Here’s a breakdown for choosing your digital marketing partner:
- Understand your marketing requirements
- Set your budget
- Find a digital marketing agency that aligns with your values
- Research an agency with the right experience, ability and skills to deliver what you need.
Digital marketing is a term that covers a wide range of different skills, platforms and services. For many organisations, outsourcing this work to a trusted supplier can be incredibly useful for saving time and money, and brings the benefit of instant expertise.
But how can we know which agency is the right fit?
Read this blog to find out!
What to consider when choosing a digital marketing agency
You have a website, and you’re looking to find an agency to support it and your organisation in your growth and future success.
The one-size-fits-all all approach no longer applies. Organisations often have their own ideas on what aspects of digital marketing work best for them, and what they’re willing to dedicate a budget to. Choosing the right agency to address the specific business needs is a must, and the cheapest, or most expensive, is not always the best option.
Feel free to ask us about our bespoke plans today and determine where to focus your marketing budget.
Although cost is one of the main factors when choosing the right agency, there are many factors to consider when finding a digital marketing partner that’s best for your business.
Here are some our clients have come across…
Can they deliver on digital marketing needs?
One of the most important factors when choosing a supplier for any job is whether they can actually do it. This is no different in digital marketing!
Some agencies may have specific focus services, or areas of expertise they can offer, this can include:
- IT Support
- Website Hosting
- Website Design and Development
- Social Media Management and Content Creation
- Google Ads Campaigns
- Email Marketing.
With each of these services, comes a list of best practices and guidelines to follow. Many agencies will have their own methods to bring to each task, but the most important thing for any organisation looking to trust others with these services, is the assurance that they will follow best practices and use current trends to deliver best results.
Honesty is essential for any agency. It’s important for organisations to trust their digital marketing partner. As we say, “You can trust us to do what we say we’ll do.”
Find out from previous clients
In an earlier blog on how to harness the power of cognitive bias to influence consumer behaviour, we talked about the benefits of social proof in showing the audience that you can be trusted to manage and address their goals and requirements.
In digital marketing, examples of good service like a Google review or social media testimonial are incredibly valuable to deliver that social proof. These not only show a brand’s credibility to human audiences but also tell Google the agency is highly regarded by real people, which in turn boosts ranking position in search engine results.
Other ways to build credibility and demonstrate authority are displaying accreditations and qualifications.
With any qualification, we’d always recommend checking the source. In this era of easy graphic design and artificial intelligence, looking at sources and confirming any accreditations is a straightforward way of ensuring the organisation you’re trusting with your digital marketing is credible and suitable for your brand.
Are they available to offer digital marketing help?
Have your customers ever spotted a problem on your website that needed fixing? Have you ever needed a website fix quickly, so as to not alert your audience or cause disruption in online sales?
Then you’ll benefit from a digital marketing agency that’s always there to help!
Being available as an agency is essential. Without it, clients are likely to feel lost at sea trying to work on their website, social media, or even Ad campaigns alone.
Our tip? Choose an agency that always has your back!
A good digital marketing agency will offer ongoing support and constant communication. This could include a ticketing system, like ours, which you can access via our website, where issues can be raised and resolved on time. It could also mean having a reliable point of contact to keep you informed during a project or campaign, to add security and reassurance that your needs are being noticed and met.
Having flexibility in how you keep in touch with an agency is also useful. This could include:
- Video conferencing tools such as Zoom or Microsoft Teams
- Email communication and email marketing promotions (Subscribe to ours here)
- Phone conversations
- Website live chat agents, check out this free one we added to a client’s website
If all these options are available, it’s easy to choose an agency offering regular support and guidance in your digital marketing tasks.
With these key considerations in mind, it’s time to reflect closely on your brand, and find the best fit.
Digital marketing that aligns with your values
Choosing the right digital marketing agency is more than finding someone to run Ads or edit your website content. It’s about finding a partner whose values align with your own.
Different agencies bring different values and approaches to digital marketing. For ongoing success, choosing a partner that matches your brand values is the way to build a long-lasting, productive relationship.
