Fully functional, in-house marketing departments can be the backbone of your entire brand. I’m not talking of a one-man-department. I think of a team of marketers, each specialized in a different field of marketing. It doesn’t matter whether it is SEO, Google Ads or some particularly social media platform.
I know that every business owner agrees when I say that in-house marketing gives much better control of the overall marketing activities than outsourcing marketing. After all, control is the only way for them to rest easy, knowing that everything is running smoothly.
So, let’s settle on the fact that it’s always better to have more control over the processes that are executed in your company.
Of course, this doesn’t apply to owners who are goal-oriented!
Goal-oriented business owners are occupied with KPIs such as return on investment. They aren’t concerned with the location of their marketing team. They just want a better ROI, and it’s fine with them even if they never meet the team that brings them success.
But ok, let’s say that in-house is preferable to outsourced marketing.
Nonetheless, marketing departments are cost-effective only in huge companies. Small to medium-sized businesses struggle to handle all their marketing efforts alone and all they do is throwing money down the drain.
I presume, since you’re still reading this, you too aren’t satisfied with the results of your marketing.
Bear with me, read the signs below and if your concerns are confirmed, you should Contact Us!
1. Your Sales Team Is Creating Paid Advertising Campaigns?
STOP THEM IMMEDIATELY!
They are not only embarrassing the company, they embarrass themselves!
Your sales team may be great. But, if their side job is branding your company, then by no means you should expect any results. Outsourced marketing agency, on the other hand, is fully focused in examining your targeted audience, specifically tailoring your brand image to THEIR likes, defining the tone of communication and the proper marketing channels through which the brand will communicate with its customers.
Outsourced marketing firms have the necessary technical knowledge and experience to properly set up Google Ads (Adwords) or Facebook ads. Don’t get me wrong. Anyone can set and launch paid campaigns on Google or Facebook. Both giants worked tirelessly on simplifying the set-up process, so that anyone, regardless of their experience, can advertise on their platforms. However, being able to and actually-know-how-to launch a paid campaign are two very different things.
These advertising channels try to make themselves user-friendly, often setting up “autopilot-like” features so you can set it and forget it, letting an algorithm make adjustments for you.
Again, it all comes down to the return on investment.
2. You’re Not Happy with the Company Growth
While marketing is one part of business growth, it is a key driver. If your marketing activities are not bringing results, then a root and branch review may be needed to ensure you’re talking to the right people in the right way. Your marketing efforts should make it easy for customers and prospects to do business with you. Only then will you notice great uplift in new leads, sales and profit margins.
3. Customers Say They Can’t Find You Online
No need to add anything here.
Actually, I do want to say a couple of things to make sure you understand what I mean by this.
Companies spent tons of money on website SEO with one goal in mind; reaching the top page of Google results for keywords of their interest. However, the most important keyword for every company is its brand name. You must appear at the top of Google when someone searches for your brand.
Now here’s the catch.
You can easily appear at the top of the results for your brand UNLESS your competitor is using Google Ads and is using your brand name as a keyword. To give an example of this, when someone writes “Tesla” in Google, Mercedes would be the first result they see and Tesla second, or third, if there are other car companies who bid on “Tesla”.
Here’s our tip: From time to time, Google your brand and check if you are in the first position in the results.
Please note that the results you see are only for the location you’re currently using Google from. Check the results page for your brand in every country that your business is targeting.
4. You Don’t Have Time to Think
Great marketing requires time and thought, two things you probably don’t have time for. Like any project, an established process leads to a better chance of success – initial brainstorming, market research, selection of strategy, detailed planning, scheduling, costing, and well-delivered execution. Of more concern, an ‘on the fly’ approach to campaigns can lead to significantly wasted budget and missed opportunities, handing precious advantage over to your competitors. Outsourcing your marketing activities will give you the vital breathing space to think, plan and generally, get back in control.
5. You haven’t refined your branding in years
Your brand should be a constant work in progress. Both should regularly evolve to be more customer-centric, more attractive, more interesting and above all, accurate. Putting off necessary changes for too long could cause you to wake up one day and realize you’re losing business because your brand or website looks like it belongs in the ‘90s and contains outdated information.
Part of the value of outsourced marketing companies is that they’re educated on new trends and critical changes in the marketing landscape. They can reflect the need for change to you and push your business to improve.
Oftentimes, the objective opinion of a partner is needed to even notice a need for change.
Why Should You Outsource Marketing?
Before we go, let’s look at some of the benefits of outsourcing your marketing:
- Quick scalability when revenue needs to be grown at a faster rate
- Reduce overhead expenses
- A shift from marketing tactics to strategy
- Expanded marketing channel expertise
- An outside perspective which fosters innovation
To Wrap Up
If you recognize any of the signs, then it’s probably time to get help with your marketing. Going the outsourcing route means you can hit the ground running with an experienced team. It can take some time for an agency to fully understand your business but the rewards are significant. Even if outsourcing is not your long-term plan, it’s a great way to get your marketing strategy established and high-quality marketing activity up and running. And you don’t have to do everything at once – you can outsource small portions of your marketing efforts to an agency and build it up over time.
Ultimately, outsourcing your marketing will give your business a swift injection of expertise and creativity and give you back the breathing space to drive your business forward.
