Guide to Choosing a B2B Tech Marketing Agency
Raising brand awareness and generating quality leads are the keys to growing your B2B tech company. Brand awareness extends your reach and enhances the reputation of your company, while leads that convert translate into increased revenue.
To achieve these goals, your B2B tech firm needs to develop a marketing strategy that includes the right mix of tactics to attract, engage, and convert target customers. While some tech companies may have a marketing team run by an experienced and dedicated marketing director, other firms may be making do with a small team that lacks specialized leadership.
Outsourcing your company’s marketing to an agency is a great alternative to relying on an in-house team or hiring a dedicated marketing director. The right B2B tech marketing agency will have depth of expertise and extensive experience working with companies like yours to create custom marketing strategies that deliver measurable results.
Leaders and decision makers at B2B tech companies will benefit from insights into how to choose the ideal marketing agency.
Why B2B Tech Companies Need a Marketing Agency
B2B tech companies and managed service providers (MSPs) need to expand their marketing efforts. However, hiring a dedicated marketing director can be difficult. Marketing directors are often generalists who lack expertise in the needs of B2B tech firms. Hiring a full-time marketing director can also be expensive with salaries running to almost six figures.
Even with the leadership of a marketing director, a small in-house marketing team may not be able to handle all your marketing processes from search engine optimization (SEO) to content creation, lead generation, and social media management.
By outsourcing your marketing efforts to an agency that specializes in working with B2B tech companies, your firm gains access to a deep bench of experts that can help you develop marketing strategies and track performance so you can carry out continuous improvement.
Understanding the Role of a B2B Tech Marketing Agency
A B2B tech marketing agency helps solution providers, MSPs, managed security service providers (MSSPs), software-as-a-service companies, and channel organizations develop comprehensive marketing strategies that overcome lead generation and growth challenges.
A marketing agency will work with your B2B tech firm to set lead generation goals, track performance, and adjust strategies based on key performance indicators (KPIs). The ideal marketing agency will collaborate with your company, taking the time to understand your business and growth objectives.
Depending on your company’s needs, a marketing agency can either augment your in-house marketing team, take on a leadership role, or handle all your marketing efforts. For a monthly fee, a marketing agency can provide your tech company with a team of specialists, including:
- Dedicated Marketing Manager
- Web Developer
- Content Strategist
- SEO Expert
- UX director
- B2B Tech Copywriter
- Social Media Specialist
A B2B tech marketing agency will help your company keep up with the latest trends in marketing, including AI SEO, so your brand can build a reputation as a trusted partner, advisor, and thought leader.
Signs You Need a Marketing Agency
How does your B2B tech company or MSP know that you need to work with a marketing agency?
Ask yourself if you are experiencing:
- Lack of lead quality
- Difficulty creating content
- Insufficient website traffic
- Low conversion rates
- Failure to rank for industry keywords
- Misalignment between marketing and sales teams
- Inability to reach target audiences
These challenges are signs that your company needs the guidance of a marketing agency to optimize your lead generation and brand awareness efforts.
B2B Tech Marketing Skills and Services to Look For
When choosing a marketing agency for your B2B tech company, look for one that offers a wide range of services carried out by a skilled and experienced team. The services offered should enable your company to develop a modern, comprehensive, and omni-channel marketing strategy.
Must-have marketing services include:
- Website Development & Optimization
A marketing agency should help your company turn your website into an engine for demand generation by ensuring it is full of engaging content and opportunities for conversion, as well as optimized search.
- Lead Generation
Your agency should offer services for generating leads to fill your pipeline and nurture them into marketing- and sales-qualified leads that can be converted into customers to sustain growth.
- SEO & AI SEO
SEO and AI SEO services ensure that your company ranks for industry keywords and surfaces in searches conducted using AI-powered platforms and assistants.
- Channel Marketing
A marketing agency with expertise in the channel can help your company find the right partners to sell your solutions and related services and develop joint marketing strategies.
- Marketing Consultation
Marketing consultation services provide leadership and expertise to develop marketing strategies for achieving short- and long-term growth objectives.
- Content Creation
Content creation services empower B2B tech companies to craft informative content that attracts and engages potential customers and establishes your business as a thought leader and authority.
- Digital Advertising
A marketing agency with digital advertising services will manage paid search, social media ads on platforms such as Google and LinkedIn, and retargeting campaigns, as well as track performance and make improvements.
- Social Media Marketing
Social media marketing services empower your company to engage with target audiences on the social platforms where they congregate and interact with content.
