What Differentiates Small Business Digital Marketing Agencies From Other Online Marketing Companies?

Small business digital marketing agencies do everything that regular ones do, however, they specialize in the growth of new and/or smaller enterprises.

Serving small businesses and big enterprises requires different strategies to reach their objectives.

Small to medium enterprises (SMEs) are more cost-sensitive, have fewer in-house marketing resources, and require smarter investment plans and closer collaboration with their digital marketing partner.

As a result, the services the agencies that work with SMEs offer are:

  • Cost-effective
  • Highly tailored to maximize return on investment
  • Growth-oriented and optimized for the client’s particular stage of development
  • Dedicated, often acting as an extension of the client’s in-house team

If there’s one defining trait of agencies working with small businesses to be singled out, it would be the combination of affordable pricing and effective services.

And owing to a much wider reach of online platforms, small business owners are guaranteed much better visibility than what they had to rely on in “the old days”, such as newspaper or radio ads.

The cost-per-lead method used by digital agencies is much more effective and cheaper than traditional marketing – something small businesses on a tight budget will always value.

Digital marketers creating strategies for a client
The strategies of digital marketing agencies for small businesses are highly tailored to maximize return on investment

What Services Can You Outsource To Small Business Marketing Companies?

Companies that offer digital marketing for small business specialize in developing strategies that foster growth and help startups and small enterprises to achieve success online.

Just like other similar agencies, they offer standard online marketing services that include but are not limited to:

  • Website design
  • Print and graphic design
  • Identity development
  • Search marketing
  • Social media marketing
  • Video production and marketing
  • Email marketing
  • SEO
  • PPC
  • Content marketing
  • Influencer marketing
  • eCommerce marketing services
  • And more

How Much Does Digital Marketing For Small Business Cost?

The expertise of a small business marketing agency comes with a price that they can offer in several ways:

  • As an hourly-based payment model
  • Monthly-based payment model or
  • Project-based fee

Frequently, these agencies will have a pricing structure on several tiers – each suitable for different wants and needs. The one-size-fits-all package never works in digital marketing.

The fee per hour can start as low as $5 and can go up to $150.

The average cost per project ranges from $2,500 to $12,000 per month for small-to-midsize businesses.

Why Hire A Small Business Digital Marketing Agency?

Small business marketing companies offer certain unique advantages for their clients.

Some of the most immediate ones are:

#1: They Can Help You Increase Brand Awareness

With the growing user base, competition and algorithm changes, the social media environment is becoming noisier and difficult to take advantage of. But the sheer size of the audiences it attracts and the engagement levels make social media worth investing in.

Specialized digital marketing agencies help small businesses cut through the noise and capitalize on the immense opportunities social media platforms offer.

#2: They Can Help You Boost Your Revenue 

For every $1 companies spend on email marketing, they can expect an average ROI of $42.

In fact, small businesses cite email marketing as one of their biggest opportunity for gaining new customers.

Besides social media, email marketing can be a highly effective tool accessible to small businesses. Yet, many choose to keep their email marketing efforts in-house.

Investing in professionally run email marketing campaigns can help small businesses increase open, click and even conversion rates.

#3: They Can Help You Lower Your Digital Marketing Cost

Eventual in-house digital marketing operations are much more costly over time than hiring a professional agency.

Unlike in-house teams, digital marketing agencies for small businesses come with no overhead and more flexible contracts, giving you more control over your investment.

#4: They Can Help You Gain A Better Understanding Of Your Buyer Persona

A buyer persona is a projected collection of common traits that permeates the general demographics (i.e. target audience of your business).

These personas are given a profiling structure, such as age, gender, location, interests, income etc. – taking the collective data of the entire segment of the audience into account.

Digital marketing agencies for small businesses analyze your audience, profiling each and every segment of it to draw deeper insights and devise effective strategies. Knowing your audience in detail makes it easier to create effective marketing campaigns, targeted at all the right people.

#5: Your Growth Is Their Top Priority

70-80% of consumers research a company online before they visit a brick and mortar small business store or make a purchase. (BlueCorona)

With their highly efficient teams, smaller client bases and accounts, small business digital marketing agencies help you optimize your internet marketing efforts, from website and on-page SEO to content marketing strategies.

#6: They Can Help You Get More Foot Traffic

46% of all Google searches have local intent.

Local, or “near me” searches are rising exponentially. Your prospective customers turn to Google maps to discover local businesses like yours.

