Marketing Agencies: The Good, The Bad & The Ugly

Introduction

Marketing agencies have evolved significantly over the past few decades. While traditional advertising relied heavily on billboards, print ads, and TV commercials, today’s agencies focus primarily on digital channels. However, despite this shift, many agencies still operate with outdated mindsets and practices. Buzzwords like AI, machine learning, and big data are frequently used, making it difficult to distinguish genuinely effective agencies from those simply skilled at pitching.

In this article, we’ll explore the good, the bad, and the ugly of marketing agencies. You’ll learn how to spot red flags, when hiring an agency makes sense, and what alternatives exist to help you achieve your growth marketing goals.

Common Problems With Marketing Agencies

Misaligned Goals

One of the biggest issues when working with marketing agencies is misaligned goals. Many agencies measure success by how much of your budget they spend, rather than by meaningful business outcomes such as:

Increasing revenue
Acquiring new customers
Improving conversion rates
Generating qualified leads (MQLs and SQLs)

Agencies often lack accountability for your business objectives, treating your account as just another client rather than a partner whose success matters.

Junior Staff Doing the Work

Agencies frequently pitch their services using senior executives, but the actual work is often delegated to junior team members with limited experience. This practice can lead to subpar results and frustration for your business.

Many agencies apply standardised strategies across all clients, regardless of unique business needs or market conditions. Effective growth marketing requires tailored approaches, not generic solutions. If an agency isn’t willing to deeply understand your business and customise their strategy, it’s a clear warning sign.

Long “Testing” Periods

Some agencies ask clients to accept poor results for the first few months, labelling this as a “testing period”. This is unacceptable. Effective growth marketers deliver meaningful insights and measurable results from day one.

Claiming Expertise in Everything

Be cautious of agencies claiming expertise across all marketing disciplines. Growth marketing requires specialised knowledge. Agencies that claim to do everything often lack the depth needed to deliver meaningful results. Instead, look for agencies or consultants with clear specialisation and proven track records in specific areas relevant to your business.

Lack of a Holistic Approach

Effective growth marketing involves optimising the entire customer journey, not just running ads. Agencies that focus solely on ad spend often neglect critical areas such as:

Landing page optimisation
Product messaging and positioning
Pricing strategies
Customer incentives and urgency mechanics

A good growth marketer or agency takes ownership of the entire customer experience, ensuring every touchpoint is optimised to drive conversions and revenue.

Insufficient User Research

Continuous user research is essential for effective growth marketing. Agencies that don’t prioritise user research are essentially guessing. Choose partners who regularly conduct research to inform their strategies, ensuring decisions are data-driven and customer-centric.

When Hiring an Agency Makes Sense

Despite these common pitfalls, there are scenarios where hiring an agency can be beneficial:

You have a proven acquisition formula (landing pages, ad copy, targeting) and simply need someone to scale it efficiently.
You temporarily lost an in-house expert and need a short-term solution.
Your primary goal is straightforward paid media management, and you have clear, measurable KPIs.

However, keep in mind that acquisition strategies typically have a limited lifespan. Landing pages and ad creatives need regular refreshing, and agencies often struggle to iterate quickly enough to sustain long-term success.

Questions to Ask Before Hiring a Marketing Agency

Before signing a contract, ask these critical questions to evaluate an agency’s true capabilities:

What meaningful results have you driven for similar products or services?
What was the specific cost of acquisition (CAC) for comparable products?
What conversion rates have you achieved on prospecting traffic?
How did CAC evolve over time on channels like Facebook and Google?

If an agency can’t confidently answer these questions or hesitates to share relevant data, consider it a significant red flag.

Alternatives to Hiring a Marketing Agency

If you’re wary of agencies, consider these alternatives:

Hire in-house: Bring on a senior growth marketer or pair a junior marketer with an experienced mentor. This builds institutional knowledge and ensures alignment with your business goals.
Engage a freelance growth expert: Many talented growth marketers offer flexible, part-time engagements. They can deliver significant value in fewer hours per week than a full-time hire or agency, with the added benefit of month-to-month flexibility.

Benefits of an In-House Growth Team

An in-house growth marketing team offers several advantages:

Deep understanding of your product, customers, and market
Ability to move quickly and adapt to changes
Accumulation of institutional knowledge and learnings
Direct accountability and alignment with your business goals

For a helpful visual guide on which marketing activities are best handled in-house versus externally, check out this graphic from MKT1.

How Growth Method Can Help

Whether you choose an agency, freelancer, or in-house team, Growth Method simplifies your growth marketing workflow by combining ideation, experimentation, and analytics in one powerful platform.

Ideation: Generate and prioritise growth ideas aligned with your business goals, automatically categorised and shared with your team.
Experimentation: Run structured experiments with enforced timelines to maximise velocity and learning.
Reporting: Produce professional, detailed reports to demonstrate your team’s value to stakeholders.

As Laura Perrott from Colt Technology Services says:

“We are on-track to deliver a 43% increase in inbound leads this year. There is no doubt the adoption of Growth Method is the primary driver behind these results.”

Growth Method is the only work management platform built specifically for growth marketers. If you’re ready to implement a systematic approach to growing leads and revenue, book a call today.