As the owner or marketing leader in a small to mid-sized company, you’ve most likely attempted to utilize different marketing tactics to improve your company’s bottom line and increase revenue. While you’ve probably seen some success, it hasn’t come without its fair share of headaches and frustrations. Perhaps you’ve reached a breaking point and decided it’s time to bring someone else in to take some of the weight off your shoulders and add a fresh perspective to your efforts. The problem is you aren’t exactly sure who you should turn to for help. You’re not alone; many businesses are faced with this dilemma! Here’s the good news: when it comes to navigating digital marketing, a marketing agency or consultant may be just the right answer to your organization’s marketing problem.
What is a Marketing Agency?
A marketing agency works with clients to develop and implement a variety of marketing strategies and campaigns. Typically, marketing agencies are equipped to take on quite a bit. Some are highly focused on a specific segment of marketing, while others offer a wide range of services. For example, a digital marketing agency focuses specifically on digital marketing strategies such as search engine optimization (SEO). Digital marketing agencies have a wide range of tools and tactics to increase brand visibility, advance rankings in search engine results pages (SERPs), bolster website traffic, and more. Other marketing agencies may provide more traditional forms of marketing, such as direct mail, billboard placements, and television/radio commercials. Some common marketing agency services include:
- Brand development
- Social media marketing
- Content marketing
- Email marketing
- Search engine optimization
- Search engine marketing
- Website hosting and development
- Analytics and monitoring
- Media relations
- Crisis communications
- Video creation and editing
- Graphic design
Due to an agency’s specialized nature, they tend to be more focused on campaigns and particular projects. When you hire a marketing agency, you’re usually getting more group thinking and less individualized attention. Depending on the size of the agency you’re working with, you may have as many as ten people working on your account simultaneously.
What is a Marketing Consultant?
A marketing consultant is a marketing specialist who works with companies to examine their current marketing campaign and help create adjustments or develop new marketing strategies. They may be independent professionals or part of a marketing consultant firm. A marketing consultant mainly aims to offer strategic advice on improving an organization’s marketing efforts. Companies can turn to a marketing consultant for many reasons. For instance, a simple project may need to be done quickly and efficiently, or a company may need assistance establishing a long-term vision supporting brand values.
What is the Main Difference Between an Agency vs Consultancy?
Marketing agencies and consultants differ in one crucial way. Marketing consultants operate more on a macro level. They focus on designing a marketing strategy to support, improve, and propel the brand’s messaging and core values. You can think of them as the masterminds behind an organization’s marketing efforts, tasked with solving a business’s challenges. Marketing agencies are there to help a brand realize its marketing vision. Their job is to implement and support the design of the marketing consultant. Whether creating content, designing a website, conducting cold email outreach, or more, marketing agencies are tasked with creating and providing deliverables.
Pros and Cons of Marketing Agency
Creative Perspective
When an organization finds itself stuck in neutral with its marketing strategy, a marketing agency can offer new, exciting, and creative ideas to boost the campaign. With a large team of talented marketing experts at your disposal, just a few adjustments can pay huge dividends for your investment.
Specific Areas of Expertise
Each marketing agency has a wide range of departments specializing in different marketing aspects. For instance, the content department can create blogs around relevant topics to your market, increasing traffic to your website. From keyword research to website design to B2B content marketing and more, marketing agencies have a wide range of expertise to offer your organization.
Free Up Time
With the expert guidance of a marketing agency, a company’s personnel can be freed up to focus on other areas of the business. Whether you’re busy developing your products or services or running your business, you won’t have to deal with the time-consuming stress of putting a complex marketing campaign together.
Expenses
Just like any valuable service, market agencies can be another added expense to your marketing budget. However, when you use the right tool for the job, your ROI may pleasantly surprise you.
Pros and Cons of Marketing Consultant
Flexibility
Hiring a marketing consultant allows companies to add valuable assistance for a short while without having to go through a full-time hiring process.
Valuable Skill Set
Whatever your marketing needs may be, you can find a marketing consultant with the right skill set to rise to the occasion. Whether it’s an email marketing campaign or incorporating influencer marketing strategies, there’s a consultant out there with the proper skill set.
One of Many
As nice as it is to have their expert guidance, you’re not the consultant’s only client. Just like a marketing agency, they may be handling a large number of clients at the same time.
Choosing Between a Marketing Agency vs Consultancy
If your organization is having trouble formulating a marketing strategy, a consultant’s expert advice may be just the thing to get the ball rolling in the right direction. They have the versatility and skill set to grow businesses and help them reach their full marketing potential. While most consultants are geared toward the strategy and planning portion of a marketing campaign, agencies are more task-oriented and focus on getting results in each area. For example, if your company has created a marketing strategy that consists of launching a new digital campaign to drive organic traffic through SEO, you would want to turn to an agency that specializes in SEO to accomplish this. They would be your trusted resources for all things related to SEO.
Combining the expertise of a consultancy and a marketing agency can create a powerhouse marketing strategy for an organization. With digital marketing consultancy, a team of SEO nerds, and a wide range of digital tools and techniques, CadenceSEO has the best of both worlds. Having originally been formed as an SEO agency, CadenceSEO has evolved into a full-service marketing consulting firm. They have the ability to stand in as the consultant and lead a team of marketers or operate like an agency to work on just one aspect of the business. If you want to take your marketing to the next level, schedule a free consultation with us today!
