8 Questions A Digital Marketing Company DOESN’T Want You To Ask

Do you ever get these?

We get ’em all the time! And we’re a digital marketing company that does SEO and has good rankings. Digital marketing company pitches come at most firms from the left and right and the whole practice remains a Harry Potter-like dark art to many. So how are you supposed to know how to spot a good digital marketing company?

Based on 20 years of helping major organizations select good marketing firms, we’ve put together a list of 8 questions you can use to separate the contenders from the pretenders. (Need to pick a branding company instead? See the bottom of the post.)

1. Can you show me your 5 most recent projects?

Everybody is ready to show you their best work. Ask for the five pieces of digital marketing work that left their shop yesterday. It’s amazing how this separates those who have had ‘lightning-strike’ viral success from those who have a process that delivers real results consistently.

2. Will you change your process for us?

A friend told me a story. He happened to go to dinner with the guy who was in charge of purchasing worldwide for Coke. He oversaw the purchasing of everything from machinery to raw materials, and had been asked for the first time to get involved in the hiring of marketing firms. He observed that every marketing firm pitched some magical, proprietary process that got great results. But when Coke asked if they would change it for them they said ‘Yes!’. He found their answers stunning. If the process is really worth anything, how can you abandon it just like that?

So look for a digital marketing company that has developed a process that delivers success and won’t change it when you ask.

3. Can you show me how your direct marketing results improve over time?

The marketing gods blessed us when they gave us the ability to use digital marketing to improve marketing performance by testing & learning, rinsing & repeating. And we now have a toolbox brimming with diagnostic tools.

So beware the digital marketing firms – particularly the smaller, lower cost ones  – who operate on a set-it-and-forget-it model. One confessed to me: “I just set it up then enjoy reoccurring revenue every month and have very low hours against it except sending an auto-generated report. It’s like an annuity!” SearchEngineLand had a great post recently on how set it and forget it doesn’t work for Google Shopping campaigns because of the importance of a whole host of factors. It’s true of all digital marketing.

4. How will your digital marketing work blend with my other marketing efforts?

66% of marketers surveyed last year said their digital marketing efforts weren’t integrated into their main marketing strategy and it’s an ongoing source of frustration for good reason. We’ve gone past the point where there’s an online and offline world. There is no line. Your marketing should be non-line. 69% of Canadians say search – not TV, nor other traditional media – introduced them to new brands.

Your digital should reflect and respect your brand and not simply be cookie-cutter ads that could just as easily as be for your competitor as for you.

And, on the flip side, your traditional brand should be fueled by digital insights. Ask for real examples.

5. Can I get SEO results in 3 months?

Trick question. If they say ‘yes, be wary. Any keyword worth ranking for is going to take time. With on and off-page SEO work underway, our most experienced SEO mechanic suggests your expectations should be:

• see some progression in as little as 3-6 weeks
• see good progression in first 3-6 months
• see great results in months 7-12
• FEEL the power of top rankings in months 13+

In our work to increase organic search traffic for a leading healthcare company by 15X, you can see this playing out exactly.

By month 3 (each dot is a month), no real change. Real growth happened in month 7-12 and beyond.

But notice how it flattens out? Our contract ended and changes were kept current with the ongoing changes in search optimization. Fortunately, they asked us back in and results are taking off again.

Read more how common language was a key factor in this SEO case study.

6. How do they measure Social Media Marketing performance?

We divide the marketing funnel into three narrowing stages: Fame, Found and Fans with ROI being higher the lower in the funnel you go. So, while Social Media is in the top fame-generating section with a lower ROI, that doesn’t mean you should be wary of any firm that considers it as a faith-based initiative. Your digital marketing firm should be looking at your social beyond just engagement with posts (likes, shares) on your social media sites into how much traffic it drives onto your site and the quality of that traffic as measured in bounce rate, time on page and, yes, actual orders.

7. How well do you know the ________ industry?

Digital marketing companies dread this question because most believe that true online marketing success comes from valuable learning across multiple industry sectors. That’s the honest answer you want to hear.

You may meet some digital marketing companies that say they specialize in a specific industry. While this can be an advantage particularly if they bring technology unique to your industry beware of being plopped into a templated, cookie-cutter solution. Ask them how your business will look different from your competitors?

8. What do you rank for?

When I asked a prospective client last week how they found us, he said “I googled __________ and found your company. I figured if you can get yourselves ranked high, you can do the same for me.” A simple but often overlooked test of a digital marketing company’s SEO skills. (Double-check that it’s a keyword with good search volume.)

Hope this helps

If you need to pick a great branding company vs a digital marketing company? Check out “7 Foolproof Ways To Know You Picked The Best Branding Company“)

The Marketing Garage is an award-winning Toronto digital and branding marketing company that cuts through the digital marketing hype to deliver real results. Our unbiased, data-driven audits help you understand what’s working. And what’s not. Read some marketing case studies or give us a call to pop the hood on your marketing.