Originally published 2/24/21 - Updated 1/4/23
Every big decision in life deserves careful consideration and hiring a marketing agency is no exception. You want to make sure that any agency you employ is highly qualified to handle your business. To ensure you are hiring only the best, here are some questions you should be asking during the interview process.
1. How Do They Measure Success?
This is a great way to start our interview question suggestions. You need to know how any marketing agency plans to quantify its results. What is considered a success to them? What are their goals, metrics, and/or benchmarks? What does this mean?
The ideal answer: While it might not be in these exact words, you want to hear something about sales and revenue here. After all, you aren’t partnering with a marketing agency to add to your Christmas card list, you want and deserve actual results.
2. What if Any Services Are Outsourced?
Don’t automatically assume outsourcing is negative. In some cases, it can be pretty beneficial if an agency simply doesn't have a particular area of expertise. However, critical components of your overall campaign should be handled under one roof by a team of people who are all on the same page and dedicated to the same goals you are. That provides all-important continuity and consistency in how your campaign is designed, managed, executed, and tracked.
The ideal answer: The agency outsources only ancillary components where they may not have the tools or expertise, but the core components of your campaign from concept to creation to outcomes are managed by one central dedicated team.
3. What is Your Industry Experience?
You want to know if a marketing agency you are considering has ever worked in your industry and completed successful marketing campaigns for other companies within your field. It is even better if they can show you evidence of actual tangible results.
The ideal answer: This is another tricky one. On one hand, it’s good to know an agency can handle a marketing campaign in your industry. On the other, what if they are already doing a marketing campaign for one of your direct competitors? That could get dicey, not to mention the uncomfortableness of potentially crossing paths with your rival at an agency-hosted get-together. The other possibility is an agency that specializes in only one industry - a detrimental approach that offers cookie-cutter solutions, not taking into consideration your particular business, market, goals, and target clientele. Your best bet is an adaptable agency that can generate results, regardless of the industry.
4. How Many People Are on Staff? How Big is Your Agency?
This isn’t Earth-shattering. After all, we all know companies that have several people doing a job that could easily be completed by one person. We also know companies that have one person doing several people’s worth of jobs. However, finding out how many full-time and part-time employees as well as contractors work for an agency is a good question. You also want to know who your point person is, and who you would be speaking with as you form a marketing strategy, launch it, and then monitor its progress.
The ideal answer: What you want to hear as an answer is really based on the size of your company and what you are hoping to accomplish. For example, if you have a small company, then partnering with a small marketing agency is fine. If you have a multimillion-dollar company, though, you probably want to make sure that any agency you trust with your advertising has enough boots on the ground to win the war. Keep in mind, though, even a small agency of highly-skilled employees can accomplish a great deal. Remember SEAL Team 6? Small in number, but great in ability.
At fuze32, we can answer all the above questions and more. We can’t promise to be all things to all people, but when it comes to advertising, we can be all things to you! Contact us today to learn more and don’t hesitate to go off-script. These prompts are just jumping-off points, we welcome any and all additional questions you can think of, even asking us about our favorite fast-food restaurant or the name of our dog, the sky’s the limit here!