So you’re looking to engage a digital marketing agency. That’s great! A good one will certainly be worth their weight in gold. But here’s the thing. How are you supposed to tell the good ones from the not-so-good ones before you’ve already invested a chunk of money? How are you supposed to know what to ask a digital marketing agency in 2021?
Alas, many an agency will promise you the world. Some may even guarantee “number 1 ranking on Google” (by the way, if they do this then run a mile!). It’s up to YOU to make the choice on who to go with. But perhaps you don’t feel confident enough in your own knowledge to make an informed choice. There’s no doubt I’d feel the same if I had to make a decision on which car mechanic to choose. Hell, I have a hard enough time choosing a flavour of ice cream!
From a personal point of view, I’ll admit that I do have a slight axe to grind with the amount of charlatans or BS artists in our industry. Like many good and trustworthy digital agencies, we work damn hard for our clients at Vim Digital. We believe it is 100% imperative to be fully transparent and upfront from the off. You will know exactly how we carry out our work, the costs involved and the level of communication you can expect from us.
So here it is. We’ve put together five points on what to ask a digital marketing agency when initially talking to them. This will ensure you can feel confident and relaxed when you come to making your decision. After you’ve asked these, any agency would know that they’re dealing with someone who can’t be taken for a ride.
WHAT TO ASK A DIGITAL MARKETING AGENCY IN 2021
When speaking with and scoping out potential agencies, it would be very useful to ask them the following questions:
1. Will the person strategising and executing the work be based in Australia?
Often agencies use cheap offshore resources in places like India or the Philippines but charge you top Australian agency prices at the same time. We would strongly recommend that you avoid this. Those hired, third-party, offshore resources are not likely to be knowledgeable or experienced enough in the local market to successfully execute a campaign that connects with the audience. If you’re paying for onshore experts then that is what you should get.
2. Will I have direct access to the person responsible for undertaking the strategy and implementation?
In many cases you may not have direct access to the person doing the work – rather an ‘Account Manager’ or ‘Account Director’. This is not a problem if the Account Manager or Account Director understands fully what is involved. However, many Account Managers and Account Directors tend to be predominantly salespeople rather than technical or marketing experts.
3. How much experience does the person who will be doing the work have?
For example, if looking for PPC assistance you should seek to find out how many years of running PPC campaigns the person has. The last thing you want is a junior, as they could lose you money due to their inexperience in optimising and knowing how to get the best returns on campaigns. As this is going to be an important investment for you, you need to be confident that the person knows and is experienced in what they’re doing. Ask for examples of previous success stories for clients – SPECIFICALLY from the person who will be running your campaign.
4. What strategies and channels would they use and why?
Ask them to provide reasoning and rationale for their recommended approach. Some agencies will recommend things based on the fact it will make THEM money rather than what is best for you and your business.
5. How do they measure success?
Always ask the agency how they measure success of a campaign for a client. Ask if they can directly link sales, leads or registrations back to specific ads or searches and how would they achieve this? Is there an extra cost in setting-up any systems in order to do this?
- If so, who would set it up and are they an expert in this field?
- Have they done this before for other clients?
- Have they experienced problems when doing this before? If so, how did they troubleshoot and overcome them?
- How do they test to see if a reporting system is working and reporting accurately?
- What are their recommended conversion and view-through conversion windows for ads (and why)?
There you have it! ‘What to ask a digital marketing agency in 2021’. While not an extensive list, this should be enough to give you good insight to what kind of digital agency you’re talking to. Ultimately, you should feel confident and comfortable with the decision you end up making.
Our last piece of advice is to obviously talk to us here at Vim Digital.*
