It seems like every college grad in Denver is starting up an agency. At last count, there were dozens of Denver marketing agencies to choose from—and that’s just downtown! That’s good news if you’re an under-staffed, strategy-starved marketing team and bad news if you lack the time and resources to vet a boatload of potential partners.
Consider this blog post your guide to evaluating Denver marketing agencies in a crowded, highly competitive marketplace.
Does Your Team Just Need Extra Hands?
Lack of bandwidth, resources or skills are common pain points amongst in-house marketing teams, and they’re what drives many organizations to seek out Denver marketing agencies. If your team has an airtight marketing strategy in place but is too overburdened to carry out the tasks to execute it, you need a marketing shop with reliable tactical skills. Now, how specialized those skills are depends on how specialized your needs are.
If all you need is someone who can build and deploy marketing automation programs in Marketo, you’ll be well served finding just about any Denver marketing agency that’s well-versed in Marketo. If you need someone to write four white papers a month covering highly specific, super-technical subject matter, you’ll want to do a thorough job vetting a potential partner’s technical writing chops and efficiency. Maybe you need ad-hoc support across a variety of disciplines. In this case, how specialized the agency is might not matter and your best tactical partner is one that can be a reliable “jack-of-all-trades” resource.
Does Your Team Need Strategy and Direction?
Maybe you have all the helping hands you need to execute a marketing plan, and all you lack is the plan itself. In this case, you may want less of a tactical agency and more of a strategic consultant. If this is the case, spend time vetting a Denver marketing agency’s strategic knowledge and experience. Be sure to ask questions that help pull back the curtain on their capabilities:
- What types of client projects have they worked on?
- What types of strategy have they put in place?
- What have been the results of the programs they’ve implemented for clients?
- What went wrong when strategies didn’t work?
Also, get a sense for how potential strategic partners manage client relationships. This can help you weed out partners that just don’t fit your “style.” Ask questions like:
- How do you prefer to communicate with your clients?
- Will my team have a direct point of contact at your firm?
- How fast can I expect to get a response if I have a question?
- Are you comfortable disagreeing with us? (this is important if you want quality strategic counsel)
A seasoned, knowledgeable partner might not work well with your company if you don’t gel on a more personal or logistical level, so do your homework.
Does Your Team Need Strategy and Hands to Execute It?
If you’re in the tough position of lacking a solid marketing direction and a staff that can carry out your monthly to-dos, you need a Denver marketing agency that can do it all. To put it bluntly, these agencies are hard to come by, and it doesn’t help that most agencies say they can do it all.
Finding that rare marketing consultant-agency hybrid requires a smart, thorough vetting process. Denver marketing agencies all have their strengths but finding one with the right strategic and tactical skillsets takes some digging. Comb through portfolios. Interview current and former clients. Ask to see results. Learn about their methodologies. Of course, you’ll never really know what you’re going to get from a marketing partner until you see them in action, but you can set yourself up for success by dotting your Is and crossing your Ts during the vetting process.
Unsure What Type of Denver Marketing Agency You Need?
Hopefully this blog post gave you a good starting point for finding a Denver marketing agency, but if you still aren’t sure whether you should be looking for a tactical agency, a strategic consultant or an agency-consultant hybrid, pop open our white paper for a few more tips and insight.
Download When Is a Marketing Consultant a Good Investment?
