A great agency, however, does far more than that. A great digital marketing agency in Chicago can help you craft your brand and web strategy, help you glean insights from analytics and data, and even work to improve your SEO. When you’re looking for an agency to work with, it’s important to look at their team, their prior work, and how they treat their clients.
Digital marketing agencies in Chicago are often equipped to fulfill your design, marketing, and development needs. At Digital Authority Partners, we’re equipped to help you in a number of service lines — ranging from getting you in front of potential clients to building out AI and ML solutions and other more technically challenging products.
What’s the Difference Between a Digital Marketing Agency and a Traditional Marketing Agency?
Short answer: the “digital” part. Traditional agencies focus on methods outside the realm of the internet to get your brand visibility. Tactics include outdoor marketing such as billboards and signs on public transit, and direct mail, like fliers delivered to your mailbox. Traditional agencies also tend to focus on print and broadcast marketing and advertising — like radio and television ads, local and national newspapers and magazines, and pamphlets and brochures.
A digital marketing agency, on the other hand, helps you build your presence online. Methods commonly used by digital agencies include search engine optimization, paid advertisements, email marketing, and social media. Digital agencies also often deal in digital products, such as websites and mobile applications. Top digital marketing agencies in Chicago are able to harness both traditional and digital methods of marketing. Traditional agencies, however, are usually slow to adopt digital.
Working with a digital marketing agency can be what your business needs to bring it into the 21st century.
Why Should You Work with a Digital Marketing Agency?
Whether your company is a startup, mid-sized business, or a multinational establishment, working with a digital marketing agency in Chicago can be beneficial for you. K7
One big reason is the rise of internet usage. 51% of shoppers say they use Google to research a product before making a purchase. Google gets more than 70,000 searches a second. 96% of the American population owns a mobile phone, and there are 3.2 billion social media users every day. This means that no matter what industry your company operates in, or what size it is, your company needs to be online to maximize its customer base. Digital agencies play a unique role in being able to take businesses online and optimize them in several areas.
Digital agencies are often multitalented: this means they’ll be able to identify opportunities for improvement in a number of areas. At Digital Authority Partners, for example, we’ve worked with clients across product marketing, building mobile applications, and promoting their brands on social media. Oftentimes when working on a project with a client, we’ll find that we’re well-equipped to take on another problem they’re facing. A digital marketing agency is uniquely positioned to give you a distinct advantage on the internet.
Last but not least, a digital marketing agency is often a long-term partner for a business. Digital marketing and internet products are rarely a one-shot solution: they need constant work to ensure they’re relevant to the times. Working with an agency means that you’re not scrambling for resources when each project need comes up.
Problems with Traditional Marketing
There are advantages and disadvantages to both traditional and digital marketing. However, in recent times, digital marketing has taken the lead — no surprise with increasing adoption of the internet and technology. Traditional marketing channels are by no means dead, but there are a few reasons that they lag behind digital today:
- Traditional marketing is expensive: This is possibly the most commonly known drawback of going the traditional route. Buying a television or newspaper ad is extremely expensive and is often out of reach for smaller businesses. Digital marketing channels like pay-per-click and social media can be tailored to each business’ budget, and you can see results with a relatively small expenditure. Digital marketing is also highly scalable — ranking high on search engines has the potential to draw traffic that would be extremely difficult to obtain through traditional marketing avenues.
- Results from traditional marketing are often hard to measure: Determining whether a television ad is successful or not can run you a bill of thousands of dollars. By nature, it’s difficult to know who saw it, how long they viewed it before switching channels, and what else they viewed. On the other hand, most digital marketing agencies in Chicago can show you how to run A/B tests to figure out what works and what doesn’t — even on a small scale. When you work with a top digital marketing agency, you’ll receive reports for every step of the marketing funnel. You’ll know how many people saw your ad and what percentage of that clicked and made a purchase or reached out. In marketing, it’s essential to constantly look at data and see what it tells you, and this is simply much easier on digital channels.
