We need to be clear about one thing before we answer this question: What are digital marketing services, exactly?
Digital marketing is a term used to describe all online activities that are done to promote a brand or drive sales. Today, any company that wants to reach an audience needs a digital presence.
Traditional marketing methods have become less effective and efficient over the years.
Today, smart phones are everywhere, and everyone uses them.
It’s important to be able to search for information using just two words.
Want to find the closest take-out? You can Google it.
You need to know where to go to get a new wedding dress. You can Google it.
All you need is a single click away.
Are you just a few clicks away from being found by others? It all depends on your online presence, which is not limited to one factor but involves multiple factors.
Your website’s ranking, your social media strategy, and your budget for paid advertising all play a part.
There are two ways to manage all of these channels.
* You can hire a digital marketing agency that offers full-services,
You can hire several niche agencies.
Which is the best option?
To answer this question we must look at the different types of methodologies.
Hiring Multiple Niche Agencies
What is a niche agency?
Niche agencies are those that focus solely on a particular area.
One agency can handle the design and development of your website, another will take care of your search engine optimization and search engine marketing and another will take care your content writing.
Some niche agencies will only focus on a single platform and not the entire social media. You can therefore have an agency to handle your Twitter account, another that focuses on your Instagram account, and another for your Facebook.
It is important to specify, but it can be challenging when the company is looking for a variety of services. It is important to keep in touch with each digital marketing agency, as there is no communication between them.
One agency might handle the Instagram account of a company, while another would manage its Facebook page. While this may be beneficial in terms of personalisation and specification, it could also lead to a lack of consistency and continuity.
What does this mean?
Easy! If you want to promote a product or an event, and if an agency manages both accounts as well as the other channels, including your website, it is easy.
You will have to tell each company that they should post the same information on their channels.
One post is fine, but if your company requires constant communication, whether it’s to provide content to the agency or to request specific work, managing multiple agencies may not be ideal for you.
It is also important to ensure that the voice of your brand is consistent across all channels. Niche agencies are very familiar with how to address the audience on a specific social media network. On the other hand, your brand voice may vary from channel to channel.
Imagine that, putting social media aside, you have your website designed by a certain agency and the content written and search engine optimization done by a different agency.
There are too many people who have access to your site. What if you were to have a problem? The second thing to consider is that website development and design play a vital role in SEO. So, any changes made to your website could either improve or hurt SEO.
This would be no issue in a full-service digital marketing agency as the departments have easy communication. However, when agencies are crossed, things become a little more complicated. This would require several employees who are responsible for maintaining contact and creating communication between the departments.
You should hire a full-service agency if your business relies on more than one aspect of digital presence. Digital Agency Network has a list of digital services.
Hiring a Full Service Digital Marketing Agency
What is a digital marketing agency that offers full-service?
Full service digital agencies manage all aspects of an online presence. This type of agency has different departments, each focusing on a specific area. For example, a design department, a website development department, specialized content writers, specialised social media managers, and specialised SEO and SEM departments.
The agency will then come up with an overall strategy, defining the KPI and evaluating how every department can contribute to the achievement of the end goal.
The UX team would create a mobile-friendly, eye-catching design for the company’s website. Once the design was complete, the website would then be developed, while the SEO, content writing, and SEM departments were preparing.
Social media channels will follow suit and the strategy will be launched in coordination with other departments.