5 Steps to Grow & Scale Your Digital Marketing Agency
- Written by Brigitte Evans
Growing your business is, of course, your primary objective, but in the competitive and ever-changing world of digital marketing, business growth can be a double-edged sword. On the one hand business is booming and you’re bringing in more clients than ever before, and on the other you’re no longer able to maintain the level of quality and service that make your agency the top choice in your market. If you don’t do something quickly, you’re going to start delivering subpar results, your employees are going to get stretched too thin, and clients are going to start feeling neglected.
This is what happens when your agency starts growing too fast without you being able to compensate and scale your growth accordingly. With that in mind, today we’ll be taking a look at the essential tips that will allow you to grow and scale your marketing agency safely.
Start with an internal analysis
First things first, you have to analyze your current standing in the market and figure out how your processes, objectives, resources, and needs have changed now that you’re experiencing an influx of clients and projects. It’s important that you run a thorough internal analysis of your marketing agency to collect and collate all relevant business data into actionable reports, so that you know exactly what you should focus on in the months to come.
Otherwise, you might make the mistake of investing in your PPC department when in fact you should have brought in more SEO experts and content creators into your team. There can be no room for mistakes when you’re scaling your agency, so make sure to use your analysis to pinpoint the key areas you need to tend to right away.
To specialize or to expand your services?
There comes a time in every business leader’s career when they have to stop and consider whether it would be better to start specializing in a curated set of services, or if they should go all in and expand their offering even further. Specializing in only a couple of key services such as SEO or PPC is a great way to stay in control of your resources and your company’s growth, while expanding your services is a great way to attract even more clients to your doorstep and become one of those full-service agencies. Choose the former if you don’t want to risk getting way in over your head, and the latter if your goal is to one day develop your agency into a corporation.
Outsource your most intensive processes
Photo by S O C I A L . C U T on Unsplash
Now that you have to handle more work and more clients than ever before, it’s even more important to retain the level of quality that put your brand in the spotlight in the first place. Unfortunately, this is the point when quality starts to falter as you’re struggling to meet the new deadlines and the added workload.
One of the most cumbersome processes for a growing agency is search engine optimization, which is why working with a reliable white label SEO company would be a prudent and cost-effective idea, as you can simply outsource your extra workload in order to meet the needs of your clients and at the same time keep your in-house employees happy. Do this for all the services that are in high demand in your agency, and you will be able to maintain productivity, quality, and employee satisfaction.
Focus on employee retention
Speaking of employee satisfaction, one of the biggest problems that managers and leaders in the field of digital marketing face is employee retention during times of rapid business growth. This is because leaders are usually pressured into making their employees work more and meet increasingly shorter deadlines, while the expectations of their clients continue to rise month to month.
When this happens, people will start leaving your agency, which is why employee retention should be one of your top priorities. Make sure to answer the needs of your team members, and provide them will all of the tools they need to run an efficient and effective operation. This is also our final key point.
Leverage technology to achieve better results
When business is booming, you need to automate as many processes as you can in order to alleviate some of the pressure off of your key team members and help them focus on the complex processes that help push the company forward. Be sure to integrate automation tools for all repetitive tasks, project management tools to ensure efficiency and collaboration, and implement a comprehensive CRM tool to manage your clients with ease.
Wrapping up
Growth might be your key objective, but when your agency finally starts getting the traction it deserves, you need to know how to scale properly in order to capitalize on your sudden rise to prominence. Be sure to use these tips in order to scale your growth safely and set the stage for long-term success in your field.
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