- It’s invasive: Traditional marketing channels have always struggled to strike a balance between visibility and non-invasiveness. Typically, formats like print and television ads interrupt what users are doing. Have you ever opened your mailbox to more than three unsolicited fliers, or seen your television cut short by the words “we’ll be back after this short break”? That’s exactly what we’re talking about. Digital marketing, however, can be made more subtle. For example, companies can create dedicated blogs to provide content that users are looking for and sell their services at the same time.
- It’s hard to personalize: Traditional marketing companies have some idea of the demographics of who views your advertisements — but after you’ve launched an ad, you’ve launched. You can’t know the specifics. In contrast, digital marketing offers the opportunity to target customers based on certain characteristics. A paid ad on social media, for example, can be targeted based on age, demographics, and interest. Further, after your advertisement is launched, you can review analytics data to see who viewed it, who engaged, and who you should be targeting in the next cycle.
What You Should Think About Before Working With an Agency
Working with a digital marketing agency in Chicago can be extremely beneficial to your business. However, it’s important to know why you’re working with them before you dive in. There are a number of factors to consider:
- Goals: Why do you want to work with a digital marketing agency? Do you want to boost your rankings on Google? Do you want to redesign your website? Do you need general advice on how to improve your business’ presence online? All of these, and more, are good reasons to seek out a digital marketing agency in Chicago. However, you should establish a sense of what you’re looking for so you can look for a firm that’s a fit for your business.
- Stakeholders: When your company partners with a digital marketing agency in Chicago, who will be the point of contact for them in your company? Are there multiple stakeholders with different points of view on digital projects? How will those be reconciled? These are all things to at least give a little thought to before diving into a digital marketing engagement.
- Budget: The obvious factor. What is the ballpark figure of what you’re looking to spend on a digital effort? Your budget, needless to say, can determine the agencies that will work with you, the kind of work to undertake, and the projects you can work on. Think on it before you seek an engagement.
- Time-frame: Do you want your digital marketing agency of choice to deliver a project in four weeks, or are you looking to work with a longer horizon in mind? Some digital marketing agencies specialize in quick projects, others prioritize longer engagements, and other companies can handle both equally well.
Things to Consider When Choosing a Digital Marketing Agency
So you’ve decided that you want to work with a good digital marketing agency. That’s great! But your work is just getting started. Looking for a digital marketing agency in Chicago is not a straightforward task. You want to put a lot of thought into which agency you choose to work with, as this could be the beginning of a long client-partner relationship.
First, identify why you want to work with a digital marketing agency. Are you looking for something specific, like help with technical SEO or conversion rate optimization for your website? If you are, be sure that you choose an agency with expertise in that area. Their team should have a proven track record of delivering that solution to a number of clients — if they’ve worked with a client similar to your business, that’s a plus too! If you’re looking for something more general, then make sure to work with an agency that offers a variety of services.
Regardless of the kind of services you’re looking for, some things you should look for in a potential agency are:
- Work with a one-stop-shop: When choosing a digital marketing agency in Chicago, it’s important to work with a team that’s experienced in a number of marketing channels. After launching the marketing campaign of your choice, you may determine that another is the perfect complement — at this point, it’s best not to have to look for another agency.
- Find an agency that can help you with strategy and execution: Some digital marketing agencies in Chicago will be more than happy to execute what you tell them to — but won’t be able to help you increase market reach beyond that. It’s important to find a team that can help you determine your next move as well as just get it done.
- Choose a team for the long haul: We shouldn’t have to tell you this: marketing your brand is not a short-term task. Find a company that has a history of long client engagements, so they can gain an in-depth understanding of your business and iteratively improve your company’s digital marketing efforts.
