Hiring a social media agency vs. an in-house employee
A question we get asked a lot as an agency when we’re in the pitching stages with new clients is: “Why should I hire an agency when I could build an in-house team?”
As someone who runs a digital marketing agency, I clearly see how clients benefit from having a well-established external team take the reins of their social media, paid search, and so on.
But there have also been times when I’ve agreed that a client’s choice to bring on board an in-house employee has been a wise move!
Plus, the best agencies are agile and adaptable, and we’re certainly very adept at working with internal staff through a hybrid in-house/agency structure.
So how do you decide what’s best for your business, or for a specific campaign, one-off project, or even an individual social media channel?
Here, I give you an honest look at the pros and cons of employing a social media agency (like us) or employing a new member of staff.
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Agency pricing vs. the cost of hiring an employee
This is typically what gets discussed first. Fees charged by marketing agencies vary a lot, but will almost always cover the cost of a new salary for an employee. So, at face value, you could say that an employee would be the best investment.
However, agencies will often grant you access to several of their specialists beyond just your main account liaison. Also, there are additional costs associated with hiring an employee which aren’t imperative when working with an agency:
Taxes
Pensions
National Insurance
Desk space
IT costs (computer equipment, software service subscriptions)
Holiday/sick days
Health insurance and other benefits
Businesses have more room to negotiate with agencies, and the recruitment process is far more cost-effective, with fewer complications caused by employee turnover.
These cost advantages are true when onboarding agencies for both short-term projects and longer-term partnerships.
Agency team discussing ideas for clients
Diverse expertise vs. a unique way of doing things
The best social media marketing agencies have teams with varied skillsets and methodologies to help you complete briefs and reach targets. In-house employees, in contrast, typically fill a singular role with tighter scope and specific perspectives and specialities. Employees may have a deeper, closer familiarity with your business, whilst an agency will offer more flexibility and a wider range of experience and talent.
I’ve found that it’s rare for one person to be sufficiently brilliant at every role needed to deliver a quality marketing campaign. Through an agency, a client will be given a team of specialists who all keep on top of the latest developments related to their role. These specialities might include:
Account Manager
Social Media Manager
Paid Ads Manager
Videographer/Editor
Community Manager
Copywriting
Influencer Manager
Even when budgets don’t afford dedicated specialists, agencies can tap into their pools of talent within the guidelines of what gets negotiated, and then scale up or down as needed.
Agencies often have an established level of diversity that can benefit your business from the get-go, so if you opt for an in-house hire, consider how you’re nurturing diversity in your own team. A broader range of perspectives, niches, and journeys through the industry can bring countless advantages.
How flexible are agencies, compared to employees?
Working with agencies will almost always allow for more flexibility and scalability than solely working with in-house teams.
A good digital marketing agency will have all the systems in place to deliver campaigns and drive results in ways that are fully trackable and attributable, and, perhaps most importantly, agencies have the resources to stay in the know about how social media platforms and online cultures are evolving day-to-day.
All of this contributes to a holistic online advertising strategy that would be harder and costlier to replicate with just employees.
Can agencies fully integrate with company culture?
An in-house employee will naturally be involved in more internal meetings — the professional 9–5 kind, and the holiday party kind! — but that doesn’t mean agencies can’t put down firm roots and get well-acquainted with what makes a company tick.
In our experience, the best way to work with a digital marketing agency is to bring them close to the company and get them familiar with its culture.
An agency won’t be working from your offices on the daily, so there’ll never be as much face-to-face time as with an in-house member of staff, but in this rapidly-changing world of remote work, that’s an increasingly moot point.
A hybrid approach can sometimes be the best course of action. A business may have a long-term social media manager who knows the company incredibly well, but doesn’t know how to utilise TikTok like an agency would. In this case, the employee could work with the agency to ensure the company’s culture is truly coming through in every piece of content the agency puts out.
Agencies vs. employees on industry insights
Working across different sectors on multiple projects at once gives agencies much more of a ‘big picture’ view of the entire digital marketing space.
Employees tend to have professional networks they communicate with to keep a tight grip on market trends, but when it comes to the financials, competitors will typically keep their cards close to their chest.
If you work with an agency which specialises in your sector, they’ll have niche learnings and will be ahead of the curve in understanding what the market is doing in your industry.
Creative agency work vs. capturing content in-house
Social media platforms — TikTok in particular — reward consistent and engaging content.
The best content comes from teams who show the true experience of a brand, or great, funny, and culturally-relevant ideas. This is often best captured in-house.
We’ll often start a shared messenger group with clients which includes in-house creatives, where we can suggest timely trend-driven ideas and advise on what to shoot. They can send us the footage, and we’ll edit, publish, and promote the final video.
This is a perfect demonstration of how an agency can collaborate with the client’s existing teams through a hybrid approach.
How new hires can build networking and partnership opportunities
As an agency, we often see ways two or more of our clients could work together. We open the conversation, build the creatives and mechanics of the campaign, and, after, report on its successes.
New employees can also bring a wealth of leverageable partnerships with them — a network of contacts they’re able to tap into to help bolster the work they’re doing.
Agencies will likely have a larger network — and perhaps more authority within it — but individual employees could have more tightly-knit ones.
Should you hire a digital marketing agency or employ someone in-house?
We’re an agency, so you’d expect us to say a digital marketing agency is what you need to be successful and grow, but we’ve been in this game long enough to know that what’s best isn’t always what we want.
You’ve got to consider your budgets and motivations for working with an agency.
Clients will often work with a digital marketing agency while they build their roster of employees. These can be longer-term relationships, with the agency helping shape the evolution of their in-house team. These clients will keep us on for projects which are too big for their own teams to handle.
Creative digital marketing agencies can be brought in to lead or audit larger-scale creative projects which are separate from the day-to-day social media coverage that’s managed by core staff.
An agency might also be brought on board to nurture growth in areas where the client’s employees don’t have expertise. This is generally when a client knows the outcome they want, but not how to get there.
If you’ve got more questions, get in touch with us, and we can explore the pros and cons of agency vs. in-house hires together.
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Let’s discuss your business needs and how we can help.