10 Questions to Ask Before Hiring a Marketing Agency or fCMO

By Sara Nay, CEO at Duct Tape Advertising

For those who’re hiring a advertising company or fractional CMO, these 10 questions will enable you consider their priorities, processes, and the way they deal with purchasers earlier than signing any contract.

Lately, I spoke with two small enterprise homeowners who jogged my memory why this subject issues. One is locked right into a three-year, $8,000/month web optimization contract they barely perceive. One other pays $10,000/month for Google Advertisements however doesn’t even personal their advert account. Small companies deserve higher. This submit is about serving to you’re taking again management of your advertising.

The most effective advertising companies for small companies lead with transparency, strategic considering, and collaboration; not simply tactical deliverables and fancy metrics. If they will’t reply these questions clearly, preserve trying.

10 Inquiries to Ask Earlier than Hiring A Advertising Company:

1. Who Owns My Accounts and Data?
2. How Do You Define Success?
3. How Do You Connect Tactics to Strategy?
4. What Happens If I Want to End the Contract?
5. Who Will I Work With Day to Day?
6. Can I See a Sample Report?
7. How Do You Use AI vs. Human Expertise?
8. How Will You Collaborate With My Team?
9. What’s Your Strategy Process?
10. Will You Teach Me Along the Way?

1. Who Owns My Accounts and Knowledge?

Purple flag: If it’s not you, stroll away.

When outsourcing your advertising, your advert accounts, CRM, analytics, and e mail lists ought to all the time stay your mental property.

If an company insists on creating every part below their very own logins or refuses to provide you full entry, that’s not a partnership.

Why it issues: For those who ever need to transition suppliers or convey issues in-house, you shouldn’t have to begin from scratch or lose years of information.

Professional tip: Insist on establishing your individual accounts and giving the company entry, not the opposite means round.

A superb place to begin for guaranteeing account possession:

• Google Advertisements: The advertiser ought to have admin on the advert account and grant the company entry by means of a supervisor (MCC). Possession entry may be revoked by unlinking. Google Help
• Meta Advertisements (Fb & Instagram): What you are promoting ought to personal the Meta Enterprise Suite and advert accounts and the company must be a associate, not the account proprietor.
• Analytics: Create the GA4 account below your authorized entity. The account owns the information for its properties. Google Help
• Reporting: Require direct logins and exportable reviews. No screenshots solely.
• Contracts: Spell out who owns inventive, advert accounts, audiences, and CRM lists.

2. How Do You Outline Success, and How Typically Do We Evaluation It?

Purple flag: They give attention to clicks, impressions, or follower counts with out tying these numbers to enterprise outcomes.

At Duct Tape Marketing, we name these self-importance metrics. They make a report look good, however they don’t transfer the needle for your enterprise.

A superb associate defines success round outcomes that matter to your enterprise: certified leads, constant gross sales, and buyer lifetime worth. In addition they evaluate outcomes with you on an everyday schedule so you may make good changes collectively.

So, what do you have to really observe? Right here’s an instance of what that may seem like;

• Prime of the Marketing Hourglass™ (Know, Like, Belief): Deal with visibility and consciousness. Measure the place your guests come from, which channels drive natural progress, and the way your model presence is increasing.
• Center of the Advertising Hourglass (Attempt, Purchase): Take note of engagement and conversion exercise. Observe which campaigns or channels generate leads, kind submissions, or significant interactions, not simply web site site visitors.
• Backside of the Advertising Hourglass (Repeat, Refer): Join advertising exercise to gross sales and retention. Watch metrics like buyer acquisition price, repeat purchases, referrals, and total profitability to see which efforts ship actual outcomes.

When your metrics reflect business goals, you’ll be able to see what’s working, what’s not, and the place to focus subsequent and also you don’t want a PhD to investigate it.

3. How Do You Join Ways to Technique?

Purple flag: They will’t clarify how a weblog submit or an advert marketing campaign suits right into a broader plan.

Too many entrepreneurs promote duties: a brand new web site, a funnel, or social media administration. However and not using a technique, it’s simply noise.

A robust associate will bridge the hole between strategic marketing vs tactical marketing, guaranteeing each tactic helps an outlined enterprise aim.

4. What Occurs If I Wish to Finish the Contract?

Purple flag: Lengthy lock-in intervals, excessive cancellation charges, or obscure off-boarding processes.

One of many largest marketing agency red flags is unclear cancellation insurance policies or hidden off-boarding charges. Transparency must be the baseline. A assured, skilled advertising associate will make it straightforward to half methods and received’t maintain your enterprise hostage.