- Choose data-driven over anything else: When you’re looking for a digital marketing agency in Chicago, it’s integral to find a firm led by the numbers. At Digital Authority Partners, we believe that data tells the truth about any marketing campaign. When we tell you that a campaign was a success or a failure, we always use data to back up what we say. No hand-waving, only fully data-driven insights are allowed here.
- Fast and always available: At Digital Authority Partners, our team doesn’t like to just meet deadlines — we actively beat them. Our team is available around the clock to talk about issues that you need resolved or digital marketing campaigns that you need launched.
- Pick an agency that has skin in the game: A lot of digital marketing agencies in Chicago will do what you ask of them and nothing more. Pick a company like Digital Authority Partners, where your success is our success. There’s nothing our team likes more than seeing a client climb to new heights. The way we see it, you’re not just our client. You’re our partner.
Why You Need to Work with a Digital Marketing Agency in Chicago
85% of mobile advertisers think they’re providing a positive experience; only 47% of users agree.
Content marketing costs 62% less than traditional marketing and generates about 3 times as many leads.
The total average that each US consumer spends a year on eCommerce is $1,800.
51% of shoppers have completed an online purchase with a smartphone.
Only about 22% of businesses are satisfied with their conversion rates.
Companies that blog get 55% more web traffic.
Our Services
Strategy
Details: As a premier digital marketing agency in Chicago, we don’t just execute (although we do that rather well too). We consider it part of our job description to help you plan the right marketing strategy to grow your business. We’ll conduct in-depth research to determine the right target audience to go after, the channels to best reach them, and how to position yourself to be the best in your industry.
How it works: First, it’s important for our team to get to know yours. Our project lead will conduct stakeholder interviews with your business’ leaders. We’ll understand how your business works, what you’re looking to get out of a digital marketing engagement. With this information, our team of analysts will devise a clear plan of action for success, complete with regular check-ins with you.
Content Marketing
Details: Writing clear, goal-oriented content is one of the most powerful digital marketing strategies you can choose. At Digital Authority Partners, we conduct in-depth research into the keywords and topics your target audience is interested in, and partner you with our writers to produce content that both search engines and real people like.
How it works: Effective content writing serves two purposes: to get you to rank for relevant search terms, and to interest your audience to work with you. Further, it’s important to create several different forms of content: long-form content (3,500+ words), for example, is a great tool to use to rank on Google. Shorter content can be referenced from social media, and can be easy for readers to consume. We’ll work with you to figure out what’s the best fit for you, and create a comprehensive content plan so you’re prepared for the future.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Details: 49% of marketers say organic search has the best return on investment of any marketing channel. We consider SEO a powerful source of traffic and potential business, and we have helped a number of businesses rank on the first page — and the top spot — of Google search results. We’ll work with you to identify and evaluate potential opportunities to rank, and help you get there.
How it works: Google looks at over 200 factors to determine what ranks and what doesn’t. Further, these factors are constantly changing. Our team works to audit your website to identify the areas that need to be improved for you to rank highly on search. The team gets to work refining your website technically, producing relevant content, and acquiring valuable backlinks so Google, Bing, and other search engines know the value of your business.
Design
Details: Design plays a large, and often overlooked, role in how well your digital marketing efforts perform. Our team of designers, marketers, and product managers will help you leverage great design to reach your business goals. We start by understanding your business, and then research and refine the right designs for your target market. We’ll work with you every step of the way.
How it works: We don’t just dive into building you a solution. We’ll first get you in touch with our product and design teams, so you can talk to them about what you hope to accomplish. Next, our team will come up with some versions of what you proposed. After a few cycles of review and user testing, we’ll be ready to bring your solution to market.
Software Development
Details: Effective digital marketing efforts often require some development effort. At Digital Authority Partners, we’ve built out high-converting landing pages and visually appealing email marketing templates, among other solutions. Our team of experienced developers will work with you to build out sleek products that help you reach your business goals.
