What Does a Digital Marketing Agency Do?

Before we dig into what a Digital Marketing Agency could do for your organization, let’s take a look at the transformation in buyer behavior over the past handful of years. Let’s start with a simple, fun example, the largest online shopping organization, Amazon. In 1996, Amazon generated $15 million in sales; the company generated $515 billion last year. 

A second fun fact is that with Amazon’s stock at $140 a share at the time of this writing, it means a $10,000 investment a little over 25 years ago would now be worth (get this…) $16,454,196. For those of you keeping score at home, we’re talking about an aggregate return of 164,607%. Yeah, I missed buying the stock in 1999 too. ☹

Secondly, roughly 3.5% of all sales were conducted online; today, that number is 15%, and as you can see by Statistica’s chart below, we can assume that number will only increase. It is anticipated that retail e-commerce sales will experience a significant increase of 56% in the coming years, ultimately reaching approximately 8.1 trillion dollars by 2026. (Source: Statista’s worldwide retail ecommerce sales statistics) Amazon is the largest online retailer in the world. Amazon had 3,161.64 million monthly visitors in 2022. (Source: Statista’s data about online retail)

Hopefully, with those two simple facts, we’ve established that online sales are growing and will likely continue to grow. In addition, we understand that you likely know that an increasing amount of shopping research is done online as well.

McKinsey forecasts that online sales will account for 31% of total B2B sales by 2024, up from 20%

Let’s look at 7 additional facts that may impact how you will handle your digital marketing strategy from Zippia – one of the best site for aggregating digital marketing data:

1. 29.7% of business conducted in the US is done online – For context, just ten years ago, in 2012, only 19.3% of business was conducted online, and 20 years ago, in 2002, that number was merely 9%
2. 60% of shoppers start their online product research with a search engine
3. 62% of customers share online deals with their friends
4. Websites with localized content are 2.67 times more likely to generate sales 
5. 69% of Americans shop online, with 25% doing so at least once per month
6. 92% of consumers visit a business’ website for the first time for a reason other than making a purchase
7. 85.9% of Millennials make purchases online.
8. Businesses with a blog experience 126% higher lead growth – Blogs also include benefits like 55% more page visits, 97% more inbound links, and 434% more indexed pages, to name a few

For our B2B clients that often push back against creating an online sales presence and are putting their marketing dollars back into events, face-to-face sales presentations, and traditional advertising, McKinsey forecasts that online sales will account for 31% of total B2B sales by 2024, up from 20%. McKinsey further suggests that having a robust e-commerce capability is no longer an optional extra for B2B merchants. Brands that haven’t already built out their digital commerce operations should work to do so or risk being left behind.

Unfortunately, many organizations have been slow to adapt, losing customers and sales to competitors who have embraced selling online. This blog post will discuss what we mean by “embracing” digital marketing and how an agency partnership may provide the competitive advantage your organization needs to beat your competitors online.

What You Should Expect from a Digital Marketing Agency 

Ok, let’s get started. What a Digital Marketing Agency does for its client organization is a gargantuan question that is constantly expanding and evolving. That said, let’s start with a general definition; fundamentally, companies collaborate with digital marketing agencies for their expertise in online marketing. These agencies possess knowledge of the latest trends, best practices, and tools and strategies required for achieving digital marketing success. 

That is the umbrella answer to the question of what a digital marketing agency does; now, let’s define 15 specific tasks that a typical digital marketing agency can handle.

