A business needs to focus on digital marketing to grow in an organic manner. Search engines are now more important than any other factor when it comes to marketing. Showing up on the 7th or 8th page will rarely generate leads organically from search results.
The way that companies handle their digital marketing differs. Some of the largest brands in the world outsource marketing tasks regularly. The options that a company has will depend on a few factors. The budget is always going to play a role and overall goals will as well.
A marketing agency isn’t likely to accept a contract if the potential client has unrealistic expectations. The following are options that your startup has when it comes to handling digital marketing.
Create a Strategy and Have Freelancers Implement It
The creation of a strategy is imperative for digital marketing. Without direction, freelancers can waste quite a bit of time and expect payment for it. Freelancers need to be given detailed instructions on what they should be doing with the hours they are given. There are so many freelancers that have worked at major marketing agencies that simply wanted to freelance due to the lifestyle appeal. Current employees at certain agencies work to supplement their income by using their experience.
Freelance writers can be a great way to scale up a content marketing campaign. Other freelancers can handle outreach to place content that has been written.
Allow Freelancers to Handle All Marketing
There is a chance that you build a team of freelancers that you can utilize to handle all marketing. This can include strategy if the freelancer has a proven track record of garnering results for clients. Management of these freelancers will be a challenge as you might have a team that is located on multiple continents. You need to keep motivation in mind as certain cultures push a bit harder than others in a professional setting.
Allowing freelancers to handle all marketing can keep the budget in check if they are given a limit of hours per month.
Outsourcing to a Marketing Agency
Outsourcing marketing to an agency is rarely going to be the cheapest route but could be the route with the highest ROI. The tough aspect is sifting through all of the companies that offer digital marketing services. The question to ask is for the agency to provide a case study or data from previous campaigns. Agencies that are not willing to show results likely have not garnered any for their clients. You might hear a few key phrases like “marketing is a process and that is why the client’s search engine rankings stayed stagnant” or “these are the important numbers, not sales or leads generated”. Finding a quality SEO company is possible as there are professionals that know Google’s search engine algorithm like the back of their hand.
Personal referrals are the best when it comes to picking a digital marketing agency. Another startup founder will point you in the direction of an agency they used or warn you to stay away from another.
Watch out for agencies that seem to constantly rebrand as this could be due to poor results they have generated for clients. Marketing agencies oftentimes source out work given to them so it is important to watch out for blackhat SEO techniques. These tactics can lead to a penalty from Google or even having the company website deindexed totally from the search engine.
Hiring an In-House Marketing Team
Hiring an in-house marketing team will allow the brand’s marketing strategy and voice to stay consistent. Hiring needs to be done carefully. Plenty of people might consider themselves as social media gurus but have never managed multiple campaigns at once. The interview process should be extensive and there should be a practical part of it. Asking someone to generate titles based on keywords for a copywriter is a perfect example. Do not simply believe an applicant that they have done certain things but rather ask for examples. Seeing the work a designer or writer has done is going to give a clear picture of their quality of work.
There is no right answer to how you should take care of digital marketing for your startup. There is a chance that you outsource to an agency and build up a marketing team over time. The slow hiring of professionals can allow these members of the staff to lessen the work being sourced out. There are plenty of large companies that have an in-house team but also supplement this by sourcing work out to agencies. The most important aspect is to base decisions on data and results rather than being tricked by a digital marketing snake oil salesperson.