Ethical practices and data security
“Black hat” or underhand tactics in digital marketing are common across a range of platforms and their use can harm your reputation in the long term. For example, did you know that keyword stuffing can lead to search engine penalties?
When putting trust in a digital marketing agency to conduct a project or campaign, it’s important they adhere to ethical and sustainable practices that will help your business.
This includes tasks such as:
- Link building (We always recommend Google Business Profile optimisation as part of this process. Ask us about our GBP support plans)
- Content creation and social media management
- Keyword research through trusted sources
Do they adhere to the rules of UK GDPR?
All businesses based or operating from the UK are subject to UK GDPR, which outlines seven key principles for processing personal data:
- Lawfulness, fairness, and transparency
- Purpose limitation
- Data minimisation
- Accuracy
- Storage limitation
- Integrity and confidentiality
- Accountability.
These principles require personal data to be processed legally, used only for specified purposes, limited to necessary data, kept accurate and up to date, stored only as long as needed and secured against unauthorised access or loss. The ICO hold organisations to account with this legislation.
If you’re considering working with an agency for digital marketing, ask them how they store data and what information they’ll obtain from you. That way, you can rest assured you’ve chosen an agency that takes their responsibilities seriously and will keep you, and your business information safe.
Sustainable offerings that benefit your brand
If you’re a sustainable business using eco-friendly practices wherever possible, check that your digital marketing provider shares these values.
As shown in a recent article from Elementor on website design trends, sustainability, in particular, sustainable website design is a topic more customers value, and something more organisations have begun to pay attention to.
For this reason, it’s now more important to choose a partner agency that shares sustainable values and works to reduce the environmental impact of digital activities on the planet.
So, what will a sustainably conscious digital marketing agency offer your brand?
- Green hosting using renewable energy sources
- Carbon reduction plans for website content
- Optimisation of content, both image and text based.
And much more!
Find more information on Beech’s sustainability mission today. To check out our values, and if they align with yours, take a look at our website.
Digital marketing red flags to check for
Using the key considerations identified in this post, organisations can narrow down the extensive list of digital marketing agencies available and find one specific to their needs.
But with so many organisations and agencies to choose from, there’s also some red flags that may appear.
So, what else is there to watch out for when choosing the right agency?
- Too good to be true statistics and promises
- Like many things, not everything online is guaranteed. Websites and Google algorithms change and update several times a year, and strategies that may have hit the spot once can change rapidly. Agencies promising guaranteed top-spot rankings in Google, or unbelievable statistics may be too good to be true.
- Like many things, not everything online is guaranteed. Websites and Google algorithms change and update several times a year, and strategies that may have hit the spot once can change rapidly. Agencies promising guaranteed top-spot rankings in Google, or unbelievable statistics may be too good to be true.
- Unauthorised SEO that could harm more than help your business
- Black hat or underhand SEO includes tactics like keyword stuffing, using private link networks, duplicating content, sneaky redirects, and cloaking techniques on a website. All these once-favoured methods have proven to be more harmful than good for search engines and can even cause websites to be punished for using them. Ask agencies what SEO actions they’re taking on your behalf.
- Black hat or underhand SEO includes tactics like keyword stuffing, using private link networks, duplicating content, sneaky redirects, and cloaking techniques on a website. All these once-favoured methods have proven to be more harmful than good for search engines and can even cause websites to be punished for using them. Ask agencies what SEO actions they’re taking on your behalf.
- Lack of communication
- Website projects, social media promotions, and the likes of Ad campaigns all cost time and marketing budget. It’s important for any business that the agency they trust with such large-scale projects are regularly keeping effective, transparent communication and offering support, not disappearing when needed.
Choose a digital marketing agency you can trust
To summarise, there are many digital marketing agencies out there, and choosing the right one is essential for success. Consider what they can do, how they do it, and research the experiences of others in your shoes to ensure they can deliver on your requirements. Then, check an agency’s values, and whether they match up to your own business culture and standards. Keep an eye out for any potential red flags that could suggest an agency maybe isn’t the right fit for you.
We hope this blog helped find the right agency for your digital marketing!
For more information on our integrated digital marketing services at Beech, get in touch with us today.
