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Deciding on an agency for content marketing is often a tough choice to make, and that’s mainly because:
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Hiring one will cost — at least — $3,000 per month. Cost depends on your project scope and the agency, so you want one that won’t waste all that money, but will actually deliver ROI.
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This decision will be a major part of your company’s entire marketing process (and the results from that process).
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It involves checking out a myriad of content marketing agencies to select only one.
To give you some perspective, the popular marketing agency directory Clutch currently has nearly 15,000 content marketing agencies on their platform:
And that’s just Clutch. There are other directories with many other content marketing agencies. So narrowing them down can be a real hassle.
While you’re looking, keep in mind that there are two main types of agencies you’ll encounter:
(1) Partners
(2) Vendors
Ideally, you want to work with an agency that’s a partner, not one that’s just a vendor.
“What’s the difference between a partner and a vendor?”
A vendor would simply have packages and a generalized approach they’ll use for all clients that, usually, can’t be customized to suit your goals.
Conversely, a partner is focused on the goals you’re trying to achieve so they can — as much as possible — build a custom strategy for your business. Here are two examples of what a typical conversation with a partner vs. a vendor looks like.
Example 1: A typical conversation with a vendor
You: “We need to increase traffic for our business. How can you help us?”
Vendor: “We