Establishing A Healthy Relationship With Your Digital Marketing Agency...The Insider Scoop!

What are the qualities of a good agency? They’re creative, responsive, and reliable. And you want to make sure they have these qualities before you hire them. But there is one more thing that separates an average agency from a great one: the ability to meet your needs long-term. You’ve invested time and money into the search for a marketing company that you feel confident in. You landed on one, and now it is time to put your best foot forward with them. These few simple steps will help set yourself up for a long-lasting agency relationship, and what you can expect from the Digital Marketing Agency you have chosen to partner up with.

How do you know if an agency is a good fit? There are many factors to consider, but the most important two are healthy communication and clear expectations. If agencies prioritize these things from day one, they will be much easier to work with. In this post we explore how to communicate better with agencies and what should be expected of them in return.

Establishing Clear Expectations With Your Agency

Agencies are amazing for getting you up and running, but once you sign on, there's still more work to do. Specifically, when you start your projects with them, they'll hand off all the responsibility to their account team. You might think this would be bad because it means that you won't have someone guiding you every step of the way through your project until completion – but that isn't true at all! The people in charge of managing your account know more than anyone else at the agency because they're responsible for making sure everything goes smoothly from start to finish.

As a client, there are few things more frustrating than feeling like the sales team is not being fully transparent with you about their expectations for your account. It can be hard to build trust. We all know that trust is a huge factor in any business relationship.  Well, the answer is not always easy but it starts with setting clear expectations and giving them time to interact with other teams before jumping into project work.

Many businesses are looking to hire an agency, but they don’t know what qualities to look for. There is a tension between the two parties in that one wants to do everything possible to make sure you have a good experience and the other wants you to be happy with their work. The best agencies will understand this tension and will drive these trust-based conversations so you don’t have to. 

Delivering on early small promises like we’ll send you an email with a recap and some questions (and then actually sending that email) is a good signal that they’re dedicated to making sure you have a good experience. They’ll move quickly, communicate often, work hard on building your campaign and trust.

Communication & Collaboration Are The Keys To Unlocking a Great Agency Relationship.

There are many keys to unlocking a great agency relationship, but you really just need the right key...and that's by talking first. The most important thing about what goes on in an initial meeting for both parties has nothing at all to do with pitching; rather, making sure everyone gets their voice heard and understood clearly.

Setting expectations can be the difference between a great collaboration and an unproductive one. One of the most important things to remember when working with an agency is that they are humans too. It can be easy for business owners to forget this aspect and focus on their own needs, forgetting about the people who are helping them build a strong relationship with their customers. The more you get to know your team members, the better understanding you will have about how best to approach any given project.

Establish The Frequency of Communication You Need & Expect

When it comes to communication, be sure you get the right amount. You need a lot in some cases and hardly any in others!  First, you need to determine how often people will be in contact with one another and what type of content they'll want or expect from each other.

To start, let's talk about the two types of agencies: synchronous and asynchronous. Synchronous agencies offer real-time interaction with their clients. This means that they are available to answer questions or provide feedback at any time during the day as long as you have a live connection to them. 

Asynchronous agencies only offer communication in specific times slots like one hour blocks, for example from 9 am - 10 am PT on Monday through Thursday. The main difference between these options is how much your agency will be able to respond to your needs depending on what you need help with and when you need it done by.

There are so many moving parts that make up running an agency: managing clients' expectations, maintaining a productive team, having healthy interpersonal relationships with all members of staff. All these factors combine to create both successes and failures within agencies. So how do we know what to focus on? How do we know where our priorities should lie? The answer is establishing clear expectations around rhythms early on!

Many organizations find that they have to juggle the needs of a creative agency, internal teams and clients. This is common when working with a marketing agency. Managing these relationships can be difficult for any business and often leads to miscommunication and project delays. 

In order to help keep projects on track, many companies are implementing single points of contact. A single point of contact can consolidate questions from other teams, provide updates on what’s happening at all times, address feedback from anyone involved in the project at hand and more!

What It Is Really Like Working With a Digital Marketing Agency

There will be times when contracts go exactly as planned, everyone is thrilled, revenue comes in the door, and engagement sizes grow with more upsides for all. However there are times when things don't go according to plan; priorities change while companies pivot or customers change preferences. 

Scoped work can also run into unexpected roadblocks that may interfere with reaching deadlines or objectives within the contract period. It's important to be aware of these various scenarios so that if something does happen during your projects being done by the agency.

In the end when you’re looking for an agency, it’s important to find the right partner. It takes patience and careful consideration before deciding on a company that will be dedicated to your success.  It's important to be transparent and upfront about your needs. A great way to do this is by sharing a brief overview of your company in order to give the agency context around what you’re looking for from them as a Digital Marketing Agency.