How it works: Building software is a task that requires careful planning and a close eye. Luckily for you, we’ll handle that part. Our product team will meet with you to understand and write requirements for what you’re building. Next, our design team will come up with several versions of the solution, and once you’re satisfied, we can begin development. Post-development, our quality assurance team will ensure that everything works as expected — and is ready to go live!
Analytics
Details: In the 2020s, it’s absolutely necessary to use data to understand how your website, campaign, or advertisement should be refined. As a top digital marketing agency in Chicago, everything we build will have the right analytics associated with it. We’ll help you track impressions, clicks, conversions, and more — and work with you to iteratively improve whatever we build together.
How it works: Depending on your project, you’ll need a certain tracking platform implemented so you can see the data you need to make decisions. For example, we often work to implement page and event tracking in Google Tag Manager and Google Analytics for a number of our clients. For visual tracking, we use other tools. Our Head of Analytics will talk to you about what you want to track, why you want to track it, and the best way to display it to you. We’ll then implement tracking and provide regular reports for you.
How You Know That You’re Working With a Great Digital Marketing Agency in Chicago
Sometimes, you just have a great feeling. Your metrics are off the charts, your team loves the agency’s work, and the two of you are creating some great products together. Other times, however, you need to think about whether or not you’ve chosen the best digital marketing agency in Chicago for you. Here’s some things to look at to decide whether your partner agency is a good fit:
- They’re responsive: A sign of any good professional services company is complete dedication to the client. It’s important for your agency to be available to answer your questions, any time. After all, it’s your business, your campaign, and eventually your success that’s on the line. Why should you settle for less? At Digital Authority Partners, we’re available to talk to all our clients at any time.
- They’re able to help in multiple areas: Sure, you can partner with an agency that does exclusively SEO — but what happens when you decide you need to optimize your website to capture all the traffic you’re now getting? Digital marketing channels, by nature, are all interconnected. At Digital Authority Partners, we understand that approaches such as SEO, paid search, website optimization, and analytics solutions are all complements of one another. We’ll harness the power of a number of approaches, all in one area. Why look for an agency that can do just one?
- You can learn from them: You go to a digital marketing agency in Chicago for their expertise — this doesn’t mean that they operate in a black box. A truly great agency will show you what they are doing, why they are doing it, and how to do it, at every step of the way. You’ll come out with know-how for the future in addition to the marketing reach that you’re paying for.
- They show results: All companies claim to bring excellent results, but how many show you the data that backs that claim up? When choosing a digital marketing agency in Chicago, be careful to work with only those companies that show you the numbers behind their success. What was the click-through rate increase of their email marketing project? Do their clients see an increase in website conversions after working with them? The numbers can tell you whether or not it’s worth your while to partner with them.
- They’re nimble, and can adjust quickly: The best digital marketing agencies in Chicago can change course, fast. In the digital universe, things are often changing — customer tastes, Google rankings, and the strategy that is best for your business. At Digital Authority Partners, we know that industries change, and so do your requirements. Our team of product managers, analysts, and marketers are ready to make the best of changing circumstances.
- They’re attentive to your needs: Some companies approach digital marketing with a “let’s execute as quickly as possible” attitude. Often, that’s a misguided approach. At Digital Authority Partners, we take time to get to know your business and deeply understand your goals. Armed with this knowledge, we can better plan, build, and deploy a digital marketing solution. If we’re doing a job for you, we make sure that it’s the right job for your business.
- They report, often: Hearing from an agency at the beginning and end of a project is nowhere near good enough. For example, businesses often take 6-8 months to rank on the first page of Google. If you work with Digital Authority Partners, we’ll tell you where you rank, where you’ve improved, and the work to be done on a regular basis. Staying in the loop is your right as a client!
The Bottom Line
Working with a digital marketing agency in Chicago can be the push your company needs to be more competitive. A good digital marketing agency will work with you to define your business goals, execute against them, and report measurable results to you. Further, an agency can identify tangential problems for your business
