5 Signs Your Marketing Company Is Failing You

Digital marketing has been an essential element of running a successful business for decades, but currently it’s more important than ever. Online commerce is growing exponentially, and even businesses that rely on in-person business transactions need to have some kind of online presence.

If you’ve decided to take the leap and hire a digital marketing firm, it is likely that your business is growing. A growth period for your business will entail that you have sufficient revenue to invest into your business’s online marketing goals.

Even if you have the know-how, you are likely managing so many facets of your business that you don’t have time to take on the numerous responsibilities of digital marketing.

When hiring a digital marketing company, you should always expect results. An effective marketing campaign led by experts in the field should yield positive outcomes. A flashy new website doesn’t mean very much if there isn’t an audience to engage with it.

It is important to know what to look for in order to identify when your digital marketing company is failing you. Whether an agency has the malicious intent to scam you or whether it is due to incompetence or neglect, you shouldn’t have to put up with preventable marketing failures.

Below, we will explore five signs that your marketing company is failing.

1. There’s No Specialized Marketing Strategy
2. They Don’t Articulate Clear Goals
3. They Don’t Provide Measurable Results
4. They Don’t Discuss Worst Case Scenarios or Contingencies
5. They Are Not Accessible

1. There’s No Specialized Marketing Strategy

The marketing strategy that is best for you will depend on a variety of factors that are unique to your business and the products/services you offer. Ineffective marketing companies may take a fairly standardized approach to marketing strategies, assuming that a uniform set of tactics will work for businesses that are entirely dissimilar.

For instance, a successful digital marketing company will take many things into account to inform the foundation of the marketing plan for your business, such as:

What is the typical age range of your customers? Marketing to an older, more financially established clientele requires a different approach than getting younger consumers excited about your business. Digital marketing firms that assume all consumers are the same will certainly fail to get results for your business.

Does your business have physical locations or are you entirely online? Running a marketing plan that aims to attract customers to a brick and mortar business requires a different methodology than trying to drive clicks, engagement, and online sales.

What is the price range of your products or services? Does your branding paint your business as a great bargain, as a high-end luxury option, or somewhere in between? The way you portray the price range of your products and services is an important part of your business’s brand. Effective digital marketing companies will play to the specific strengths of your unique brand.

If your marketing company isn’t considering how your business is best represented, what your business offers, and who is most likely to utilize your services or buy your products, then they are not crafting a marketing plan that’s specific to your business. This type of failure will undoubtedly result in a very low ROI for your marketing budget.

2. They Don’t Articulate Clear Goals

When you hire a digital marketing company, you are investing capital in order to reach desirable goals for your business. But what are the marketing goals for your business?

Are you trying to drive user engagement online? Do you have a deadline for successful website development? Are you focusing on driving sales? Are you trying to gain an edge in a competitive local market?

If you can’t readily and clearly articulate the goals that your marketing company is aiming for, they are failing you. The lack of clear marketing goals can mean one of two things.

They are not communicating clearly enough about what their strategy is designed to do. A marketing company should function in partnership with your business and should be able to plainly state how their marketing strategies and goals help to further the aims of your business.

They do not have clear or coherent marketing goals for your business. Clearly, this possibility is much worse than a simple lack of communication. Whether it is because they are scamming you, or because they are simply not providing your business with the care that it deserves, lacking clear goals and a coherent strategy for achieving them is an inexcusable failure.

3. They Don’t Provide Measurable Results

One of the most important advantages of digital marketing over more traditional forms of advertising is the ability of companies to collect fine-grained stats (analytics) that measure the effectiveness of a marketing strategy. Whether it’s through social media metrics, SEO measures, blog views, or call-to-action engagements, effective digital marketing companies provide clients with data to clearly display the effectiveness (or lack thereof) of each marketing strategy.

If your marketing company simply provides a flashy website or social media design, but lacks the numbers to back up successes and plan readjustments, they are failing your business.

4. They Don’t Discuss Worst Case Scenarios or Contingencies

This failure overlaps heavily with the previous failing regarding measurable results. No marketing strategy works perfectly and there is always room for improvement. This is especially true with initial marketing plans. It takes time for digital marketing tactics to convert into engagement and business, and some plans simply don’t work even with the best intentions and efforts.

The best digital marketing companies acknowledge the potential for failures and plan for worst case scenarios by developing reasonable contingency plans. Rather than covering up elements of an initial marketing plan that has not worked, successful marketing companies track measurable results and strive to adjust their strategies to produce positive outcomes.

An agency that only provides you with a rosy picture of your online marketing strategy, especially in the absence of hard data, is failing.

5. They Are Not Accessible

Some marketing companies will put in enormous efforts to sign clientele, only to promptly become less accessible after gaining their business. Your business should always have reasonably quick, direct, and easy access to the specific point of contact for your digital marketing campaigns.

It is vital to be able to easily contact the individual (or individuals) at the marketing agency who manage your account.

Let Epitome Digital Marketing Show You Marketing Done Right!

If your marketing company is showing any of the five signs mentioned, it’s time to look elsewhere. They are failing your business.

For superior remote digital marketing, contact Epitome Digital Marketing online or call us today at (980) 404-9250.