external marketing agency allows access to the latest technology and marketing tools that can be expensive to acquire if you don't have resources. The agents are always on the leading edge of technology that targets the right customers and offers.
They will provide technology such as lead generation tools to help track your leads. At the same time, the agency can provide the technology needed to automate your market activities. Working with an external agency helps businesses avoid the cost of technology while still gaining the benefits.
Increases the efficiency of your existing staff
When you hire an external marketing agency, you allow your existing staff to be more efficient by reducing burnout. The third-party option allows you to divide labor where your employees handle the projects they excel and the agency handles other projects.
It is this division of labor that can help your staff be more efficient in the business. The agency offers fresh perspectives and ideas that an in-house team lacks while allowing you to concentrate on other functions.
In the end, it will enable your employees to focus their energy on their vital areas such as product development.
Cheaper than hiring and training in-house employees
When you hire a marketing agency for your campaigns, you save time and money paying for the time and expertise only.
The best thing about an external marketing agency is that you don't need to offer in-house training. An agency has skilled staff already who have the expertise and training required to complete the job. Hence, it is cost-effective for smaller businesses to hire professional services than train their employees. In-house staff can eat up your marketing budget through training and monthly salaries.
Signs you are overpaying for a marketing agency
When hiring a marketing agency, there is a risk of overpaying for the services without getting a return on investment. If the marketing agency makes you feel out of place with the language they use, then you are not getting value for your money.
You may need to change your marketing agency if you are not getting your money's worth. Here are the signs you are overpaying for the agency:
When the agency has implemented a flawed strategy
You may be overpaying for a marketing agency if it implements a flawed strategy that doesn't align with your ultimate business goals. At the same time, an agency that fails to produce content on a regular basis may not be right for your business.
The key to successful inbound marketing campaigns is consistent quality content. Agencies may fail to produce consistent content due to lack of industry knowledge and expertise. As a result, you need to change the agency to avoid overpaying them.
When you get in touch with the agency
You may need to switch a marketing agency when communication issues develop. A marketing agency can only implement and execute inbound marketing campaigns if there is an open line of communication.
There should be a balance of the relationship between your business and the marketing agency. If there is a disconnect through unproductive phone calls, delayed response to emails, or poor project scope alignment, then you need to reconsider the relationship.
When you don't receive the results promised
A marketing agency that fails to deliver on its promises doesn't deserve a second chance. It may be illogical to continue paying an organization that is not driving the results as promised. In most cases, such companies may not be generating qualified leads, website traffic, or revenue as agreed in the contract.
How marketing agencies can prove ROI
Showing ROI of the service offering is the most important thing for marketing agencies.
The best way to show ROI for a marketing agency is with an increase in company revenue, sales conversions, and brand awareness. You should be able to calculate the exact revenue increase to determine the average ROI and ensure you get the best possible value for your money. At the same time, you can prove ROI by showing the lead quality, lead detail, and lead value numbers from the marketing campaign.
Every business has goals it aims to achieve at the end of the day. An experienced marketing agency can help a business achieve these goals and add value to a startup by focusing on what is scalable. For example, if your marketing goal was to improve the profit twice more than what you spend on marketing, the ROI will be measured by how well you achieved the goal. Any profit less than the projected annual profit could lead to loss of business.
Good marketing agencies have access to tools that allow them to track the success of your campaigns. They can easily see the value in marketing metrics and actual sales based on the marketing campaign.
One way Agency Jet helps their clients is by recording every single virtual meeting. This means that you have an insurance policy. In other words, if we say we're going to get results or complete tasks, we have to do them, no matter what.
The simplest way to prove marketing ROI is to connect the marketing to actual leads and demonstrate the number of leads gained from marketing. At the same time, a business can prove ROI based on the ability to qualify leads.
Marketers understand the challenges of providing ROI, but they should be honest with you about that.
The best agencies will work with a business to determine a way to measure the success of a marketing campaign and ensure it meets your expectations.
Early in the marketing campaign, the marketing agency should start to track the performance of your marketing efforts using a baseline metric. For example, the agency can base its projections on industry standards before it focuses on the individual data.
The way you measure and prove ROI varies depending on your business and unique goals. The marketing agency should prove ROI for consumer conversion, social media, brand perception, and image to help you measure the ROI. For example, you may track sales analytics and conversion rates based on the average cost per visitor. On social media, the ROI can be proved by the number of follower counts measured via each platform. Furthermore, you can analyze the overall impact the agency has on brand perception using consumer sentiment analysis.
In essence, proving ROI is not an easy task, but has been made possible by advancement in technology.
Today, technology can show the financial impact of a marketing campaign on business success. You can calculate the ROI using the level of sophistication in lead tracking, management, and reporting system. Hence, it all comes down to integrating the agency's technology with the client's analytics technology to help in proving ROI.
Bottom line
Continuing to handle your marketing efforts may not help your company achieve its overall goals. The marketing function can be costly and time-consuming for small businesses with limited resources.
This is why you need to get the services of an external marketing agency to complement your current marketing needs. If your company can train employees for an in-house marketing team, then it can be a good option. If not, you need to get the best marketing agency that is passionate, dependable and skilled.
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