- Telemarketing
Using an outbound approach through telemarketing services enables your company to add a human touch to digital marketing efforts.
HubSpot Agency Skills
Working with a marketing agency that is also a certified HubSpot Agency will enable your company to add the HubSpot Platform to your marketing tech stack or optimize your existing HubSpot instance. A HubSpot Agency will have the expertise needed to customize your HubSpot Platform so that its capabilities align with your marketing goals.
How to Evaluate a B2B Tech Marketing Agency
To successfully evaluate potential B2B tech marketing agencies, your company needs to ask the right questions. Ask about their experience in key marketing services, including website builds, digital advertising, and SEO. Find out how the prospective agency handles performance tracking, reporting, and continuous improvement.
Assessing Experience
The right marketing agency will be able to demonstrate ample experience in the B2B technology industry working with a range of tech companies, including solution providers, MSPs, MSSPs, SaaS firms, and channel organizations. Ask candidates to present a portfolio of previous engagements with companies of your type that includes information about measurable results.
Red Flags
When evaluating marketing agencies, look for red flags that signal a bad fit.
Setting Unrealistic Goals
Making unrealistic promises, such as viral success or a massive number of leads within a short period of time, is a red flag. An agency should work with your company to set SMART goals: Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-Bound. Effective marketing takes time and goal setting involves establishing baselines and evaluating results so adjustments can be made.
One-Size-Fits-All Approach
An agency that presents cookie-cutter solutions and service packages isn’t making the effort to understand your marketing challenges. You need to work with an agency that will create an overall custom strategy that aligns with your marketing goals.
Poor Communication & Collaboration
If an agency gives vague answers to your questions and fails to conduct regular meetings with clients, they will likely be slow to respond to your needs and lack transparency. Working with a marketing agency should be a collaborative and consultative experience.
Lack of Strategy
If a marketing agency offers only piecemeal services or prefab packages, they lack a strategic approach to marketing. A marketing agency should help your company build a strategic roadmap for ongoing growth.
Misaligned Goals
An agency that focuses on metrics that don’t matter to your company can’t help you develop effective lead generation strategies. The right agency will work with you to define KPIs, set meaningful goals, and track performance.
Poor Culture Fit
A marketing agency should work to understand your current sales and marketing teams and their processes, as well as how you want to present your brand.
Engagement Models for Marketing Agencies
B2B tech companies can choose from different engagement models when working with a marketing agency.
Pilot Program
B2B tech companies that are interested in working with a marketing agency can test the waters with a pilot program. Once the agency proves their value, the company can transition to a full retainer.
For example, at TSL Marketing, we have a 3-month pilot structure that includes:
- SEO for raising brand awareness
- Blogs for promoting credibility
- Website Optimization to attract and engage visitors
A pilot program can be the start of a long-term relationship with a marketing agency through a full retainer.
Retainer
A retainer allows your company to outsource marketing services to an agency. A retainer for B2B tech marketing services may include different levels of service based on a tiering system.
- Bronze Tier: Consulting and support as part of your marketing team
- Silver Tier: A combination of specialized strategy, training, and support to drive growth
- Gold Tier: True partnership with the marketing agency in which you work together to align business objectives with platform optimization
A prospective agency should track pilot performance to show your company a measurable ROI. Once you’ve seen the results, you can decide which tier of services best meets your marketing needs.
How to Measure Success
To ensure that your B2B tech company generates a return on your investment in a marketing agency, you need to measure the success of your efforts. Before engaging a marketing agency, set a baseline for sales performance so you can track improvements.
Once a baseline has been established, calculate the total revenue generated from the services the agency provides by subtracting the total investment in services from revenue, divide the result by the total cost of the services, and then multiply by 100. The result will quantify your return on investment (ROI).
ROI = [(Revenue - Total Investment) / Total Investment x 100
You can also track metrics, such as lead volume, conversion rates, deal close rates, and lifetime value of customers acquired through your engagement with the marketing agency.
B2B Tech Marketing Best Practices
Your marketing agency should follow best practices to ensure success for your B2B tech company.
Measuring Performance
Working with a marketing agency should help your company increase customer engagement, lead generation, and conversion rates. To ensure your company is meeting goals, a marketing agency needs to set expectations for performance and use Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) to track progress toward performance objectives. KPIs may include marketing metrics, such as email open and click-through rates. Your agency needs to review these metrics frequently so that you can adapt to reach your objectives.
Communication & Collaboration
Communication and collaboration allow your marketing agency to customize your overall strategy, marketing mix, and lead generation objectives. Your company should establish a cadence for communicating with the marketing agency using collaboration tools such as Slack, Asana, Teams, and HubSpot. Through communication and collaboration, you can encourage internal buy-in and establish alignment with line-of-business goals.
