Internet marketing is no easy task. If your business is in need of a new digital marketing strategy, then you may be considering hiring outside help. What’s even more critical is that whatever agency you select is in tune with your in-house department so that there is a seamless cooperation among the two groups.
Many companies will turn to outside assistance when the in-house team has too much on its plate to meet certain deadlines or doesn’t have the appropriate skill or know-how to mount an upcoming campaign.
Bringing in a digital marketing firm to assist your business is also a great way to reduce your marketing department’s workload and provides a specialist’s outlook on a particular marketing strategy. But with so much riding on your company’s success, the marketing is not the place you want to skimp. Instead, you want to take the necessary precautions to hire the best firm out there.
So how does one go about doing just that? Not everyone knows what makes one firm better than another and we’re going to give you four specific factors you must consider before you make a commitment to the agency that you expect to deliver.
Perhaps the first, and most important, thing to ascertain is how well any digital marketing agency represents itself to the public. Before you even think of investigating their abilities further and asking what they can do for you, take a look at their placement in search engine rankings.
This is incredibly easy to do, simply do a search of the various digital marketing agencies in your area and check out the names that pop up. The firms you find on the first page are the only ones you want to explore, anything beyond that is an automatic pass.
Why? Because if the agency can’t get even get itself a high placement in the rankings, what makes you think they can do anything to boost your company’s visibility? The truth is, they can’t and they won’t.
So eliminate the names you find on page two and after.
Stick with your results on the first page, these agencies are a lot more likely to produce the kind of results you’re seeking for your business.
Go do your search. Now that you have the names of some firms, these are the major factors you want to keep in mind as you investigate further:
Set Your Goals
Everyone knows that the most effective method for achieving any objective is to decide on a game-plan for success. When it comes to your business’ marketing, you need to do some serious thinking about where you need to be and when you need to be there.
This is where internal planning becomes important and you need to call all of your departments together to start discussing what goals need to achieved. Adopting a long-term outlook will enable you and your personnel to develop a time-line for reaching your chosen marketing objectives.
Once you’ve created clear-cut goals and developed a road map for how to get there, you can start to determine how an outside digital marketing firm can be of service to your business. Knowing your goals means you can select just the right solutions for implementation of that game-plan by discussing it all with potential candidates.
Big or Small
The size of the firm you’re planning to hire isn’t important, as long as they can service your needs by going above and beyond the call of duty. That could take five people, it could take 50. Don’t be intimidated by a huge agency nor underestimate one that has only eight or nine people on staff.
Sure, you can find some advantages of hiring one over another – a smaller “boutique” agency may allow you to have more personal treatment with their project managers and their supervisors, while a larger firm may have a more well-rounded and highly experienced workforce that can take on more facets of a marketing campaign at once.
But only one or the other will benefit you if it can actually service the particular needs of your business.
Wealth of Experience
Speaking of experience, it too matters when you’re deciding on the right digital marketing agency. Although it’s not as critical as some of the other factors we’ve discussed, it does play an important role in your decision.
But where you should be pointing your attention isn’t so much the experience of the agency overall, it’s more vital to find out which agencies have the most experience in the kind of marketing campaign and the related services you require.
Ask for References
Lastly, hiring a digital marketing agency is no different than hiring any other type of service with regard to establishing the firm’s credibility and reliability. So find out the names and contact information of previous clients and speak directly to those companies who have worked with your prospective agencies in the past.
Sometimes the most useful information can be found from other clients who were seeking richmond seo services just like you.