Tips to working with marketing agencies that invest in data

Trust the data, not the guru.

How working with an experienced Marketing agency could improve your Business.

How many times have we let feedback in our own businesses that claims to be from an informed source influences us but in reality, that is the last thing it really is, it is likely an opinion and even worse, third hand feedback, someone said the other day or someone said to me just now.   What about marketing data?The truth is when it comes to marketing you need to deploy experts and need to have data to back up decisions and to be proactive with that information and that comes with cold hard data. Compare competition and examine market and never doubt your assets or decisions, always move forwards. There are no secrets, only decisions to be made and your data and ground floor conversions are all relative to your online traffic.

If we as marketing agencies took preference of dubious sources of ‘feedback’ or even armchair ‘guru’ as gospel over data how misleading could that really be for your business.  Imagine veering off a strategy on a whim or a passing comment.  Resist friends and competitor’s analysis, it will likely always be knee jerk reactions and it’s your customer journey that is important, don’t knee jerk to knee jerk!

Feedback is crucial, but how we collect it is important as the decision to act on it and when to. Never prompt for feedback is a good idea and study user trends over time, finding out if that trend is converting or another opportunity to do so is even more crucial, keep on pursuing more avenues to harness traffic and customers, keep achieving growth. Remember GDPR? It not only proved a lot of companies just simply didn’t know where they got our data from, a large number of companies encouraged people to subscribe from them – wow.

Bear in mind someone who needs a marketing strategy but is also an expert at it, is not a listener – so position your insights carefully and rely on data to make structured approaches to adjusting strategies. Avoid the guru and look closely at facts and marketing data, trusted sources and listen to proven experts in their field, not experts in talking about being experts. Data, data, data and collect it at every touch point!

Data is the only true entity you can rely on and drill down into your conversion process so objectively identify any broken links in the chain with your customer journey in the real world. Know your customers and take confidence in the traffic and market you have, that data screams loud and clear – traffic and engagement leads to business, on and off line.

So how does that relate to choosing a marketing agency that will work for you?

1. Choose an agency that relies on data and can access at different levels in addition to being creative and having a wide skilled set. Look for a firm that can look at data from analytics through to competitor analysis and can suggest everything from content to reasons why that route over other types will generate more leads.

2. Choose an agency that has proven experience in working with tough markets and are competition driven but client centric. The only player in the room is your business so for that reason look for loyalty.

3. Non-compete ethics. It is impossible to truly rank your business without capitalising on your competitors. For that reason, choose an agency that does not also have a similar client like yourselves and is prepared to do background research before engaging.

4. Work long term, work with an agency that is looking to work for you long term and can set out tier levels and constantly bring you up. The online world is changing every day and a good agency will appreciate and explain that and also point out your rankings need to be earned and that takes time.

5. Look for an agency that is in the right space for you. The agency has a business model too. Find a good balance between billing hours or project fees and expectancies of service and what that time really entails to your business.

Icarus Communications Ltd are a client focussed marketing agency with deliverables of website design, marketing campaigns and strategies, advertising and content creation. We also rely a lot on marketing data and not so much on prophecies.

If you would like our advice or to engage with us, please do contact us on projects@icaruscommunications.co.uk or owen@icaruscommunications.co.uk