When you’re weighing the decision to outsource all or part of your marketing, cost savings are possible. Our Outsourced Marketing Survey showed that 1 in 5 respondents reported saving up to $25,000 per year by outsourcing all or part of their marketing. That’s far from chump change; there are many ways outsourcing can save you money, and if you harness as many of them as you can, you stand to save big. With all that money saved, you can divert funds to develop your great ideas for company growth. Here are five ways outsourcing can save you money.
Delegate to Your Partner
An excellent outsourced partner can get on board with your vision and make it happen. Without an outsourced partner, the execution of your vision falls solely on your internal team, and while cultivating a team that delivers is important, it’s not the only option or always the most cost-effective option. Let’s break down the cost of relying solely on your internal team:
- Hiring and onboarding
- Salary
- Taxes
- Health insurance and disability
- Paid leave
- Retirement
- Supplemental pay (overtime, bonuses)
- Ongoing training
- Non-productive hours
Benefits alone account for over 30% of the cost to hire and retain an employee. Relying on your internal team to execute your vision is a massive internal cost, and while outsourcing your marketing comes with a price tag, it’s a price tag that doesn’t include the bulleted list above. You save money outsourcing by hiring a person or team to execute and execute alone.
Take the example of a content writer. A yearly salary for a content writer ranges anywhere from $40,000-$60,000 on average depending on the required skillset and experience (copywriting vs. blogging, for example). Add in the overhead costs, and you’re looking at upwards of $80,000 or more per year. If you break down the cost of hiring an outsourced writer using standard industry pricing structures, you can save close to 90% of the costs of keeping it in-house. But it all depends on who you choose to partner with.
Align Goals and Budget
Vetting a marketing partner takes time, but once you’ve found your ideal partner, you’ll be well on your way to saving money and achieving your marketing goals. If you want to ensure you save some cash in the process of delegating your marketing, make sure you have a budget and goals alignment. Here are your steps:
- Decide your marketing goals. How much do you want to grow? In what direction? Be clear before you outsource.
- Check your marketing budget. How much do you have to spend? What do you need to prioritize in that budget to meet your goals? Seek a partner that offers the services required to meet your goals.
- Vet your potential partners. Who else have they worked with? What were the results? Choose a partner with a stellar track record.
When your budget and goals are aligned, you will get the most out of your marketing partnerships. There will be less time spent onboarding and less back and forth to make sure your vision comes to fruition. Essentially, if you bring a clear vision to your outsourced marketing partner and a good sense of your budget and goals, you’ll be able to focus less on the logistics and more on the results, saving you money in the process.
Rent the Tech
One of the most significant benefits of outsourced marketing is that you gain access to cutting-edge technology—without the cost.
Marketers spend a lot of money on technology. Technology is the most considerable portion of their yearly budget. And that’s the case, even in the context of the pandemic. It’s no secret that using technology that drives impact sets marketing agencies apart. Here’s what a tech-savvy agency leverages for its clients:
- Advanced metrics tracking for measurable results
- Connecting strategy to impact through technology
- Automating essential processes to streamline workflow
- Gaining a competitive advantage
- Connecting to customers more effectively
With technology by their side, agencies can provide a superior service focused on results. And they’ll do it without your company incurring any direct cost. Think about it this way: You benefit from the technologies marketing agencies use, but they pay the price for the account, the subscriptions, and the different tiers of service.
All benefit. Minimal cost.
Working with an agency that uses technology and data to support their expertise means any cost will be offset by impact.
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Do Your Research
Our outsourced marketing survey showed that companies who have successfully outsourced look to partners for support with research and strategy more than any other facet of marketing. About 1 in 3 companies that have outsourced conduct audience research regularly, and another 1 in 3 have conducted audience research at least once or twice. Without an engaged, loyal, and enthusiastic customer base, it’s exceedingly difficult to keep your business moving forward.
Outsourced marketing partners provide research and strategy that can take you from guessing games to increased engagement, website traffic, and ultimately sales.
Armed with research, you can gain insights like:
- Your customers’ values, beliefs, preferences, challenges, and goals
- What your customers need to happen to convert
- Ideal times to communicate with your customers
- Preferred channels to communicate with your customers
- Customer perception—what’s working, and how you can make adjustments
So, instead of guessing how to connect with your customers, you’ll gain evidence to guide your strategy, saving you time and money spent on campaigns that are less likely to land or land without the impact you want.
Let’s break this apart as an example. Say you needed to roll out a new product and you planned a complex marketing campaign with email blasts, social media posts, and supporting blogs. You posted primarily on LinkedIn and Instagram and posted around 10:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m. every day for a week. The copy you included was full of exclamation marks, an upbeat voice, and a conversational tone. You had 2-5 team members working for the better part of a week executing this campaign. Hours. Dollars. Disappointing results.
Then, you partner with a research and strategy marketing agency and find out your audience likes email, but only once per week. They’re on social media, but mostly Facebook and Twitter. Their scroll times are 12:00-2:00 p.m. and 8:00-10:00 p.m. and they aren’t into blogs, but love video. Additionally, they’re not into that upbeat voice; the data showed they preferred a more direct voice and a professional, formal tone. Data is the key to better results and impact-driving strategy.
Level Up Your Strategy
The best marketing strategy comes from data-backed insights, and the most effective marketing partners use data to support their strategic thinking to offer their clients, clients like you, the best chance at success.
There’s something to be said for the marketer who’s spent a decade in the industry and has strategic thinking as muscle memory. At the same time, any marketer worth their weight in conversions knows that marketing changes rapidly, and audience connections can surprise you. We’ve seen it with our data—a lot of the stats line up with what you know through years of experience, but there are often surprises in the data. These surprises are essential to fill in the gaps in an otherwise solid strategy.
A marketing partner that offers research-backed strategy saves you money on trial and error. Strategy comes with the guarantee that data provides.
Save Money By Outsourcing
Whether you’ve outsourced before or you’re considering it for the first time, it’s likely to save you money. But it’s also likely to make you money, especially if you hire a trusted partner that can get you the results you need—better audience connections, streamlined workflow, and the website traffic you’ve been working towards. There are many solutions to any problem, and with a bit of strategic thinking of your own, you can leverage an outsourced marketing partner to save money and make you money.
Technology. Research. Strategy.
These are the secret ingredients to outsourced marketing success.
Are you ready to put your vision into action? We’ve got solutions. Email us at [email protected] to start today.
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