Last Updated on October 18, 2017 by
Regardless of industry, the most important department in your business is your marketing team. The more your business can invest in marketing, the more money you should make from increased sales. Unfortunately, business owners often assume that simply hiring a marketing manager will solve every marketing issue, however, this is almost never the case. There are many hidden costs to hiring an in–house marketing manager or team. In order to assist you and the thousands of confused business owners searching for answers, we’ve listed the top 7 things to know before hiring a marketing manager:
1. Getting More for Your Money
The average salary for a marketing manager ranges between $70,000 – $130,000 annually. Even for smaller businesses, the salary for a marketing specialist may cost between $50,000 – $80,000 annually. While a marketing budget can go a long way towards increasing sales, these salaries can be a burden on your profit margins.
For a similar or lower price, your business could outsource marketing efforts to a marketing agency and see equal, if not better, results. In fact, most marketing agencies will provide fantastic campaigns for much less than these prices. This leads me to the next point:
2. The Hidden Costs Beyond Their Salary
Marketing managers can be great assets to a business, however, they can generally be nothing more than consultants, who may not have the experience to deliver a quality campaign. They typically have an overarching skill in campaign strategy, but may lack the knowledge of how to implement the ideas effectively.
This leads to a situation where the marketing manager must outsource projects like social media management, website development and graphic design, introducing new charges to the mix. This can still generate great increases in sales, but will generally cost more on a per-project basis than with an agency.
3. Agencies Can Provide More Experience and Expertise
As mentioned in #1, an agency can easily be contracted for the salary equivalent of a marketing manager, with the added benefit of having a team of experts and specialists who use their individual expertise to create a whole campaign designed to serve your needs. They don’t need to outsource their social media management, website development and graphic design work, because individual members of their team possess those skills. Their work will be included in the price of your campaign or contract, whereas comparable work would be an additional cost if your marketing manager contracted their services.
4. Software Costs and Experience
Marketing professionals use a combination of programs to accomplish their campaign tasks, many of which can be very expensive. Project management systems, SEO tracking software, social media management programs and graphic design software, like Adobe Creative Suite 6, can cost up to $8,000!
Agencies typically have already purchased all of the required software and have plenty of experience using the systems. These teams use the software everyday, for multiple hours, and have found the best way to use the resource efficiently and can translate that efficiency into savings and sales for your business. Some agencies may have extra fees for these softwares, while other agencies may have the cost of this software built into their prices.
5. Hidden Internal Costs for Hiring New Employees
When you hire a marketing manager or even a team of specialists, your business acquires costs that you may not have considered. You will need to have the space to house the marketing department, purchase additional computers, desks, furniture and equipment. Additionally, having an in-house marketing team increases electric and water bills.
Each time you hire an additional employee, that person must be trained, which is a labor cost that you assume. Not to mention, the additional cost of paying someone to train them and paying your Human Resources representative to set up their accounts and sign them up for benefits. Unfortunately, marketing positions have a high turnover rate and these costs must be incurred each time a new employee is hired. All of these costs are irrelevant when using an agency, because you’re receiving a team of people.
6. Don’t Put All of Your Eggs in One Basket
Even if you did find a stellar marketing manager, with experience in several different aspects of the marketing process, you are placing plenty of responsibility upon one person. Should your manager decide to find another position or if they end up incapacitated by an accident, your business’ marketing efforts stop immediately and will not be continued until a new replacement is found or your manager recovers from the hypothetical accident. Contracting an agency prevents you from ‘putting all of your eggs in one basket’ and places the responsibility upon the agency to get the promised work done in a timely fashion, regardless of any incidents that may occur.
7. Campaign Synergy & Content Voice
When marketing managers hire different freelancers for outsourced content, they typically do not take into account the different writing styles and voices provided. Effective campaigns use this voice to bring together different aspects of the project. The social media accounts should be mentioning the same promotions that the graphic designers are placing on flyers and postcards. That same content should be reflected on the website by the developers and any advertising should be using similar keywords to pull in quality leads from search engines.
Agencies know the importance of a brand’s voice and delegate most of the content to be written by a specified content manager within their team. This provides a cohesive brand voice that can be identified by consumers, rather than a website with pieces of separate content spliced together. When the social media manager, web and graphic designers are located in the same office and have open communication between each other, it keeps the promotional message coherent. This is much easier than trying to coordinate different freelancers, potentially around the world, to use similar content.
Consider An Agency When Looking For A Marketing Manager
For the same price as one marketing manager, your business can have an entire team of experts providing their knowledge towards your campaign. Consider hiring an agency before taking any applications. You may find that an agency will provide more of the services your business requires. For an in depth review of your marketing efforts, contact Multiverse Media Group for a FREE consultation.
