What to Look for in a Social Media Marketing Agency

When researching the right social media marketing agency, many companies overlook key strategies that take their social media beyond a popularity contest and build their customer base instead. Here’s what to look out for before partnering with a new social media agency:

Evaluate Their Success

The best place to start is by looking at an agency’s social profiles on the platforms where you want to grow most. For example, if your primary focus is Instagram and Facebook, then any social media agency with less than 5,000 Instagram followers or 1,000 Facebook Likes should be an immediate red flag. Most agencies indeed put their client's achievements before their own, but if they're not able to get their social strategy to work for themselves, then you can’t rely on them to magically make it work for you.

Next, look into the agency’s case studies. Examine the results they’ve already achieved for clients. Right off the bat, you'll want to know whether they have experience in your industry or a comparable industry. Effective social media marketing extends beyond the measurables that are publicly visible on a page or profile. The real success comes when social media marketing partners drive results that move the needle for your business. Look at how an agency communicates results. What Key Performance Indicators (KPI) do they highlight, and how does that data reflect the goals that your business wants to achieve?

Look for the behind-the-scenes value that they deliver. Your social media budget should produce more than likes and followers. Engagement is great and it helps to beef up your exposure, but quality leads and conversions are what really matter. Depending on the game plan in place, they also signal that your overall digital marketing strategy is working. When inquiring about a potential agency, understand how an agency provides value to your business beyond engagement. What ways do they move the needle for their clientele, and at the end of the day do they deliver leads that convert?

How Do They Achieve Results?

Every social media marketing agency should have a unique set of core strategic processes that they put in place to carry out their social advertising and content marketing. When doing your research check out the kinds of organic engagement they get for the different types of content they’ve posted. This provides insight into their ability to connect with a brand’s target audience.

Does the agency treat each platform individually? Check for little things like optimized images for each platform. The content that resonates on LinkedIn may not connect with Instagram users, so the approach for each platform should be tailored to each platform's respective audience.

Get insight into the strategic processes they carry out to achieve results. An agency’s targeting capabilities are quite possibly the most significant indicator of their ability to deliver the results you want.

Do They Provide ROI-Positive Results?

A social media agency won’t just hand over their secret sauce, but any local marketing agency or major ad agency partner should help you understand why they do what they do. Especially as it pertains to achieving your social media goals.

Establishing brand unity within your digital marketing strategy across social media platforms keeps your messaging consistent and your credibility unhindered. Relevant brands influence the masses. In many ways, relevance is the most valuable form of social currency, especially on social networks. Regardless of the platform, achieving lasting brand relevance requires a targeted approach that’s constantly refreshed.

Achieving better ROI for your social media marketing requires expert guidance. When inquiring about an agency’s services, ask about their targeting strategy when running Instagram and Facebook ad campaigns. And better yet, what will they do to make sure that your perfect prospects will see and engage with those ads. Proficient hyper-targeted and geo-targeted strategies create ROI positive social media advertising opportunities.

Require a Proven Track Record

Go beyond improving your brand’s social engagement and brand awareness. Your business needs more than frequent thumb-stopping social media content to drive your content marketing strategy. There are plenty of social profiles out there with stellar content that nobody knows about because they’re not visible to the people who are primed to become brand evangelists. Just posting doesn’t deliver results or benefit your bottom line. You need more than an active feed. An effective social media marketing strategy works alongside other marketing channels to truly grow your audience. Reap the benefits of proven strategies that strengthen your brand’s influence and relevance with an omnichannel approach. An experienced social media firm understands how your social media fits within your overall digital marketing strategy and will work with you to manage your content and social ads strategy to deliver better marketing results via social media.

Lasting growth for your company should accelerate with a specialized team of social media experts and strategic content marketers. Agencies are often better equipped to create social media campaigns and contribute expert insight than in-house employees. It also doesn’t hurt that for a fraction of the annual costs of hiring in-house employees, you can get an entire team of experts with an agency.

We’ve spent the last 10+ years multiplying audiences, driving traffic that converts and supercharging sales to grow businesses across a variety of industries. Time and time again, we deliver 2-3x the results of our clients’ previous agency partnerships or in-house social media marketing efforts. Consider partnering with a social media marketing agency that also has full-service capabilities. Why? Because social media may be all the marketing your business needs today, but as your business experiences new successes you’ll also likely want a more robust digital presence, smart search advertising, an evolved brand, and maybe even a new website that better converts the increased traffic to your website. To learn more about how we can deliver a better return on your social media marketing budget, give us a shout.