What To Expect When Working With A Digital Marketing Agency

What To Expect When Working With A Digital Marketing Agency 

Having a great working relationship with a digital marketing agency isn’t just about finding one you enjoy working with. It’s also about choosing the most successful collaboration partner for your business. 

 A lot of digital marketing agencies can get you results. 

But a lot of agencies don’t prioritise their relationship with you. 

Why does that matter? Well, a good client-agency relationship results in faster and more effective work that gets you better results. 

How can you find the right digital marketing agency to partner with?

Well, it’s hard to judge whether you’re working with an agency that values your relationship when you don’t know what to expect from working with a digital marketing agency! 

So, let’s look at what you should expect from a digital marketing agency and 3 tips to have a successful relationship with yours. 

What You Should Expect From A Digital Marketing Agency

Clear Expectations

First off, you should know exactly what to expect from your agency because they should have told you! 

At a minimum, your agency should set clear expectations around goals and deliverables.

But a good agency? They’ll go a step further. 

A good digital marketing agency will:

• Map out a clear strategy of where their work can take you, based on research into your business and your marketing goals
• Communicate how success will be measured and what metrics will be used to measure it
• Be transparent about their work process and clearly communicate what they expect from you to make everything happen on time
• Set realistic expectations around deliverables and when you can expect them
• Be clear on what reporting they’ll provide you and when you’ll receive it

Having a great working relationship with your agency is a two-way street, so you need to make sure that you are also clear on what your expectations are. 

Maintaining Regular Communication

Now that everyone is on the same page about what to expect, it’s time to put that strategy into action.

While there is an element of trusting that your agency knows what they’re doing and are getting the work done, there does need to be regular communication. 

A lot of agencies work 100% remotely, but there are several ways they can maintain regular communication. Maybe they invite you to a Slack channel for your project or have a Notion board that is regularly updated so you can check it any time you’re looking for an update.

If that’s not your thing and you prefer a more traditional contact method, make sure you consider this when choosing your agency. This could involve a video or phone call to catch up regularly. 

Understanding How Your Ads Are Performing

Great, you’re communicating with your agency regularly! But how do you know if your marketing strategy (both organic and paid) is performing? 

Your digital marketing agency should be giving you clear and regular reports based on the measurements for success you agreed on before work began. 

Most importantly, you should be able to communicate with your agency about what’s in the report to ensure that you understand everything. We’re all guilty of thinking that we’re communicating something clearly when we’re not. So, if you don’t understand something in your report, you can and should be able to meet with your agency to run through it until you do. 

Making Tweaks And Changes

Sometimes the best laid plans don’t play out the way you expected them to, so it’s important for your agency to be flexible and able to make changes when needed. 

Knowing how your ads are performing is a great start, but your agency should also be letting you know what they’re doing about the bits that might not be working. It might be that they think your ad campaign needs more time to show real results, or that something needs to be tweaked. 

Remember that you’ve hired them because they know what they’re doing, so trust them! If you’re not convinced after six months, you can always move to a new agency. But remember that paid ads don’t always have an instant payoff, and there might be other things impacting their success, such as your marketing touchpoints or brand development.

How To Have A Successful Relationship With Your Digital Marketing Agency

Now you know what to expect from a good agency. But, what can you do to make sure you have a great relationship with them? Here are our top 3 tips to make it happen:

1. Choose the right agency

Deciding to hire an agency is a big decision, and it can be hard to know what to look for. 

Knowing what to expect is a good start, but you also want to have a trust connection with the business that you choose. 

Remember to look for an agency that:

• Sets clear expectations (a green flag is when they set these on their website before you’ve even thought about signing a contract)
• Lets you know how and when they will communicate (maybe it’s a Zoom call every month or a Messenger chat)
• Specialises in the type of help you’re looking for. If you want to implement your own campaigns but have someone monitor them for you, make sure you look for someone well known for these
• Can demonstrate success with previous clients and shares examples of what their reporting will look like

2. Communicate with them

The agency-client relationship is a two-way street! It won’t work unless you also communicate effectively and send over any information your agency needs within the agreed time.

Remember that they need to have a sound understanding of your business and your goals to run effective marketing, so you will need to communicate your requirements effectively. 

3. Trust your agency

You’ve hired an agency to do something that you don’t feel confident doing or don’t have the time to do. Once you’ve decided to work with them, trust that they know what they’re doing. 

This does come with a slight caveat though. Don’t trust them blindly. Make sure they’re holding up their end of the contract with regular communication and reporting. If they suggest a new paid campaign, make sure they explain why they’re recommending it and what it could do for your business goals. 

If you can have a good relationship with your agency, you can expect a great partnership that delivers on your goals and is enjoyable, too. 

How We Work With Our Clients

Are we the right digital marketing agency for you? We think so!

At So The Story Goes, we value a strong relationship with all of our clients. That’s why all of our packages include zoom calls with the team, at least every month on an ongoing basis. Depending on what service we’re providing, we run through findings from your ad monitoring package or go through your monthly report in detail so you can ask any questions.

This is all based on the clear strategy we developed at the start of the journey and maintaining an understanding of what we are working towards. 

We’re currently building out even more capability in our team, so if you’re ready to start levelling up your marketing campaigns, book a free 30-minute discovery call today to find out where to start.