Finding the most fit digital marketing agency for your business can really be a rough journey and sometimes put you on challenging moments where a simple decision can either make your project successful or not.
With an overwhelming process of identifying your needs, outsourcing notable agencies, and doubting your campaign outcomes, it can really be a handful of stressful responsibilities so an accurate battle plan can really lift off the burden.
The last thing we want to achieve is loss in assets, right? In order to prevent your campaign from being a failure, we have provided you with a complete guide as you dig deeper in understanding the efficient and influential role of digital marketing agencies in the success of your business – and the red flags to stay away from too.
So, let’s get to it!
What is a Digital Marketing Agency?
Digital marketing agencies are all-around modern service providers that utilize systematic strategies combined with analytical approach and the use of their newest tools in fulfilling their client’s demands or help them in expanding their brand’s presence online to achieve their marketing objectives.
With a team of well-trained professionals who will work on planning and creating your advertising campaigns online, you can expect quality assurance from every project because you are in good hands!
Their expertise in digital marketing will help you reach your target customers easily from several digital channels in order to attract new leads, build customer loyalty, and boost your sale through strategically executing their methods online.
Services of a Digital Marketing Agency
Every digital marketing agency has its own field of expertise which makes them unique from others and become a stand out among a competitive market especially if there is only a specific service that you want to avail. Here are some of the general services that digital marketing agencies offer to the public:
1. Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Optimizing your existing content for search engines or create new ones for SEO.
2. Search Engine Marketing (SEM)
Using paid advertisements to drive traffic from search engines.
3. Pay-Per-Click (PPC) Advertising
Increasing website traffic through paying a search engine for every click in your ad.
4. Content Marketing
Creating and publishing content to attract attention of a target audience and generate leads.
5. UXO or UX (User Experience Optimization)
Boosting your user experience to increase customer loyalty and satisfaction with your service.
6. Website Design and Development
Designing a website depending on your brand and existing trends in the industry.
7. Email Marketing
Promoting your products or services to potential customers through email.
8. Social Media Marketing (SMM)
Utilizing social media platforms with built-in data analytics to promote a product and track progress.
9. Video Marketing
Making videos to feature a specific brand and market its products or services.
10. Inbound Marketing
Strengthening customer relationships to attract specific new leads who can be converted into consumers rather than focusing on a larger audeince where majority have little to know interest at all to what you are selling.
How to Choose the Best Digital Marketing Agency for You
Finding the right digital marketing agency is not an easy thing to do because the success of your business is all on the line. It is important to look for an agency that is somehow related to your brand or familiar to what you are selling to have an efficient transaction because both parties can understand each other.
However, if you are still unsure about the most appropriate way of choosing the digital marketing agency that will surely help you fulfill your demands, here are some of the crucial factors that you need to consider:
1. Needed Service
Ask yourself first, “What service do I need and want for my business? Do I want to focus more on SEO?Do I need someone to track my analytics?”
It is highly important for you to already know what you are looking for even before outsourcing an agency because if not, you will only get lost in the void trying to understand everything all at once.
2. Agency Credibility & Expertise
As the client, you should never be afraid to test an agency’s capability to help you fulfill your business objectives.
Always ask for their plans, methods, or even tools being used because a legitimate marketing agency will never refuse to show their recent work and other proofs of their competencies.
3. Honesty & Transparency
Always go for the agencies that are very much willing to be scrutinized or open up about their background and previous projects rather than hiding some negative practices that they are utilizing.
Honesty is a vital element in working with agencies, we don’t want to work with someone who will only give us false guarantees right? Instead, choose an agency that will provide a clear vision of the campaign and marketing plan and will work with you hands-on.
4. Client Reviews & Case Studies
Agencies who don’t mention customer reviews on their websites should already be remove in your list of choices because these testimonials from previous clients will depict if they can be trusted with your business or not.
Case studies are also helpful tools in justifying an agency’s expertise wherein you can get to perceive their effective processes or methodologies that have helped other brands grow in its maximum potential that can work for your business too!
