As an award-winning digital marketing agency, we take pride in providing our clients with services they really want.

Right now, our clients are preparing their 2017 marketing budgets and making strategic decisions for next year. Understanding our clients helps us reposition ourselves to offer value.

Agency Spotter recently compiled a report that looks across the top 25 marketing services from 2014, 2015, and the first half of 2016. These results are based on what clients, like you, search on when trying to find specific marketing services. Does your marketing plan encompass any of these services for the coming year?

Staying On Top: Advertising, Digital Strategy, Web, Social Media, Marketing Strategy

Some marketing services seem to always be on top. Advertising has remained the number one most popular service. 

Digital Strategy, Web, Social Media, Marketing Strategy, Mobile all remained near the top across the same duration.

Dropping Down: Branding, Design Strategy, User Experience, and more

Branding, Design Strategy, User Experience Design, E-Commerce, Gaming, and Graphic Communication Design were all down by the first half of 2016 versus where they had been in 2014, indicating a steady decline in client interest.

Some, like E-Commerce, Design Strategy and User Experience, actually generated more interest between 2014 and 2015, only to show a significant decline for the first half of this year.

Bouncing Back: Public Relations, Events, and Innovation

Maybe it’s no surprise that the need for Content Marketing has been skyrocketing up. But did you know that searches for Innovation Agencies were down last year and seem to have more than rebounded in 2016? Public Relations and Events Marketing also bounced down in 2015 and seem to have recovered for the year.

Many Jumped Up: Content Marketing, Data Analytics, Direct Marketing, and Experiential Marketing

As some services decline, others seem to be searched more and more since 2014. With all the talk of big data, the Data Analytics service shows sustained growth in number of searches across all three data points.

Content Marketing continued to see growth so far this year, though it was near parity between 2014 and 2015.

Another addition that has taken off since its introduction in 2015 is Experiential Marketing. We have especially seen this category to be popular for marketers in the food and beverage industry and the CPG industry.

Last, but not least, we were shocked to see Direct Marketing move from number 12 up to number three with consistent growth in number of searches throughout the research period. Of course, direct marketing today is a very sophisticated business, and means much more than just mailers for many brands from across industries like automotive, financial services, e-commerce, retail, and banking.

Clients Need their Agencies to Adapt to Changing Needs

The world of marketing services is not getting any simpler for you or for us. In the US alone, there are 60,000 to 100,000 agencies, depending on how you define “agency”. That number is also growing year over year despite acquisitions and other exits.

The key takeaway? Agencies need to be tuned to what clients are searching for. The marketing services landscape is intimidatingly complex, and agencies can make themselves more accessible for clients by shifting to suit their current needs, which is something we do at Screaming Garlic in order to stay relevant.

Marketers are also managing more relationships with more agencies than ever before. Beyond that, the Marketing Technology (MarTech) landscape is also getting exponentially more complex and crowded each year.

The ability to navigate this complexity in a meaningful way has become critical. As we work with our clients to better understand their needs and insights, we both can become more savvy marketers.