The Top Challenges Faced by Marketing Agencies and How to Fix Them

As a leader of a marketing agency, you're aware of the large breadth of challenges you face from attracting new clients to a lack of internal resources to do everything you want to do.

Take it from us; we’ve seen countless agencies that struggle with everything from sales inefficiencies to a lack of expertise in areas that matter. The good news is there are solutions for every challenge. With strategic plans and the knowledge to back them up, you can turn these problems around. 

In this blog post, we’ll explore some of the most common challenges we hear from other marketing and advertising agencies – and some proposed solutions to overcome them.

The Challenge: Not Generating Enough (or Any) Sales Qualified Leads 

Lead generation is absolutely essential for business growth. Gone are the days when we can rely only on word of mouth or referrals and networking. Without a steady flow of leads to nurture, sales decline and growth feel impossible – or you simply have your leaders and/or salespeople spending too much time on the wrong opportunities. 

Lead generation is one of the biggest challenges for marketers across industries but especially in this field, with 58% of business owners saying they struggle with lead generation.  

Some common lead generation challenges for marketing agencies include: 

• Not knowing exactly where to start to up your game / lacking the expertise in this area  

• Focusing only on bottom-of-the-funnel conversions (i.e. contact us, consultation, etc.)  

• Not attracting the best kinds of prospects that fit your ideal customer profile 

• Not enough internal resources to do everything you want to do (like creating content, running campaigns, etc.) 

• The lead flow in place isn’t efficient or effective  

• Salespeople not being properly trained to follow up with different kinds of leads and turn them into opportunities 

• No solid lead nurturing strategy or use of automation 

You might be able to relate to some or most of these challenges – and if so, you’re definitely not alone! If you’ve already nailed down a lead generation strategy, but sales and revenue still aren’t stellar, you may need to pinpoint other issues. For example, you could be missing time or resources to devote to lead nurturing or sales follow-up. There are so many angles, it’s easy to see why attracting, nurturing, and converting leads is tough. 

Improve Lead Generation with Dynamic Content 

One way to dramatically boost your lead generation techniques is to create high-quality content that brings more traffic to your website and continues to funnel prospects in every stage of the buyers' journey a bit further. This content should include everything from blog posts to infographics to videos and webinars. The exact content mix should depend on your target audience and strategy.  

Create Content That Resonates with Your Audience 

The heart of connecting with your audience is through high-value content that educates readers and positions you as a leader in your field. Be sure to identify your audience's pain points and create content that will feel helpful, educational, and like it’s created for them.  

Design Content for Each Stage of the Buyers’ Journey 

The most important part of building a content strategy is being sure you understand your buyer’s journeys and the different questions and challenges they face at every stage. Once you are crystal clear on this (and for the many different personas you might be targeting) then you can ensure your content strategy is in place to address the many different stages they might be in.  

For instance, you could make an infographic for people in the awareness stage that helps key decision-makers uncover the advertising channels that would be best for them based on their goals. Another example would be speaking to those who may be further along in their buying journey and are evaluating different agencies trying to figure out which is best for them.

In this scenario, you might have a video that highlights happy clients you’ve worked with within their industry or an infographic that overcomes some key questions they have around onboarding and reporting at your agency.  

The Challenge: Trying to Appeal to Everyone

Marketing agencies that struggle to attract new prospects consistently, keep a full-funnel of leads, and convert prospects into new clients may be trying to be everything to everyone (and therefore aren’t being anything to anyone). This is a common mistake that you likely advise your own clients on – and yet might not be taking that advice for yourself.  

Narrow the Range of People You Market To 

It’s important to remember that it’s safe to narrow down your audience and make your target market more segmented. Although it can seem counterintuitive to appeal to fewer people sometimes, especially if you feel you don’t have enough prospects in your funnel, your agency is better off targeting a more specific audience than trying to appeal to the masses.

Your website should also be built for lead generation and optimized with SEO to attract your ideal clients in key industries you are focusing on. It’s impossible to grow and market your agency to everyone, so consider marketing to select ideal audiences instead. 

Get Clear on What You’re Best At 

If your agency has fallen into the trap of trying to please everyone, it’s time to get specific. Really hone in on the services that your agency is best suited for and that align with the types of clients you want.  

Your marketing agency's core should be 3-5 areas of expertise that you prioritize. This doesn’t mean you don’t offer many other services and channels to get results – but it does mean that you hang your hate on some key areas of expertise that you talk about more regularly. Focus primarily on attracting a certain audience that your agency will best serve. Decide what resources and capabilities are strongest at your agency and attract your audience based on these. 

Get More Precise About Your Audience

Start narrowing down your target audience based on industry needs. You can be more categorical according to their behaviors, interests, or purchasing history. Create target personas to get clear on whom you want to attract.

The Challenge: A Shortage of Sales Resources 

Often, marketing agencies lack a variety of things when it comes to sales resources – this could include not having:

• Expertise in selling, sales strategy, or sales enablement  

• A CRM for tracking and managing accounts and deals 

• Full-time dedicated sellers (or not enough) 

• A solid and proven sales process in place 

• Sales enablement tools to help sellers sell smarter and faster 

• Automation in place for more consistency and efficiency  

• Content and resources that answer the top questions and objections of your prospects  

• Case studies and testimonials 

• Internal employees to oversee sales and sales strategy  

It’s hard to know when you should dedicate internal or external resources to these different needs and this can vary depending on the time of year, growth, revenue, and so much more.  

Sometimes, an agency just can’t do it all, and that’s okay! Instead, think about how outsourcing certain things will help your bottom line. Outside expertise and resources can go a long way to help your sales team. 

Get Help with Resources and Training 

When you outsource your sales needs, you take these pressures off of your plate. If you struggle with converting engaged leads, your sales efforts may need an overhaul. Building a strategy with experts who have resources to spare. Your sales team may also require more training and tools to allow them to do their jobs better and provide your agency with the results you want. You can outsource by hiring specialized personnel to handle your sales resources.  

Need Help Overcoming These Barriers? 

The first step to finding solutions is identifying the struggles you face. There is a solution for everything, but it can be hard to overcome on your own. 

Considering outsourcing the services of an agency like LeadG2, to help make all these challenges more manageable. In this case, you’ll have a partner to help you identify and nail down your top needs and opportunities while creating recommendations for strategies for growth while equipping your agency with the training and resources you need to succeed for years to come in these areas.