Combining local SEO best practices and localized social media positioning, your digital marketing partner can increase your foot traffic, the number of inquiries and well product or service demo requests.

Digital marketing agencies for small businesses: the number of all Google searches that have local intent

#7: They Can Help You Remain Relevant In Your Industry

Successful digital marketing takes research and skill.

Three key points that you must know all there is to know about are:

  • Your industry
  • Your competitors
  • Your customers
  • Marketing trends and best practices

This final point is what a small business marketing agency already knows about. They will also dive into researching and identifying the previous three and giving you well-presented feedback on them.

These companies that already have a track record in your niche know how to target and analyze your target audience.

Taking their preferences, habits and behavior into account, well-adjusted marketing strategies can be conceived.

Graphic designer working on a project
When searching for the best partner, pay special attention to the agencies’ levels of expertise since not all of them excel in the same areas

How To Choose The Right Small Business Marketing Company?

The small business marketing agency you choose should be able to:

  • Implement new strategies to drive traffic to your website
  • Improve your in-house marketing by setting good examples and providing insight

The relationship between your small business and a professional online marketing agency is a two-way street: you can provide knowledge about your business (what they need) and they can deliver digital marketing know-how (what you need).

What follows are the steps you need to do on your end to make sure you have chosen the right small business marketing agency for you.

Do Extensive Research

Our agency listing above is a good starting point for your research.

This research would entail:

  • Checking their website and portfolio (don’t simply rely on the agency page on our site!)
  • Talking to their representative on the phone and arrange a meeting
  • Taking notes about every agency and comparing them
  • Looking for their client testimonials and reviews

The bottom line is:

Never go for the first digital marketing agency for small businesses that you see! Also, don’t cheat your way out of all the options by just simply going for one of the top three.

Set A Budget To Narrow Down Your Options

Being aware of your budget’s limitations is important – however, the good news is that outsourcing online marketing for a small business is quite affordable.

Even though services are tailored with a price-conscious client in mind, you still need to communicate the total cost of the agency services clearly.

When setting a budget, consider these points:

  • What services you need: What marketing channels will you be using, will there be some (re)branding needed, etc.
  • What is the projected ROI: How fast would return on investment be realized. Investing a bigger amount of money into a project that will take years to pay off might make your company financially unstable.

Knowing this will narrow your search to agencies that are the best ft, taking the pricing range into consideration as well.

Define The Services You Need

Pay special attention to the agencies’ levels of expertise. Not all of them excel in the same areas.

Your small business may need assistance in specific areas like PPC, SEO, social media management, or website design. Make sure the agency providing online marketing for small business is proficient in the set of services required for your project.

Highly valued specialist team members should be available to communicate with you at all times.

They can (should be able to) relay everything that your business can improve at the present moment and how they would go on improving it.

Find An Agency That Is Easy To Work With

Not all companies that offer digital marketing for small business allow the same level of close cooperation.

The one you opt for should have a highly defined company culture, be transparent, personable and have project management well instated in their daily workflow routine.

The detail of communication here is everything: how you relay your concerns and objectives, how much feedback they ask from you and how open they are to brainstorming together – that will make all the difference.

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10 Questions To Ask When Interviewing Small Business Marketing Companies

When meeting with representatives of a digital marketing agency for small businesses, asking the right questions will help you weed out the top of the line professionals from those that are not.

These include:

  1. What services does your agency specialize in?
  2. Do you have any previous experience working with companies in our industry and niche that you can reference?
  3. How do you manage collaboration and communication with clients and will we have regular meetings and brainstorming sessions?
  4. How do you plan to research our market and target audience and how will that affect the general strategy?
  5. How well are you up-to-speed with the latest trends in digital marketing and how do you ensure that you are?
  6. How much do your services cost and how do you form price structure?
  7. What would the timetable for handling our marketing tasks look like?
  8. How do you research what keywords we should rank for?
  9. Who are our points of contact in your team and who will be working on our project?
  10. Do you provide post-launch analytics services and are you open to measuring the results of a campaign and adjusting it where needed?
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Takeaways On Small Businesses Digital Marketing Agencies

Small business marketing companies have experience in working with small enterprises and developing strategies that allow them to achieve success online.

They offer various pricing structures. However, the most common fee is the cost per hour that starts as low as $5 and can go up to $150.

To find the best partner for your business needs:

  • Do extensive research
  • Set a budget
  • Define the services you need
  • Look for an agency that is easy to work with

Best of luck!

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