Ask this query early and get the reply in writing. A good settlement ought to embody:

• A transparent termination clause that outlines how and when both celebration can finish the contract.
• Affordable discover phrases (for instance, 30 days) so either side can plan for a clean transition.
• Outlined deliverables and possession rights that make it clear you keep entry to your information, inventive property, and advertising platforms.
• An off-boarding course of that covers the handoff of accounts, passwords, and ongoing campaigns.
• No extreme penalties for ending the connection earlier than the renewal date.

The aim is mutual accountability, not restriction. A reliable associate must be assured sufficient of their outcomes to allow you to stroll away with out pointless obstacles. It’s finest to do month to month or quarterly contract lengths if potential.

5. Who Will I Truly Work With Day to Day?

Purple flag: The senior strategist who bought you on the engagement disappears after the deal is signed.

You need to know who’s executing your advertising and the way a lot expertise they’ve. When working with a advertising company, be certain that the strategist you meet throughout gross sales is identical one managing your account.

Request an introduction to your precise account supervisor or strategist earlier than you commit.

6. Can I See a Pattern of Your Reporting?

Purple flag: They keep away from displaying actual reviews or solely supply screenshots.

You don’t should be an information analyst, however you do want reporting that is sensible to you.If the information is simply too advanced, irrelevant, or unclear then you definately received’t use it.

Clear, actionable advertising efficiency reporting is non-negotiable; you deserve reviews you’ll be able to really perceive and use.

7. How Do You Use AI, and What’s Nonetheless Human-Led?

Purple flag: Both excessive from “We use no AI” to “The whole lot is automated.”

AI is right here to remain, and good entrepreneurs use AI to amplify strategic thinking not substitute it.

Ask immediately: how companies use AI in advertising and bear in mind a balanced associate blends automation with human perception for smarter execution.

Ask how they use AI instruments for analysis, content material, or evaluation, and the way they keep a human, strategic oversight.

8. How Will You Collaborate With My Group?

Purple flag: They function in a silo or deal with your inner workforce as an afterthought.

Your advertising associate ought to combine together with your workforce; whether or not it’s your gross sales workers, inner designers, or customer support reps.

Search for somebody who values collaboration, communication, and readability.

9. What’s Your Course of for Creating Technique Earlier than Execution?

Purple flag: They soar straight into ways and not using a clear course of for discovery, positioning, and planning.

At Duct Tape Advertising, strategy always comes first. Constructing a advertising technique with any strategic company ought to all the time begin with figuring out very best purchasers, model messaging, and the client journey earlier than any ways start.

If a associate skips this, they’re promoting execution, not outcomes.

You may ask them to stroll you thru their concept of a advertising technique step-by -step, use the marketing strategy pyramid to assist information you.

10. What Will You Educate Me Alongside the Method?

Purple flag: They need to preserve you at nighttime, making you extra dependent over time.

Nice companions make you smarter. They enable you perceive what’s working, why it’s working, and how one can suppose extra strategically about your enterprise.

This doesn’t imply doing all of it your self. Nevertheless it does imply being in management and knowledgeable.

Let’s Increase the Normal

The advertising trade has a transparency downside. Too typically, small companies are left questioning what they’re paying for or worse, feeling trapped in relationships that don’t serve them.

But when extra enterprise homeowners begin asking these 10 questions, the trade can have no alternative however to stage up.

You deserve a associate who leads with technique, acts with integrity, and delivers not simply the outcomes you need however readability on what these outcomes imply to you.

Earlier than you signal your subsequent contract, print these questions out. Deliver them to the decision. Watch how the solutions shift your confidence and your readability.

Desire a Confirmed Course of That Places Technique First?

That’s what we do each day at Duct Tape Marketing.For those who’re on the lookout for a easy, sensible, and efficient system, we’re right here. Let’s discuss.

Learn More About Our Strategy First Engagement

FAQs

Why are these questions necessary for small enterprise homeowners?

As a result of advertising can simply develop into a black field.These questions are designed to convey readability and management again to the enterprise proprietor guaranteeing you get outcomes, not only a flurry of exercise.

What if a advertising associate can’t reply a few of these questions?

That’s a crimson flag. The most effective companions have thought deeply about their course of, reporting, collaboration, and technique.In the event that they fumble or keep away from these matters, it could mirror a scarcity of expertise or transparency.

How typically ought to I revisit these questions as soon as I’ve employed somebody?

Ideally, throughout quarterly evaluations. These questions don’t simply enable you select a associate they are going to enable you handle that relationship over time.

Is it okay to ask these earlier than even having a discovery name?

Sure; in truth, we suggest it. Share them forward of time or use them as a part of your vetting course of.A severe, assured supplier will welcome them.