In the World of Digital Marketing, Which is Better: In-house or Outsourcing?
In today’s modern and ever changing world, every business needs effective online marketing to stay competitive. However, now companies have a choice between investing in an in-house marketing employee or outsourcing the job to a digital marketing agency. As a digital marketing agency ourselves, we know it can be hard to decide. Each option has its pros and cons and we’re going to break them down for you so that you can decide which is the right call for your business.
Hiring an In-house Marketing Employee
An in-house marketing employee is exactly what it sounds like – hiring an expert to work on location with your company. Depending on your needs, an in-house employee has a wide range of variables to consider.
Cost – With an in-house employee, you’ll have to pay a salary to those you hire as well as any benefits that may need to be covered. On average, it is more pricey to hire a person than hire a marketing agency.
Office Space – Do you have the space in your office to accommodate a new hire or even a small team? For a startup or small businesses, this is a larger cost than one might think.
Time – Having an in-house marketing team can save time because they will be in the same office, as opposed to a marketing agency that can be located in another timezone, which can be a hassle when it comes to communicating.
Resources – One of the biggest factors that you need to consider with an in-house employee is the resources that your team has to work with. While agencies have many pre-established resources like graphic designers, SEO experts, web designers, social media experts, etc, an in-house investment works with only whatever your new hire brings with them to the table.
Dedication – One advantage of hiring in-house that you won’t get by outsourcing is a dedicated effort by an industry expert that puts all of their focus on your marketing needs, as opposed to outsourcing to a company where they handle multiple different clients at the same time.
Overall, hiring an in-house employee is just not as viable as outsourcing. The largest benefit of an in-house employee would be the person itself. You would be able to speak directly with the employee, things wouldn’t get lost in translation (as it can through large corporations), and they would better understand your company’s vision through regularly being around people who share the same vision in your office. However, these in-house benefits don’t outweigh the many more benefits which outsourcing has to offer. In almost every other aspect, outsourcing proves to be superior.
Outsourcing to a Marketing Agency
Cost– The biggest difference between the two would have to be payment. Outsourcing is paid to the marketing agency directly as a negotiated monthly payment, unlike in-house which is paid as a salary to the employee. While this lump sum payment may at first look quite costly, it is usually much more affordable than an in house salary including benefits.
Time– As mentioned earlier, having an in house employee saves time on the surface by having them available on hand. However, in today’s modern world, communicating over long distances is not an issue due to the many technological tools readily available.
Office space– Outsourcing to an agency saves you office space because they don’t have to be on-site. This will save you money if you hire a large team to work on your project.
Resources – unless you are a major corporation yourself, marketing agencies will have access to much more resources than you will. Pre-established partnerships and specialists are at the disposal of marketing agencies, which comes with the service that is provided.
In the End…
Overall, hiring a marketing agency holds many more benefits than hiring an in-house employee. Leaving your marketing needs to experts lets you focus on other priorities pertaining to business operation. Also, you won’t have to worry about going through the hiring process trying to find the perfect fit for your company. HOWEVER, there is a 3rd option that combines the best aspects of both outsourcing and hiring in-house with none of the negatives.
Here at GVATE we understand the complexity of making this decision for companies, because this is a big investment to make. So we’ve made it easier to make this decision with our innovate full-service marketing solution. What we offer is all of the resources and characteristics of outsourcing with an in-house digital marketing manager dedicated to you. To find out more, send us an email at [email protected] or give us a call today → 917-960-2736.