Proactive Lead Generation
While referrals can be a great way to generate leads using endorsements from loyal customers, a marketing agency can help your company find more reliable ways to fill your pipeline and scale. A marketing agency should work with your firm to develop a lead generation strategy that uses digital channels to provide control and consistency.
Building Brand Awareness
Awareness marketing helps your company become recognized and trusted as an advisor and thought leader in the B2B tech community. Raising the market awareness of your company is a long-term process that builds a good reputation to increase conversion rates and generate more leads.
Data Strategy
A marketing agency should help your company create a data strategy that includes what companies and contacts you want to build data on and provides details about those firms. A data strategy should capture details about ideal prospects based on your company’s expertise in specific technologies. Once you build your data strategy, the agency can help you acquire as much of the data from reputable third-party data providers as possible.
Website Optimization
Work with your marketing agency to turn your website into a strategic asset. An agency can help you assess your current website and refresh the design, sharpen messaging, and optimize content for search. Optimization efforts should include entertaining and informative content and opportunities for conversion.
SEO
A marketing agency should work to understand customer intent so your company can create content that gets found in traditional and AI-powered search. Prospects increasingly use AI platforms such as Copilot and ChatGPT to conduct search, so your company needs to work with an agency to ensure that your content comes across as authoritative and appears in AI Overviews.
Marketing Agency Success Stories
As a marketing agency with over 25 years of experience working with B2B tech companies, TSL Marketing can give real-world examples of success.
How TSL Helped a Regional MSP Generate $8.5M in New Revenue from Online Leads
TSL provided DP Solutions with a combination of inbound marketing tactics to help drive traffic to the website and convert visitors into leads. By working with TSL, DP Solutions was able to grow net-new leads from its website through SEO and pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns — fully built from the ground up using a solid SEO strategy that improved search results for targeted keywords and increased traffic.
“We are blown away by the number of quality leads coming in! Since partnering with TSL on our website optimization and paid search efforts, we consistently receive high-quality leads every month.”
-- Jill Rose, Marketing Manager of DP Solutions
Top Tip: Make sure your marketing agency continues to monitor website visitor data to improve user experience and encourage engagement.
How TSL Helped Pegasus Technology Solutions Brand Itself as a Top MSP in the Dallas Fort Worth Area
Pegasus partnered with TSL to reinvent its brand and raise its profile as an MSP in Dallas Fort Worth. TSL took an approach that combined optimizing web content and conversion opportunities with an SEO strategy and paid Google ads. TSL focused on the SEO strategy for Pegasus on improving the ranking and performance of search terms related to MSP in the Dallas Fort Worth area.
“We chose – and continue to choose – TSL because of their true partnership. Being a relationship-oriented company ourselves, it was important to find an agency that we could trust with our business. Their team is knowledgeable, and we are seeing tangible results from their efforts in our digital marketing strategy. I see the TSL team as a vital extension of our marketing department.”
– Shannon Whitehead, Director of Marketing, Pegasus Technology Solutions
Top Tip:
Use your engagement with a marketing agency to rebrand your company and raise market awareness of your B2B tech company through SEO.
Checklist for Choosing a B2B Tech Marketing Agency
Before you decide on a B2B tech marketing agency to partner with, use our handy checklist to guide your decision-making process. Stakeholders and decision makers should consider key criteria, such as:
- Deep B2B marketing expertise
- Strategic mindset
- Understanding of business and marketing objectives
- Dedication to alignment between marketing and sales teams
- Collaborative and consultative approach
- Adherence to marketing best practices
Click below to get your copy of our B2B Tech Marketing Agency assessment checklist.
Soft Skills and Culture Fit
Remember that finding the right marketing agency is about more than expertise. Your B2B tech marketing agency should fit into the culture of your company and work to understand your goals and priorities.
When evaluating candidates, look for approachability and communication skills, as well as how they handle challenges. Team members at an agency should express their ideas clearly and thoughtfully.
You can ask questions to assess how they would fit in with your company's culture, values, and mission. Look for evidence of collaboration and teamwork skills.
Find Your Ideal B2B Tech Marketing Agency
Get started with finding the right B2B tech marketing agency by booking a consultation with TSL Marketing to see if we are the right match for your marketing needs. We can assess your current website and approach to lead generation and make recommendations for optimizing your marketing strategy.
Find out if TSL Marketing is the right fit for your B2B tech company. Request a meeting with one of our experts.