I recently put together an Instagram Story, sharing my thoughts around why you as a business owner may be contributing to unsatisfactory results received from your digital marketing agency. I’m not pinging you with all the blame for an unsatisfactory engagement, as you, the digital agency bring challenges to the table too, all of which can be overcome. I put the story into the video as I think the content is very useful. BUT – its only useful if you, the business owner and digital marketing agency want to share long term, profitable marketing outcomes. If you have a short term get rich quick mentality, don’t watch the video as you won’t like the advice. If you are looking for a slave (Mr Business Owner) or a blind, compliant paycheck (Mr Digital Agency) this video probably isn’t for you.
Transcription: Long Term Profitable Marketing Engagements For Business Owners and Digital Agencies
So, I’m riding to work today and I thought I’d stop off for a quick coffee… because I just wanted a quick coffee. And so while I’m here I thought I would make a quick video about digital marketing in a general sense. So the reason I thought that I’d put this video together is and with my experience in the digital marketing industry, I’ve noticed that quite often there’s a real disconnect between a business owner and a digital marketing agency when it comes down to the service.
And if you’re a business owner, I kind of get it right, because the services you’re paying for AREN’T physical products; you probably won’t even see the consultant for most of the time he’s doing the service. You’re going need to trust at some stage and that can be a challenge because quite often it’s months and months of paying before you actually see a return on investment. And let’s face it the digital industry is quite shrouded in mystery I guess. It’s shrouded in, there’s a fair bit of secrecy and it’s technical.
And the flip side of the coin is obviously the digital agency. I mean if you’re an agency, you understand your products and you recognise how valuable and how much benefit they can produce for a client. And you just need the owner to give you a chance.
And in the middle we have these services. And these services just aren’t simply… they’re not simple to run and they’re not simple to understand. You know small elements of any service could bring the whole service down. So there really needs to be real partnership and delivery.
So as I make my way to work and during work today here’s some ideas that I’ve just been thinking about for a while, on how to bridge that disconnect between a digital marketing agency and an end client – a business owner – if you are either of those it might help.
Now I think to start with let’s just get to some concepts. Because if you’re the business owner, you have to understand there are a lot of elements to a digital marketing campaign, any of which don’t work the whole thing falls down. And sometimes it’s your fault and not the agency’s fault.
So random example, let’s say you’re doing Facebook advertising, you know, so the digital agency is really good at putting a Facebook advertising package together. But, if you’ve got a crap offer or you don’t let the agency copyright the ads it might not work. So that’s right hey, even though you’re paying the agency to do the work for you, if you don’t give them the right resources and you don’t give your clients the right offer, you know, it might be your fault that someone you’re paying isn’t generating a return on investment for you.
And on the flip side of the point if you’re a digital agency, let’s face it our industry hasn’t been great over the last 10-15 years right? There’s been a lot of dodgy stuff going on, a lot of people have been let down and ripped off so we have a mistrust that we have to overcome. And that’s our responsibility right? It’s not the business owner’s responsibility to over overcome an industry problem.
So we have to start by being a lot more transparent and you know a lot more focused on return on investment for businesses rather than more of the vanity stuff. So I think maybe the best place we can start is to as both the business owner and digital marketing agency, if we can understand where the other person is starting in the dialog maybe then we can create a dialogue that makes more harmonious partnership in the delivery and success of the campaign.
So I made it safely to work. It’s business casual Friday today, so a bit dressed down, but I’m continuing the discussion about bridging the communication gap between digital agencies and business owners. I think the next point is about your timeframe. So I think we need to understand that marketing isn’t immediate, you need a long term timeframe. So you’re looking at minimum of 12 months. So when you start the dialogue, if you’re a business owner with an agency or agency to business owner, look to 12 months plus.
And that’s because what you want to achieve is a long term improvement of the leads and sales generated from marketing. You don’t want to look for a three months or less because that instant glory story, it just doesn’t work. So, in context, as a business owner myself, even with my own team doing our own marketing, I never look less than 12 months to properly test and understand how flows work, and how offers work and that kind of stuff. No matter what the process or marketing strategy is we’re using. And to be honest, if I was a digital marketing agency still, I would not engage with a client who was looking at less than 12 months partnership with me. And the simple reason is, it’s really not enough time to actually understand an industry and understand how a service works in that industry.
Now I think the next step is to actually look at services and how they work. Obviously as a business owner you probably don’t understand and don’t need to understand the nitty-gritty of stuff, that’s why you get a consultant in. But you know to be honest, on the flip side of that I’ve seen some real doozy-doozy strategies that would just never work, presented as value-add, over the years. So that’s a real issue and I really acknowledge that issue, that there are dodgy strategies in marketing out there.
Now I think there’s a really clear answer. And it’s pretty simple, because in my years in marketing, which is you know over 15 now, I’ve never seen a value digital marketing strategy that can’t be explained by logic or traditional marketing. So as the digital marketing agency, why don’t you start by trying to explain things to the business owners that you’re pitching to, in terms they can understand using logic and maybe using some traditional marketing concepts.
And if you’re a business owner and you’re not getting that kind of explanation from digital marketing company, you know maybe there is something that’s hidden. I certainly wouldn’t engage with someone who couldn’t explain it in terms that I can understand and I’d certainly steer well clear of you know, secrets, or you know, those proprietary this and that. You know I would not engage if someone does that. The actual campaign should be able to be explained logically.
So to give some examples, you know the service of SEO. It’s basically the common day, or today’s version of the old Yellow Pages. You know, you’re searching for something you go where you know people are listed and you find the people that listed there. That’s SEO.
Social media marketing, you know that should be explained to in terms of networking. You know, going to a networking meeting so your mingling with the right group that you know is going to generate your business. That’s how social media should work. [AND BE EXPLAINED]
You know Google AdWords or pay-per-click advertising, you know that’s kind of like the old day billboard sort of an advertising strategy. You put the right message on the right street so the people that are driving past get the message and take the action. You know it’s explainable.
So there’s just some general concepts with marketing. Hopefully this this video will help engender better communication between digital agencies and business owners for more long term and high value partnerships.
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