Does Your Small to Mid-Size Business Need An Agency?

by Sandie McCarthy-Roberts

With the onset of the world wide internet, our need and want for instant gratification has been very actively fulfilled. With this Internet-laden population, opinion is rampant, and with very little worry for expertise and truth often. If you have a question, instead of going to an expert, we often type in it google or yahoo! And voila! We have an equally instant and diverse answer! However…

Come on… you knew there was HAD to be a however right? What’s missing in the google and yahoo search? YOU are! That’s what. You can’t get a marketing or advertising answer that takes YOUR business into account, without the one answering your question, taking your company into perspective. That’s just a fact.

Now, large businesses either have an inhouse person doing their marketing, or they hire an Advertising/Marketing Agency to do their work for them. They wouldn’t consider not bringing an expert into the mix. The same can be said for most, if not all, mid-size businesses. After all, they want to grow. They want to reach who they need to reach. They know that in order to do that, they need to have someone who knows exactly how to do that. Of course… there’s one more thing they require, other than an agency or firm that does this. They also need someone with experience! Yes, in this IT youth-oriented culture, we often mistake the young-progressive mind, for the progressive, creative, and innovative mind. All great attributes! However…

Again.. that word! But it fits, I promise you! You cannot replace experience. Experience has seen the innovative, and watched it sputter and die, or move forward towards success. Experience has seen times change… time and time again. They don’t mistake the current for the only. They don’t think in terms of *This is the cool way, ergo … the ONLY way. They don’t make the same mistakes. So, yes we do want the young mind… tempered by the experienced one. That’s why agencies are so helpful. They have the experienced people and the youthful element. They are forward thinkers, yet they are tempered by years of seeing what works and what doesn’t.

It’s true that small and mid-sized businesses tend to watch their money a bit more closely, but it’s also true that money well spent, is money spent well. If you are guessing at how and where to spend your money on marketing and advertising, you are clearly taking a big risk.You are more than likely wasting much of your time and money, unless you have the education and experience to back up each of your decisions. And experience and education does not come from watching television commercials, or being exposed to radio and newspaper campaigns. Unless you, yourself, have designed those campaigns, they don’t count as your experience. That’s like saying someone who watches all of those doctor shows, are qualified to give you medical advice. Sounds silly, yes?

So, if you are a small to mid-size business, you clearly do need the assistance of an Advertising/Marketing Agency, if you want to succeed and grow. You do not, however, need to gravitate to the same large and expensive agency that large businesses use! In fact, you are better off with a smaller agency. They have the same experience, and the same youthful element, but they have something the larger agency full of big business, and national accounts doesn’t always have. They have a hunger for your business. They know how to make a smaller business succeed, and they are not spending the bulk of their time and attention on the bulk of their business. They will help you to succeed. And you will tell your friends. And they will look at that Agency as well. THAT is how the agency grows. They don’t want your bad publicity. If you succeed, they succeed.

Give an Agency a call. See what they have to say. It costs nothing to sit down and ask some questions. Ask who their current clients are. Ask those clients what they are like to deal with. Coming up, I will give some examples of what questions you may want to ask during an introductory meeting with an Advertising/Marketing Agency. So, stay tuned!