5. Skills & Industry Experience
Agency’s relevant experience in the same field as yours from previous clients is already a point in the board if you’re currently weighing all your choices.
Similarities in the background is beneficial for you because they already know what will works best for your business and what to prevent in order to boost its growth.
6. Budget
Ofcourse, budget is also an important factor. As a smart businessman, only look for services that are fit to your financial capability instead of exceeding your limit because profit is our target not additional loss in asset.
There are still other competent agencies that can give you same results or much better even for a lower price that will surely satisfy your budget – you only need to be smart in outsourcing.
7. Relationship Fit
As your marketing team’s extended component, always try to look for an marketing agency that will suit your business’ core values and goals. How?
Make sure to communicate with them well. Ask questions just like you’re having an interview in order to get to know them more and create a connection between the two parties to assess if you are fit to work with each other for a long-term.
Benefits of Hiring a Digital Marketing Agency
If you’re aiming for an increase in your leads and sales or simply expand your business, hiring a digital marketing agency is the right path to take where you can get to enjoy the following benefits that they can offer to you and your brand:
1. Cost-Effective
Having a team of digital marketers to work with you will help you decrease your advertising costs which is a lot cheaper than paying for full-time employees on your team especially if you need a variety of services and/or multiple strategies to market your business with people who are really interested online.
2. Be Updated with the Latest Trends
Being a standout in a fierce competition is challenging but still possible. Marketing agencies will allow you to keep track of latest trends among several digital channels for you to remain relevant and put you on the top of the digital sphere by doing all the research tasks needed. See? A load has already been lifted from your back.
3. Acquire New Insights
A fresher perspective will not harm your brand right? Marketing agencies can even provide you with modern techniques and tools in gaining essential information about your customers and executing your marketing campaigns more effectively without being biased to your business – something that might have prevented you from improving.
4. More Focus on your Business
Receiving expert guidance from a team of experts will give you so much time to focus on other important components of your business because you can already trust them in handling almost everything in the marketing field for you with their competitive expertise and experience.
5. Obtain Measurable Results
Are you having a hard time tracking your progress? Well, digital agencies can really be a helpful tool in determining your key performance indicators (KPIs) and analyzing your metrics to assess the effectiveness of your campaigns in line to your set marketing objectives.
Digital Marketing Agency vs Creative Advertising Agency
Both marketing and advertising agencies have the possibility to work together in a single project depending on your business demands and the goals that you want to achieve.
However, they still possess their own differences from the other that would make them distinct in the market such as their central focus in the marketing field.
Digital agencies focus more on establishing and executing an effective marketing strategy that will spread your brand to a targeted audience while creative agencies are more centered on brand design and building your identity to develop a visually appealing message for your business.
If you’re only looking for some help in graphic design or creating an updated logo for your business, creative agencies are the one to look for, but if you need a range of solutions such as in sales and marketing, digital agencies can surely offer a lot more with their strategic methods and technical approach.
In short, a digital marketing agency is already a complete package that can make your business success more reachable.
Top Digital Marketing Agency to Hire
There is a wide range of digital marketing agencies to choose from in the industry so make sure that you do your research before closing the deal because we don’t want to waste our time on unproductive services and regret after. Here are some of the leading marketing agencies that have marked their spot in the top:
1. Single Grain
As a digital marketing agency focusing on ROI, Single Grain is composed of marketing professionals that will help you obtain the growth that you’re looking for with their specialization in boosting businesses’ online visibility and increasing ranking on search engine through keyword research and SEO.
Single Grain also builds up its reputation in improving a business’ revenue online with the expert use of marketing strategies such as content marketing and pay-per-click.
Notable Clients: Amazon, Uber, Airbnb, Fujitsu, Alexa
2. WebFX
WebFX is an award-winning marketing agency that offers advanced search services with SEO and even core web vitals optimization to drive more organic traffic in a business’ website and boost CTR with an ROI-focused ad copy.
With their outstanding expertise in digital marketing and influence in helping over 750 clients worldwide, WebFX has been awarded the PromotionWorld Top Enterprise SEO Company Award & AVA Digital Award.
