How to Hire an Email Marketing Agency

How can an email marketing company help businesses grow?

They help businesses grow by improving revenue per send, conversion rates, and customer retention, mostly through better targeting, automation, and optimization.

Many businesses begin on a free plan to validate their audience. Agencies help transition from basic newsletters under a free plan to revenue-driving automation, segmentation, and lifecycle strategies.

According to the ZeroBounce report, 93% of people use email every day, and many say it actively improves their shopping experience.

For a small business, email marketing often delivers one of the highest returns compared to paid advertising channels.

Higher customer engagement leads directly to improved retention, repeat purchases, and lifetime value.

Email marketing agencies turn email into a measurable revenue channel

In Litmus' State of Email 2025 findings, 35% of marketing leaders report $10-$36 returned per $1 spent, 30% report $36-$50 returned per $1spent, and 5% report $50+ returned per $1 spent.

They build automations that outperform "one-off" campaigns

Unlike scheduled (non-automated) email campaigns, automated emails show:

• 52% higher open rates
• 332% higher click rates
• 2,361% better conversion rates

In eCommerce datasets, automated emails drove 37% of email-generated sales while accounting for 2% of email volume, according to the Omnisend report.

Email marketing firms increase revenue with segmentation and personalization

• Segmented campaigns can deliver a 760% increase in revenue, according to Campaign Monitor.
• Among marketers who segment, 39% report better open rates and 24% report more sales leads.

By testing different email template variations and layouts, top email marketing agencies improve customer engagement and optimize conversion performance over time.

They recover sales lost to cart abandonment

The Baymard Institute reports that the average documented online cart abandonment is 70.22%.

• According to Contentsquare, cart abandonment emails often show strong performance: 39.07% opens, 23.33% CTR, and 10.7% conversion rate.
• Klaviyo's abandoned-cart benchmarks report $3.65 revenue per recipient and 3.33% placed order rate for abandoned cart flows.

Statistics show that nearly 4.5 billion people worldwide used email in 2025, and this number is projected to reach over 4.8 billion by 2027. This scale is one of the main reasons email marketing companies continue to deliver strong, measurable ROI across industries.

Expand reach with multi-channel strategies

The synergy between email and SMS marketing matters:

• Email is great for detailed storytelling, newsletters, and rich content.
• SMS excels in immediacy, alerts, and real-time engagement.

Using both strategically increases opportunities for touchpoints, meaning customers see your message in multiple places and multiple contexts, which improves brand recall and conversion likelihood.

What's the difference between an email marketing company and a full-service digital agency?

Email marketing companies offer deep specialization in one channel (email), driving higher engagement and conversions through targeted campaigns and automation.

Full-service digital agencies offer a broad marketing strategy across many digital channels, aiming for unified brand growth and audience reach.

More specifically, these two types of agencies differ in the following:

What is the average return on investment (ROI) of email marketing?

The most-cited average benchmark is $36 returned for every $1 spent, which equals 3600% ROI.

Email marketing ROI also varies widely across industries.

The Litmus report shows the following ROI by industry figures:

• Retail/eCommerce/consumer goods: 45:1
• Marketing, PR, and advertising agency: 42:1
• Software and technology: 36:1
• Media/publishing/events/sports/entertainment: 32:1

Average ROI is high, but outcomes depend on execution

Litmus found that 41% of businesses use direct revenue attribution to email campaigns, while many still rely on engagement metrics like opens/clicks (59%).

DMA's Email Benchmarking Report from 2025 reports 98% delivery, 35.9% open rate, and 2.3% unique click rate, which is a useful context for what healthy programs can look like.

How do I find a B2B email marketing agency on DesignRush that fits my budget?

We have created a list of email marketing firms for you to choose from based on the different budget ranges they're offering:

Beyond the project budget, our agency directory lets you filter agency profiles by area of expertise, location, agency reviews, client types, and team size.

What questions should I ask agencies before signing a contract?

We suggest you ask email marketing firms the following questions before you sign the contract:

Relevant Background

1. What measurable results have you achieved for clients similar to us?
2. What industries do you specialize in?
3. How do you measure and report ROI?
4. Who will manage our account, and what is their experience level?

Services and Processes

1. What specific services are included in your scope?
2. How do you approach segmentation and personalization?
3. What marketing automation workflows do you build?
4. Have you helped companies migrate from a free plan to a scalable email marketing system?

Related to Your Project

1. How will you improve our current metrics?
2. How do you ensure deliverability and compliance?
3. What KPIs will define success for our engagement?
4. What are the contract terms, pricing structure, and exit options?

Sources

DesignRush sustains a directory of over 40,000 agencies categorized by service category, location, expertise, and reviews. We build our database in two ways:

• Our dedicated team of agency experts actively searches the web for top-performing companies. We then pull information from their websites, online presence, and client testimonials to verify their status and qualifications prior to listing.
• The agencies listed get notified of their profiles on the website and they can choose to claim it or not, which suggests their availability for more collaborations.

Agencies can also reach out to DesignRush and must go through the verification process prior to being listed.