Finding an agency to fit all of your needs can be difficult. For your average marketing campaign, you do not need a thousand-person agency. When it comes to finding the perfect marketing agency for your brand, bigger may not always be better. In the marketing world, that is not always the case. Agencies come in all shapes and sizes, and each agency has its own personal advantages that come with working with them.
We spoke with some of the industry’s leading experts that work at small agencies on what advantages they provide. We then created a comprehensive guide of what researchers believe to be beneficial about working with a small agency.
Small Agencies Provide Individualized Attention to Their Clients
Working with a small agency has many benefits, but most of all is the personal attention and handholding service that shines above all. At larger agencies, it is common for employees to balance multiple clients projects at once, which can mean having too much work on their plate. This could prevent employees from fully investing themselves into each project individually. This could also result in the staff completing the bare minimum amount of required work and then move onto the next project.
On the other hand, to a small agency, each client is a mega-client. Smaller agencies consist of very dedicated teams who devote 100% of their time and efforts. Smaller agencies can provide each client with personalized attention from every employee because they have fewer clients. This allows each employee to become fully focused on every aspect of their client’s needs.
“Small agencies do not adopt a factory-based mentality, and since they are small, they can hone in on the exact clients they wish to work with and provide the much-needed detail for each project.”
– Andrew Rudister, Lead Technology Coordinator, MAXBURST
Smaller Agencies Have a Tighter Culture
The concept of culture can cover many facets, but at its core, it primarily conveys how an agency’s staff feels and interacts day-to-day. At a larger agency, the work environment is constantly high-paced and deadline-driven. When a culture is like this, it is likely that designers and developers are constantly stressed out, and it will suppress their creativity.
In contrast, employees at smaller agencies work closely together in teams to produce the best results for their clients. When a small group of people works closely together, having a tight and strong company culture is very valuable to employee engagement and creativity. Every employee is inspired by their agency’s mission and is excited to come to work to produce incredible projects for their clients.
The dedication presented by a small agency’s staff goes a step further than satisfying their clients. Team members support each other and learn from each other’s successes and mistakes. This helps these teams build strong relationships with colleagues at all levels.
“If everyone feels supported and heard, then they feel more comfortable sharing, which impacts the work we do. It leads to better conversations, easier paths to working together to solve any issues, being empathetic to others – even if we don’t agree – and creating good energy around our team.”
– David Klineberg, President/Partner, Response Marketing
Smaller Agencies Have a Quick Turnaround
Small agencies engage in candid, direct discussions with clients to clearly align on both business and marketing objectives that help drive campaign and program efficiency by remaining focused on the right objectives. By not losing sight of the end result and less red tape to have to work through, small agencies are able to deliver amazing results in reasonable time frames.
With bigger agencies, there are long chains of communication and processes to wade through prior to finalizing a project. Therefore, a quick turnaround is not always feasible. Smaller agencies are much more flexible and agile when it comes to delivering fast results. As mentioned above, to a smaller agency every client is a mega-client, and usually the team’s main focus. Employees of small agencies can move mountains in short periods of time when needed.
“Our smaller teams move quickly to solve problems and work more closely with clients to deliver exactly what they want the first time. A smaller team also means we’re faster to respond and adapt a strategy or project to meet shifting demands.”
– Ben Duchesney, SEO Strategist, 3 Media Web
Price/Budget
Despite the number of resources a large agency may have, small agencies will do anything to make sure their clients are satisfied, because client satisfaction is the way smaller agencies survive and thrive.
Like mentioned before, your average campaign doesn’t require a thousand-person agency and all of the overhead that requires. With smaller agencies, there are fewer middlemen, which means less talking, more doing.
Small agencies know they must deliver the best results on smaller budgets. Thankfully, one of the greatest strengths of a small agency is efficiency. Clients are able to get more bang for their buck when working with smaller agencies.
“As a small agency, we have the flexibility to customize our solutions and approach to client needs instead of forcing every brand into a one size fits all scenario. We apply operational efficiencies based on our expertise while ensuring the details fit the individual client.”
– Ashleigh Coffie, Marketing Communications Manager, Response Media
Final Thoughts
There are advantages to working with both large and small agencies, depending on the tasks and skills needed for your brand’s campaign. You can benefit by partnering with a smaller agency and still receive incredible results for a reasonable budget.
You can use Agency Spotter to find agencies to partner with. Agency Spotter has a variety of searching filters on our site, including agency size. Feel free to explore the many top agencies that are listed on our site and find the agency that provides what you need for your brand’s next big project.
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