How Outsourcing Extends the ROI of Marketing Budgets in Harsh Economic Times

No matter how effectively your business plans for every scenario, sooner or later an economic downturn is all but inevitable. Whether the result of the cyclical fluctuations of the market or larger external factors like the 2008 financial crisis or the ongoing fallout from COVID-19, challenging times can strain every aspect of your business.

To navigate circumstances like these, a company’s every expenditure and savings goes under the microscope. And marketing teams are no exception. A strategic approach is required to maximize the ROI of this critical part of your organization’s investments.

The outsourced assistance from an agency can help manage costs and employee well-being while allowing your business to focus on the future and be well-positioned for whatever lies ahead.  In a time of shrinking budgets and heightened expectations, you can find considerable benefits in outsourcing some portions of your marketing efforts.

Staff Burnout Is the Ongoing Challenge of an Economic Downturn

Tough decisions involving furloughs, workday reductions, and staff losses are never the first option in an economic downturn. And whether your organization has been forced to implement such unfortunate changes or shares an industry with companies that have, the uncertainty of what’s next takes a considerable toll beyond the financial impact.

If your marketing team has already faced staff cuts, the remaining employees can understandably struggle on multiple fronts. Forced to produce more with less, productivity drops along with quality as the previous level of performance becomes simply out of reach.

Consequently, employee growth falters and morale dips as the impact of a tough business environment spirals deeper into your organization.

Outside Help from an Agency Allows for Focus on a Company’s Bigger Picture

Achieving the same goals with fewer resources is the core paradox of navigating a difficult business climate. In a competitive digital landscape, in-house marketing teams serve multiple roles and constituencies within their organizations. A single group can be responsible for designing and developing new projects while also maintaining website content, external communications, and establishing new campaign ideas.

With an outside agency’s contributions, these functions that don’t necessarily require the ingrained expertise of the organization can be taken off your team’s plate. Freed from designing wireframes and developing a new digital presence, your marketing team can set its sight on the long-term business initiatives. These are the efforts your company must prioritize to reach the other side of a downturn.

Outsourcing Allows Companies to Achieve Economies of Scale with Their Digital Marketing Efforts

Approaching a specialized outside agency reduces a demanding workload for your team, but it offers additional benefits too. Not only will another firm offer a wide range of expertise and resources to meet your specific needs, an experienced agency has already handled a variety of such issues for other companies in your position.

Consequently, the aspects of your digital marketing initiatives you’re hiring another firm to address will likely be handled faster than your overstretched in-house team would have been able to deliver. This means a fresh team of specialists is still handling the marketing work you need with a lower impact on your budget. Doing more with less is typically a futile undertaking. But delivering more for less is just good business sense.

Marketing with a Mix of In-House and Agency Expertise Reduces Risk

Introducing an outside perspective to your organization’s marketing can feel daunting, especially amid the uncertainty of an economic downturn. At a time like this, it’s important to verify your agency has a strong track record of collaboration.

When approaching an outside consultant for your needs, ask about their proof points from working in your industry with companies similar to yours. It’s also worth inquiring about their collaboration methodologies with specific examples of how their firm navigated certain circumstances to be sure their approach meshes with yours.

But once assured a firm is suits your needs, a combined, collaborative solution that incorporates your existing team delivers the best results. On one hand, you’re retaining the core competencies of your team to incorporate in-depth knowledge of and experience with your business. On the other, an agency that operates with transparency and an ability to incorporate your team’s valued input can produce their work while side-stepping any internal politics. With both teams working toward the same business goals, your ROI continues to grow.

Outsourcing Digital Marketing Projects Is a Future Proof Business Strategy

There’s a key fact of every economic downtown your organization should always keep in mind: Thankfully, they don’t last forever.

After partnering with an agency through a difficult period, your organization will be in the position of having an existing and maybe expanding in-house team paired with a trusted outside firm. Once the economy rebounds, you then have the freedom to adjust each team’s efforts.

With that hybrid workflow in place, you have the option of returning your marketing team to their original roles before the downturn began. Then, the outside agency’s focus can shift toward improving your website’s user experience or designing a customer portal based around their wealth of experience with your business. Or maybe the structure shifts the other way around. The point is, with this established partnership in place, you have options for how your marketing efforts can proceed.

Marketing Through Economic Adversity Rewards a Strategic Mindset

From the management level through every member of your marketing staff, a faltering economy introduces a new challenge at every turn. In the short term, maintaining the status quo until the financial climate normalizes will prove difficult if not impossible.

But through thoughtful use of an outside agency, you can not only ride out the ongoing economic uncertainty but remain in sight of your existing goals. Then, with this shift in your digital marketing efforts, your firm will be well-positioned to bounce back fast when the recovery arrives.

If you need some support, particularly with digital strategy, design, and development, we’d love to talk more about how we might plug-in to your team.