How do you follow marketing strategies? Are you partnered up with an agency, or do you have an in-house marketing team?
Marketing is a hit-and-trial game, but its volatility can be reduced by collaborating with industry experts to help you with the best strategies. So, let’s look at the difference between in-house marketing and agency marketing to figure out which one you should go with!
To start this discussion, we must first see how you can distinguish between in-house and agency marketing.
In-house marketing – In-house advertising agency includes building an internal marketing team to develop, manage, and maintain your company’s marketing strategies. A study showed that 69% of junior or mid-level marketers seek in-house roles.
Agency Marketing – Agencies provide your company with an external marketing team, using various online marketing strategies to grow your business. So this includes experts in the marketing field, directly catering to your business’s needs.
Let’s look at some of the advantages and disadvantages of in-house advertising and agencies to find out which suits your needs the most!
As mentioned before, in-house marketing relies heavily on recruiting people with a base in marketing and then building a separate team for them. Its advantages are as follows:
Your internal team will know your brand, and their marketing decisions will be based on your resources.
Since the team is in your vicinity, it is much easier for you to break the communication barriers that might arise due to non-proximity.
In-house marketers will be focused only on your marketing strategies, unlike agencies that will have to cater to the needs of other marketers as well.
The disadvantages of in-house marketing include:
To build an internal marketing team, you’ll need to select people who are the best in the industry and spend higher time in recruitment.
Maintaining an in-house marketing team will require you to spend on talent acquisition and salaries of the employees.
While a whole team will be dedicated to only your operations, it might limit the team’s creativity and will negatively affect growth opportunities.
You’ll be required to make a costly initial investment in terms of technology and other SEO tools for web development, graphic designing, etc.
Scaling marketing efforts is necessary for your business but it might get hampered due to the limited no. of team members (everyone has their specialty) and resources.
Like a coin, even when you employ marketing strategies, there are two sides with different characteristics that affect your outcome. The advantages of agency marketing include:
• Experts everywhere – agencies like ours have the most experienced team players to focus on specific strategies you might want. They understand the market better than an in-house advertising agency.
• Technology presence – Unlike in-house marketing, you won’t have to spend extra money to acquire the best marketing tools as these players already have them!
• Diverse specialties – Agencies have team members specialized in the areas of social media, paid advertising, SEO, web design, etc. You will be able to access all the benefits.
• Cost optimization – While selecting an agency, you can design your marketing plan according to your budget. You won’t have the same flexibility in-house.
Furthermore, agencies are good at scaling up businesses as well, as they have better expertise and resources. The disadvantages are as follows:
• Multiple clients – Agencies work with multiple firms so you might feel neglected at times. However, working with a client-focused agency will not give you the same impression.
• Location & Control – As the workers will not be in your vicinity, you might feel there is a lack of control and the presence of communication barriers.
When it comes to agency marketing though, the disadvantages are overcome mainly by the nature of the agency you’ll be partnering up with. Still confused? We’ll help you out.
According to LinkedIn, 87% of surveyed sales and marketing leaders mentioned that collaboration between sales and marketing helps a business grow.
While choosing between in-house marketing vs agency, you need to see whether the synchronization is present between marketing and sales or not. You should make your decisions by looking over:
• Your budget – The lower budget will mean benefits in partnering up with an agency.
• Scaling and results – a marketing agency has better expertise to deliver quicker results.
• Effective marketing strategy – You need a competitive edge in the industry and a better marketing strategy from experts.
It’s quite simple to figure this out. If you are a very small business, you might want to just practice basic marketing by yourself. But if you want to grow further, hiring an agency might be better for you to scale up your business and manage a team within lower budgets. In-house marketing is generally helpful for a larger business that has the time, money, and other resources to spend on it.
Now, you know your business the best. So don’t worry and patiently decide which practice will be the best for you. Don’t forget we are always one click away if you decide you would want to partner with us and take the world by storm!
Bright Brain is a Digital Marketing and Advertising Agency with a focus on building digital solutions for Branding and Increased Sales efficiency. Our expertise includes Digital Advertising, Campaign must-have Engine Optimization, Search Engine Marketing, Social Media Marketing, Web Development, and Online Branding. Our Google Partnership brings a unique opportunity to work with the internal team at Google, adding even more value to our team & clients.
Suhail Bajaj is the CEO of BrightBrain Marketing Technologies LLP that has now grown into a full-fledged digital marketing agency with 55+ employees and clients from 7+ countries – all under his supervision. Graduated with an MBA from the esteemed Cass Business School, he brilliantly puts his learnings into practice, helping brands meet their business goals and succeed in a digital-first world.