Notable Clients: Subway, Wrangler, Verizon, Hilton
3. Disruptive Advertising
Disruptive Advertising is one of the world’s leading creative agencies that specializes in video creation and motion ad designing as they have worked with various industries such as B2B, healthcare and education.
They also help brands in increasing their customer engagement and leads through paid search services and retargeting, including Google Ads and Bing Ads, which allows them to be recognized as one of the Best Paid Media Agencies.
Notable Clients: Davinci, Adobe, NASM
4. Thrive Internet Marketing Agency
Founded in 2015, Thrive Internet Marketing Agency is a full-suite advertising company that offers advanced services in digital marketing with their wide range of clients from United Kingdom to Hongkong to help them increase their active customers.
With their expertise in using content optimization tools like SurferSEO & Clearscope in increasing a brand’s online awareness and generate local SEO leads through their Google Business Profile, it became one of the Top Digital Marketing Agencies in 2021 and National Excellence 2021 Awardee.
5. TopSpot
With over 900 customers from several areas across the globe, TopSpot has paved its way to the top as a highly reputable Houston-based digital marketing agency that have served B2B and B2C companies with their expertise in conversion optimization and even driving organic traffic.
As the rightful recipient of the American Advertising Awards & BBB Awards of Excellence, TopSpot has been certified by Google and Bing in providing prominent PPC campaign optimization strategies to yield higher value leads to the client and in achieving fresh sales opportunities by keeping in track of the business’ onsite and offsite data.
Red Flags That You much watch out
Obviously not all marketing agencies are perfect and can really justify their name in the market nor fulfill their promises to clients simply because they still lack of sufficient expertise in the field or they are just not really worth your time.
Here are some of the signs that should already help you decide to retreat your transaction with them.
1. Promises of Immediate Results
We all know that marketing campaigns are long-term and will not succeed overnight so an immediate result is only a deception that agencies make to attract your attention – but smart leaders know better.
2. Lack of Detailed Marketing Plan
Will you trust your business to an agency who doesn’t want to disclose their plans and methods in fulfilling your goals? Well, clearly not because this is just a sign that their services are suspicious.
3. Lack of Face-To-Face Transaction
How can you make sure that you’re working with a credible marketing team if you haven’t seen them nor communicate with them in person about the marketing campaign even for once? Mostly, they are just misleading agencies and definitely not worthy of your trust.
4. Lack of Website
As simple as it may seems, the availability of an agency’s website speaks volume to its expertise and authority because it can already tell you so much about their values, backgrounds, and nature of work before even communicating with them.
5. Focus on Short-term Methods
Marketing agencies will focus more on sustainable strategies that will work for a long-term project so short-term methodologies cannot offer you the same exceptional outcomes that legit and reputable agencies can yield – think of it well!
How much is hiring Digital Marketing Agencies Charge?
Digital marketing agencies offer their own customer pricing depending on your desired business goals and still differ from one agency to another with regards to their reputation and variety of services provided.
Well technically, those who are the cream of the crop may charge higher than those who are still learning in the industry but it doesn’t mean that they are not capable enough to fulfill your objectives.
Majority of marketing agencies prefer a fixed monthly fee but there are still selected agencies that choose to employ an hourly structure with their fixed rate.
To give you an idea, digital marketing service providers usually charge between $1000 (Php 50000) to $5000+(Php 250000+) every month or $150 (Php 7500) to $300 (Php 15000) for an average hourly rate depending on your business goals and target KPIs.
Conclusion
Always remember that finding the perfect digital marketing agency is highly beneficial for your business in the long run.
Choose the agency that will not only meet your expectations and offer you a variety of excellent marketing services but will also proven their competence and fulfill their promises to achieve the business goals that you are aiming for.
Now that you have enough knowledge and guide in choosing the most suitable marketing agency for your business, it is now up to you and your budget, demands, goals to decide which one to work with and will really give you favorable outcomes in the future.
Whatever you choose, always go for the smart option because it can either make or break your business.
Goodluck on your next digital marketing venture!
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