1. Search Engine Optimization (SEO): Optimizing websites to improve their visibility and rankings on search engine result pages.
2. Pay-Per-Click Advertising (PPC): Managing and optimizing paid advertising campaigns, such as Google Ads or social media ads, to drive targeted traffic to a website.
3. Social Media Marketing (SMM): Creating and managing social media accounts and campaigns to engage with the target audience, build brand awareness, and drive website traffic.
4. Content Marketing: Developing and promoting valuable, relevant, and consistent content to attract and retain a clearly defined audience, with the goal of driving profitable customer actions.
5. Email Marketing: Designing and executing email campaigns to reach and nurture leads, promote products/services, and drive customer engagement and conversions.
6. Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO): Analyzing website and landing page performance to optimize elements and improve conversion rates, ultimately increasing the number of visitors who take desired actions.
7. Online Reputation Management (ORM): Monitoring and managing a brand’s online reputation, addressing negative feedback, and promoting positive content to maintain a favorable image.
8. Web Design and Development: Creating visually appealing and user-friendly websites that are optimized for search engines and conversion.
9. Mobile Marketing: Developing strategies to target and engage mobile users through mobile-friendly websites, mobile apps, SMS marketing, and location-based advertising.
10. Analytics and Reporting: Tracking and analyzing data from various marketing channels to measure campaign performance, identify trends, and make data-driven decisions for continuous improvement.
11. Influencer Marketing: Collaborating with influential individuals or social media personalities to promote products/services and reach their dedicated audience.
12. Video Marketing: Creating and promoting videos to convey marketing messages, engage with the audience, and increase brand awareness.
13. Affiliate Marketing: Developing and managing partnerships with affiliates who promote products/services in exchange for a commission on sales or leads generated.
14. Marketing Automation: Implementing and managing automated systems and tools to streamline marketing processes, nurture leads, and improve efficiency.
15. Online Advertising: Planning and executing online advertising campaigns on various platforms, such as display advertising, remarketing, or native advertising.

These are just some of the services offered by digital marketing agencies. The specific services may vary based on the agency’s expertise, resources, and client needs.

Benefits to Expect from a Digital Marketing Agency

A Digital Marketing Agency takes information from you about your brand and your target audience and creates marketing campaigns around it. It also refines your target audience and handles website and social media updates, along with refining your email campaigning to increase the outreach of your brand. It has specialists trained entirely in marketing and growing your business with rapid results. Let’s discuss 4 fundamental benefits your organization should expect from your Digital Marketing Agency partner.

Increase Website Traffic

The primary objective of any digital marketing endeavor is to generate significant organic traffic to one’s business website. Professionals at digital marketing agencies hold expertise in inbound marketing, customer journeys, and search engine algorithms. By working with a digital marketing agency, your website will experience an increase in organic traffic – visitors who find your website through search engine results. Moreover, this traffic will result in more leads at a lower cost. These leads will also exhibit better quality, increasing the likelihood of purchasing.

Generate Sales-Ready Leads

Digital marketing agencies’ professionals possess knowledge about your business, marketing goals, sales funnel, and target audience. They are well-versed in various inbound marketing tactics, including content marketing, social media marketing, web design, and search engine optimization. Within your sales funnel, specific inbound marketing tactics prove more effective based on the leads’ position in the funnel. 

Collaborating with a digital marketing agency enables you to deliver the right message through the appropriate online medium to each lead at the right time in your sales funnel. Consequently, a digital marketing agency helps in generating sales-ready leads by progressing leads from the top to the bottom of the sales funnel.

Expand Brand Reach and Brand Recognition

Your customers are online, and every digital marketing agency understands that. Specializing in promoting brands online and establishing online customer relationships, digital marketing agencies possess the knowledge to expand your brand’s reach in the online space. By partnering with a digital marketing agency, your website gains enhanced visibility through keyword research and buyer persona development. Additionally, if you entrust your social media marketing to a digital marketing agency, your brand will gain increased online presence across various social media platforms.

Marketing Expertise and Knowledge

Digital marketing agencies enhance marketing strategies by providing comprehensive services. When selecting an agency, it should align with your internal marketing team and compensate for any lack of specialized digital marketing knowledge or resources. By partnering with a digital marketing agency, you gain expertise and identify weaknesses in your current campaigns. For instance, activities like web design, SEO, public relations, email marketing, and social media marketing require specialized skills that may not be readily available in a small marketing team.

For example, at Nighthawk Marketing, we offer a wide range of digital marketing services, including search engine optimization, pay-per-click advertising (PPC), social media marketing, marketing automation, content marketing, Facebook advertising, PR services, email marketing, video production, event coordination, and website development. Nighthawk is a one-stop shop for our clients – even if we don’t have the expertise in-house, we create great relationships with the best of the best freelancers to handle the project. And these amazing freelancers accept the work because they know Nighthawk will treat them well (see Upwork screenshot) – and the one bad review I’ve had in 7 years is from a freelancer that accidentally reviewed the wrong hiring client. 

