There’s a wonderful quote that states: “If the only tool you have is a hammer, then the solution to every problem is banging a nail.”

The same holds true to working with a partner digital advertising agency. Knowing what problem you have will help determine the best agency to find your solution.

Before you start choosing a particular agency, you should spend some time deciding what type of agency you need. The three common types are as follows:

• Specialist Agencies
• Full-service Agencies
• Hybrid Agencies

Each type offers a different scope of digital marketing services, and depending on your needs, one type might be a much better fit for your organization.

SPECIALIST DIGITAL MARKETING AGENCY

Specialist agencies, as their name suggests, specialize in a particular channel or channels. For instance, many focused agencies are drawing market share. We’re seeing specialists continuing to do well in disciplines such as email marketing, paid and natural search and affiliate marketing. They are also doing well in new areas such as PR distribution and social media planning.

THE PROS OF A SPECIALIST DIGITAL MARKETING AGENCY

• By hiring specialists, you get expert focus in each channel
• By hiring a “Search Shop” (for instance) instead of an agency that has a “Search Guy,” you get unparalleled focus and a great deal of shared knowledge.
• Shared learnings across tactics and clients make specialist agencies tough to beat in any given channel.
• Deeper vendor relationships with Google, Bing, Facebook, etc.

THE CONS OF USING SPECIALISTS SHOPS

• Shortsighted focus on one channel and missing the big picture
• Pay-per-click (PPC) shops that believe paid search solves all problems and fights for budgets that might be better utilized driving demand in social and display
• Clients that work with a handful of agencies are often overburdened with managing multiple agencies and contacts and spend more time chasing vendors than doing their jobs

FULL SERVICE DIGITAL MARKETING AGENCY

The premise of a full-service ad agency is that it is a one-stop approach to hiring professional advertisers. This means the client only has to worry about managing a relationship with one main agency versus trying to coordinate relationships with multiple agencies. One account executive usually manages the relationship, and a team of advertisers collaborates with each client’s campaigns from beginning to end.

THE PROS OF A FULL SERVICE DIGITAL MARKETING AGENCY

• One main advantage of hiring a full service agency is the ease in project management and communication between all the marketing professionals involved with one company’s marketing efforts.
• Agencies that cover a broad range of services are ideally placed to deliver fully integrated campaigns. Specialist agencies, on the other hand, tend to focus on their own particular disciplines, rather than looking at the bigger picture.
• In an integrated campaigns and process, your efforts across all platforms will be unified, bringing you closer to omni-channel excellence.
• Full-service ad agencies offer a more seamless integration of advertising media and a better likelihood of consistency in brand messages over all platforms.
• Better at aligning messages across all mediums
• Smarter budget allocations across channels (assuming they’ve got an analytics and attribution department)
• You also get centralized communication. The days of talking to one agency about your social media efforts, another for SEO, and still another for PPC are gone.

THE CONS OF A FULL SERVICE DIGITAL MARKETING AGENCY

• Less innovative and less flexible
• They are a Jack of all trades but master of none
• Not all agencies play well with others and are secretly trying to get other partner’s fired to gain more revenue. The client always loses in this model.
• Full-service agencies are not necessarily aware of changes in the market and can impair their ability stay ahead of the curve

HYBRID DIGITAL MARKETING AGENCY

Hybrid agencies are typically full service agencies that hire specialist teams to bring expertise to specific channels or specific clients. In simple terms, a hybrid agency is a traditional creative agency, a digital production house, and a Web technology company all rolled into one.

THE PROS OF HYBRID AGENCIES

A fully integrated marketing agency, hybrid agencies remove the segmented industry conventions that divide design, strategy, and development and merge them into one complete, in-house strategic marketing solution. In fact, a hybrid agency’s ability to move past just creative work to creating and executing strategy against business objectives is what sets it apart.

Agility is one of the hybrid digital marketing agency’s main strengths. That makes working with such an agency a very different experience than working with a traditional ad agency. A hybrid workflow focuses on close communication and collaboration, both within their internal teams and with the client.

THE CONS OF HYBRID AGENCIES

• Not getting the “A-team”. Many smart agencies utilize outside specialist shops to deliver for clients. While this can benefit everybody, there needs to be transparent communications.
• If they say “SEO” and “Social” as capabilities but don’t have anybody on staff, that’s a yellow flag.