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In the business world, no matter how revolutionary your service or product is, if you cannot get in front  of  the correct target audience delivered in a way tailored to meet their needs you will not manage to complete one sale. There are so many alternative ways to market goods in contemporary times, with more variety comes a greater need for better decision making on behalf of your business interests.  Here will be a comparative look at the different types of marketing agencies available to you. The benefits and drawbacks will be assessed to give you a vivid picture regarding the services that each niche market segment provides.

Creative Agency

The main objectives for these firms in this industry is to tell the story of your brand while taking into consideration the product and the customer persona. They will shape their innovative efforts around the objectives that have been set by your business, while making sure to adhere to your industry standards of your company. 

These companies mostly focus on creative marketing services like branding, design, visual identity, social media, and other marketing areas focused on brand building and brand awareness. These are very top of the funnel techniques, so they are not very focused on conversions.

The main focus after that is for them to create a visual experience that will appeal to your clients. As well as the micro level branding of each individual product they do address the task of developing your brand identity.  This is will go some way to completing your ecommerce strategy. They are able to help you online and offline. The main selling point is their ability to create.

Messy paints and paintbrush

Media Agency

The value of a media agency comes from their skills in having access to key players involved in media outlets and platforms.  

These brands typically focused on traditional media buying like billboards, radio or TV airtime, print ads, etc. However, these brands are now trying to get more into the digital media space, but since they are not digital-native they are missing some out on some key skill sets. Additionally, since these agencies use more old school media buying models, they often receive kickbacks or rebates from their media partners.

They are able to use their privilege to negotiate prices down and ensure more competitive prices. In a market that is not very organised it is vital that you are able to get your product in front of the right people and this is their sole aim. The main selling point is their network.

Performance Agency

The specialities of firms in this market segment to optimize your performance reaching clients based on online metrics.  It is heavily invested in the growing digital marketplace where more and more companies are aiming to search for their next sale.

These companies mostly focus on the end result, such as leads or sales. they often work on cost per lead, performance-bonus, or revenue sharing model. This means they typically only focus on the bottom of the funnel techniques, so if your company needs help with brand awareness or a more holistic marketing strategy then this might not be the best type of agency to go with. Also, they usually focus on PPC, not just SEO.

This is much more cost-efficient than trying to buy T.V add time after the Super Bowl halftime show. However, you only pay when there are successful transactions. All their care about is traffic! Traffic! Traffic! The main selling point is their search engine optimization

Hurdlers on a track

Consulting Agency

This is much more of wholistic approach to your business needs. This type of firm will not just knowledge concentrated on the marketing aspect of the product, but also on supply-chain, human resources, project management and many other value-adding departments. 

These are more strategic and less hands on. While they can be especially useful for defining the strategy, they may not be the ones implementing it, and therefore are not a replacement of an in-house marketing team.

These types of resources should be called upon when a change in culture and strategy needs implementation. This will be a decision made by strategic management with an adjustment in company direction. The main selling point is their breath of business expertise.

Digital agency

The digital agency tends to pair the tasks of content creation with implementation. They are capable of formulating a marketing strategy that analysis all channels that best meets your budget. This strategy will consider key analytic metrics such as lead conversion rates, cost per click and website traffic. If you are looking to have some aid in marketing, you could check these ten chrome plugins.

There is no one size fits all definition of a digital agency. A digital agency could be a specialist team, like an SEO or Social Media agency, or more full-service digital teams like Codedesign. Unlike creative agencies that only focus on brand awareness, and performance agencies that only work on the point-of-sale, full service digital marketing agencies will often focus on the entire marketing funnel.

While also creating and advising you on new ways to meet your customer through cold emails or social media platforms.  We also have another blog highlighting the key questions to ask a digital marketing agency.

Next Steps 

Another type of agency that was not given its own section is the ecommerce marketing agency, but he is a link to gain more insight. 

In reality many agencies will be a blend of the above types but will usually have a clear expertise in one of the market segments out line above.  Before making any decisions make sure it is always in the best interest of your business to ensure future growth and prosperity.

Codedesign is a digital marketing agency specializing in data-driven online sales and lead generation solutions for brands in a variety of verticals. Contact us to schedule a consultation with one of our digital marketing experts.


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