Questions to Ask Prior to Hiring a Digital Marketing Agency Partner

Before hiring a digital marketing agency, assessing your company’s needs and evaluating its marketing skills, strengths, and capabilities is crucial; through a 30-minute call, we typically do that together with a client. Determine if your business requires assistance with content overhauling, SEO implementation, or website UX redesign. Consider whether your marketing activities are handled in-house or outsourced. By asking these questions, you can decide on the suitability of working with an agency and determine the specific digital marketing services your business requires.

When considering the selection of a digital marketing agency, it is crucial to conduct thorough research in advance. It is equally important to ascertain your digital marketing objectives, financial resources, and desired level of involvement in executing a digital marketing campaign.

I encourage you to gather answers to the following questions prior to hiring a digital marketing agency:

1. What services do they offer? Web design, copywriting, keyword research, PPC experts, blog writing, graphic design, etc.
2. What outcomes can you anticipate during your contract’s initial 90 days (or equivalent starting period)?
3. How frequently will updates on your digital marketing campaign status be provided?
4. What is the agency’s pricing structure?
5. Can the agency provide evidence of its success working with companies similar to yours?
6. What key performance indicators (KPIs) does the agency utilize to measure success, and how will the agency communicate this information during routine meetings?
7. Will the agency assign a dedicated contact person or project manager?
8. Will the work be executed by in-house specialists or freelancers?
9. What do testimonials, BBB ratings, or Google Reviews reveal about the agency?

Making an informed decision that aligns with your business needs is essential before entrusting a digital marketing agency with your operations.

Nighthawk Marketing utilizes the inbound marketing framework tailored to the modern customer mindset and behavior. By attracting potential customers at the precise moment of purchase readiness, we eliminate the reliance on cold-calling and uncertain buyer readiness.

To optimize your marketing efforts, we conduct an in-depth analysis of your specific business needs. Recognizing that each business is unique, we employ our 6-step inbound marketing methodology to identify inefficiencies within your sales and marketing funnel. Subsequently, we reverse-engineer a comprehensive strategy to address these issues.

Inbound marketing is a method of growing your business by building lasting relationships with consumers, prospects, and clients by “pulling” them to your brand via SEO, content marketing, social media, video marketing, and more. It is often divided into four stages: attract, convert, close, and delight.

Should Nighthawk Digital Marketing Group be your Digital Marketing Agency Partner

Yes!!! Oh, you want reasons why. Ok. First, with more than 6,000 digital marketing agencies in the U.S. alone, there’s no need to settle for just any agency. Second, find an agency that can provide a variety of services and manage them together. For example, if you want to expand your web presence by adding services and information to your website, you absolutely want a team that will work together to (1) identify the right keywords, (2) understand the prospect’s needs in your industry (3) write compelling copy (4) create graphics and web page designs that will attract visitors and more. 

Nighthawk is a one-stop shop for our clients – even if we don’t have the expertise in-house, we create great relationships with the best of the best freelancers to handle the project

Third, if you want to add pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, ensure the agency has expertise in handling Google Ads and other advertising platforms. This is critical because the vast majority of most organizations’ advertising budget is now spent on PPC campaigns. If the agency has PPC expertise, all of the assets, including landing pages, ad copy, graphic design, blog posts, social media posts, and more, can be created in one place with cohesive messaging, consistent branding, and uniform goals. A best-of-breed approach by using multiple agencies is rarely effective and often ends up with disjointed messaging, branding, and the wrong keywords for the company and industry.

Fourth, choose an agency that will make your marketing department look great to the rest of the company. At Nighthawk, we bring our clients ideas that they may not even know were possible. A simple example is creating mind-blowing presentations for their executive management, handling lead nurture campaigns with attractive, compelling content and graphics, and producing data sheets, case studies, infographics, and more because our client may not have industry expertise as yet.

Finally, choose an agency that DOES NOT require long-term contracts. At Nighthawk, our contract is 10 days – that’s it. If you are not absolutely in love with our people, the work they do, and the time and manner in which they do it, you can simply walk away. All of our work is 100% guaranteed! We strive to keep our clients engaged, happy, and feeling good about our relationship. 

I hope this has helped you in your search for a Digital Marketing Agency. I know this is a super long blog post, but I want to make sure you have everything you need to make a good decision for you and your organization.

To Learn More About How Nighthawk Can Help You, Please Call Us – as Always, We Are Happy to Help – 1 (858) 692-0819.