This week we thought we’d address a question we’ve been asked both directly and indirectly over the years, and that is: If my business is in Colorado, should I hire a Colorado SEM company? It’s a perfectly logical question and we’ll do our best to tease out the pros and cons.
In a perfect world, it shouldn’t matter where your SEM management company is. If your new online marketing manager knows how to run your campaigns, can meet your marketing goals and communicates well with you and your team, it shouldn’t matter if they are in Colorado or Patagonia. After all…shouldn’t you just find the most skilled team and sign up?
Here are some things to consider before you hire the most experienced team at the best price and ignore their location:
Knowledge: If there are facets of your business that are colored by your physical location, it will be easier if they already know the lay of the land. For example, if you work for a ski resort in Colorado, and your online marketing manager lives here, they might already know if you offer night skiing, or how far the drive from DIA is.
Time Zone: We all heard tales in the past decade or so of super-efficiency due to overlapping time zones. If you live in New York and assign a task to your California SEM manager, it’s done first thing in the morning! That can certainly be the case sometimes, but scheduling meetings gets more difficult, and the longer the gap in time zones, the less overlap your schedules have, which can make answering quick questions or putting out a fire a longer process than you might like.
Price: In our globally connected mindset, physical location shouldn’t affect price, right? Well, it does. If you hire a Colorado SEM company, they will almost certainly be more affordable than one in New York City or Los Angeles…after all, overhead is determined by physical location, even if your new PPC campaigns are all targeted to Colorado.
So what does this all mean? In most cases when you’re choosing the right online marketing team, you can talk to a few agencies and find the right fit quickly. If there are a few close contenders and you feel like they are both competitive on knowledge, creativity and price…maybe the shop that’s right here in Colorado brings a few extra perks along with it…
If you have questions about an upcoming SEM effort, or are wondering who to hire to manage your online marketing, get in touch. We’d be happy to talk about your options.