Hiring a Marketing Manager vs. a Marketing Agency

Author: Rachel Durkan Category: B2B, B2C, E-commerce & Retail, Healthcare & Life Science, Industry, Marketing, Membership Marketing, Nonprofit, Technology & SAAS Date: April 7, 2017

No matter what type of business you have, no matter the size, the industry, or the location, your business will need to be marketed. Marketing is a vital component to growing your business or taking it to the next level. Whether it’s through word-of-mouth, digital advertising, or direct mail campaigns, if you have a business, letting people know about it is important to its success. Therefore, most businesses include a marketing budget in their overall business strategy.

One of the many decisions that companies must decide is how to spend their marketing dollars. For many start-ups, the dollar needs to get maximized because the budget starts out typically small. Even for larger, well-established businesses, the marketing dollar should be maximized regardless of budget size. Many small and medium sized businesses struggle with the idea of whether to hire one full-time marketing person to manage daily marketing ideas and execution, or outsourcing their marketing efforts to an agency. Here are the pro’s and con’s of hiring a marketing manager versus a marketing agency.

Hiring a Marketing Manager vs. Marketing Agency

Time

When you have one dedicated person responsible for all marketing tasks from developing the e-mail list to coming up with a campaign strategy to handling social media marketing to designing flyers, this person can get overwhelmed with tasks – especially timely to dos. This might cause quality to decrease a bit as well. With an outsourced marketing agency, their responsibility is to provide you with what you need when you need it. They are not distracted by additional tasks as they have a team handling every little bit of the work. You can always count on deadlines being met with a marketing agency.

Cost

This is obviously one of the main reasons why a company may choose to hire someone in-house or an outside agency. If you have a certain budget, the cost factor could swing either way. An eager, younger, marketing-savvy person could be a better option for you if your budget is on the lower side. But, with that you aren’t always getting a very experienced marketing person. You could take the risk, nonetheless. Let’s do a cost breakdown for a minute:

Full-Time Marketing Manager = $40,000-$60,000 Salary

This does not include additional taxes, healthcare, 401k matches, and other benefits.

Monthly Retainer from a Marketing Agency = $2,500 or $30,000 Annually

This is all-inclusive with no hidden fees, taxes, etc. Just a flat expense.

Every monthly marketing retainer is customized for your business and your needs. So, you’ll always be sure to know that your marketing dollars will yield the highest return on investment possible.

Expertise

When you hire someone as a marketing manager in-house, you are choosing which level of expertise you can afford. You have a specific budget in mind, and for that budget, you want the best value. The most expert options may not fall within your budget though. Not to mention, someone may be an expert in one facet of marketing while lacking the skills in another. For instance, a social media expert may lack design skills. If choosing to hire a marketing agency, you are still looking at your budget, but within the agency, they have their own experts in each facet of marketing. You’ll get a strategist, a designer, a web coder, a social media manager, and more. No matter your budget, you’re still getting experts for all areas of marketing.

Location

A marketing manager will most likely be located in your office. They will know the ins and outs of the business just from being on-hand. An agency will most likely not be located in your office and must be communicated with regularly through phone, e-mail, video chat or in-person meetings.

Turnover

Hiring an employee always poses some sort of turnover risk, and turnover is pricey. Not only does it cause a disruption in the productivity, but you must re-train every time you hire someone new for the job. This can cause time and money. With a marketing agency, you do not have to worry about turnover as your agency is committed to you through a contract. Their own turnover is their issue and no matter what happens there, your work won’t cost more and there will be less of a chance for slowed progress.

So, whether you decide to hire in-house or outsource a marketing agency, your conclusion will probably be based on these factors. If you have any questions about what a marketing agency can provide for you, please feel free to reach out to a Paradigm Marketing and Design team member today and we’ll be happy to speak with you.