Digital agencies are frequently mistaken for digital marketing companies.
Although a full-service digital agency usually offers digital marketing services, they focus primarily on various digital aspects and additionally offer services such as web, app, and software design and development to help businesses expand online.
What is digital marketing?
Digital marketing, which is also known as online marketing, involves promoting a brand through various digital channels in order to engage with both potential and existing customers. The channels used for digital marketing include search, social media, email, and paid advertisements.
What Services Does A Digital Marketing Firm Provide?
Digital marketing companies provide a wide range of services that align with their specific expertise in various digital channels.
To address this question, let’s backtrack and examine the engagement models, which refer to how these agencies provide their services.
- Partnerships: Digital marketing outsourcing is one of the most common engagement models. Two-thirds of B2B companies outsource internet marketing to professional online marketing companies to be able to focus their in-house resources on revenue-generating work.
- Projects: One-time or other short-term engagements where a business outsources a particular campaign, strategy or another time-bound task to a specialized agency.
When it comes to the services provided, the top digital marketing agencies tend to integrate various techniques in order to effectively advertise your brand through different channels and achieve growth in your online business.
Several of these efforts encompass:
1. Internet Marketing & Advertising
Service marketing companies are responsible for handling marketing and advertising activities across a diverse range of platforms. These strategies encompass:
- Retargeting and remarketing
- Paid search
- Paid media
- Pay-per-click advertising
- Native advertising
- And more
These initiatives have the possibility of being implemented across various platforms, which includes:
- Bing
- Other publications
- And more
2. Content & Social Media Marketing
Outdated traditional advertising tactics, such as radio spots and expensive TV ads, are being steadily replaced by multimedia content and social media management.
Full-service marketing firms have the ability to ideate, generate, and distribute a wide array of content, including:
- Blog posts
- Articles
- Brand videos
- Social media posts and content
- Infographics
- User-generated content campaigns
- Digital newsletters
- Whitepapers
- Webinars
- And more
Based on the Content Marketing Institute, the utilization of content marketing to capture and maintain their audiences is practiced by 91% of B2B organizations.
The tasks that are outsourced the most include:
- Content creation (47%)
- Content promotion/distribution (23%)
- Content marketing measurement (11%)
- Content marketing strategy (9%)
3. Search Engine Optimization
Search engine optimization (SEO) is also included in the realm of internet marketing.
This strong initiative involves optimizing both your web design and corresponding content to achieve a higher ranking on relevant search results.
To have a comprehensive organic search strategy, it is essential to prioritize three types of SEO.
- Technical SEO
- On-page SEO
- Off-page SEO
Given that Google holds 92% of the total market share in the search engine industry as of May 2020, it is not surprising that most companies prioritize optimizing for this particular search engine.
The engine utilizes over 200 factors in order to assign rankings to websites.
Top marketing agencies possess the necessary experience and data to create successful SEO strategies that can naturally augment the traffic to your website, although the clarity may vary among these agencies.
4. Additional Digital Marketing Services
Digital marketing companies have the capability to implement numerous campaigns that can effectively expand your business.
Included in the range of digital marketing services are also the following:
- Email marketing
- Marketing automation
- Affiliate marketing
- Data and analytics
- Inbound marketing
- Digital public relations
- Conversion rate optimization
- Influencer marketing
- And more
Why is digital marketing important?
There are several reasons why digital marketing is important.
- Reach: Worldwide, billions of people use the Internet. With the Internet’s reach, your business can reach the right people at the right time with the right message. The result? Your marketing campaigns perform better, resulting in more revenue for your business.
- Targeting: Digital marketing offers immense targeting options, from demographics to behavior. With these targeting capabilities, your company can optimize its marketing spend, focusing on the users most likely to become customers.
- Tracking: Digital marketing’s performance is easy to track. That makes answering questions about key performance indicators (KPIs) like conversions fast and easy. Plus, with MarketingCloudFX, you can instantly track each channel’s contribution to your bottom line.
- Customization: Everything about digital marketing is custom, including which strategies you use. Compared to traditional marketing, your business can instantly adjust its strategies and campaigns, preventing wasted spending.
- Effectiveness: With its reach, targeting, tracking, and customization capabilities, digital marketing is highly effective. Companies investing in digital marketing services can accelerate its effectiveness, too — as demonstrated by our clients experiencing a 20% greater marketing ROI.
How Much Do the Best Marketing Companies Charge for Their Services?
Local digital marketing agencies in the U.S. typically determine their service pricing by considering hourly rates, which generally fall in the range of $100 to $175.
If you decide to team up with an international digital marketing company, the hourly rates can decrease to as little as $40.
Many organizations also enter monthly retainer contracts with top specialists hired by internet marketing companies, which means that these companies act as expert consultants that provide advice to your business.
Monthly retainer fees for US-based companies can vary depending on the type of project, ranging from $1,000 to over $3,000 or more.
In the meantime, the companies located abroad offer monthly retainers that are relatively cheaper, amounting to approximately $700 per month.
Other pricing structures that can be considered are project-based fees or fees based on the achieved results.
How do I choose a digital marketing agency?
To help your business hire the best digital marketing agency, you can follow these tips:
- Outline your goals (or what you want to accomplish) with online marketing
- Compile a list of the services you need
- Determine your monthly budget for online marketing
- Generate a list of agencies that meet your budget and provide the service you need
- Review every qualifying agency’s reviews, testimonials, and case studies
- Research how the agency measures and reports client success
- Chat with the agency one-on-one to see how they blend with your business
- Look into the agency’s growth and successes through online marketing
In summary, the objective is to select a digital marketing service provider who possesses the following characteristics:
- Transparent
- Trustworthy
- Reliable
- Client-focused
- Successful
- Knowledgeable
