Shopping for an Agency

Balancing Act Between Quality and Price

When searching for a marketing agency, it is easy to focus primarily on price—after all, if the price is beyond the limits of your budget, then you are back at square one in your efforts to create marketing collateral. While price is certainly an important factor when outsourcing marketing collateral, it should not be the top/only factor.

You can avoid costly mistakes by asking the following questions when looking for a marketing agency:

• Is the work outsourced?
  Why send your important marketing deliverables to an agency only to have it outsourced to another?
• Is it a full-service agency that can provide copywriting, multimedia, graphics and layout, and PR?
• Does the copy team have the required domain knowledge?
  If your company sells networking applications, servers, solar panels—you fill in the blank—then it is critical that the agency has experience writing about that technology. Having a strong background in your technology area ensures that the copywriter can conduct meaningful interviews to elicit information that best conveys the value of your product or solution.
• Can you perform translations, off-hour interviews?
  If you want to create case studies for all your APAC clients, for example, be sure to inquire about an agency’s ability to conduct off-hour interviews and translation services. Also ensure that they have experience working with clients in a particular geographic area and that they have the proper training related to cultural norms and sensitivities.

While price is clearly an important factor in your choice, don’t let it be the primary determinant. Remember that whichever agency you choose, you are entrusting it with your name, your brand, your reputation. So, choose wisely.

Joyce Fee is the Business Development Manager at NAVAJO Company