Signing a contract for anything in life can bring on mixed emotions. Joy, excitement, possibly relief, and even hope as you move forward into the next chapter. The same holds true when partnering with an agency for your marketing needs. While signing for a car usually means driving off into the sunset, signing with an agency often yields a somewhat anticlimactic next step: onboarding.
What is onboarding?
Onboarding is a necessary step that begins immediately after you sign, but before any deliverables are completed. While it can feel like a slowdown in momentum moving from sales into execution, it’s an important step that, if overlooked, can have detrimental effects. Let’s take a look at some reasons why an agency onboards new clients, why it’s important and how you can make the most of it.
Your agency wants to get to know you
Agency partnerships are relationships just like any other. The most successful relationships require time, attention, mutual respect and care. Much like dating, onboarding is the “get to know you” phase of the relationship before diving in headfirst.
There’s typically a series of meetings or exercises your agency will ask you to participate in as a way to get to know you better.
What do onboarding activities accomplish?
Onboarding activities are designed so your agency can:
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Better understand your goals and long-term vision
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Collect current information or metrics you are already reporting on (email newsletters, social media, etc.)
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Learn about your pain points in more detail and develop solutions
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Understand your preferences across multiple areas like communication style and meeting cadence
The better your agency knows you, the better the results and the smoother your experience.
Your agency may have questions on details you wouldn’t normally think to disclose
Onboarding is the perfect time to allow specialized teams to collect vital information that sales may not need to go deep enough to ask, or that you wouldn’t normally think to disclose.
For example, a developer may ask you where your site is hosted, who your domain registrar is and if there are any specific IT considerations to bear in mind with a site launch.
A designer may ask you specific questions about pain points in your current brand or visuals.
A writer may ask you granular details such as if you prefer the Oxford comma.
Why are small details important to disclose to my agency?
While this information may seem like overkill or feel time consuming, it’s only going to aid in the end result.
If you get back a deliverable riddled with things you don’t prefer, you’ve lost time and money.
Onboarding sets expectations on both sides
Agencies onboard clients as a means to review and set expectations on both sides. While sales collects high-level goals and aspirations, operational teams evaluate these needs and turn plans into action. Sometimes, that means realigning on what the plan, process and timeline are in reality compared to what is desired on both sides.
What if we want to skip onboarding?
The onboarding process can feel like a slowdown in the momentum between sales and execution, but it’s actually the opposite. It’s setting you up for success at a quicker pace.
Consider the value of working with an agency versus hiring someone off of Fiverr or Upwork. With those platforms, execution happens fast but can be extremely transactional. The work may look great, but is it informed and aligned with what your broader goals are in order to grow?
While those platforms have their place and purpose, hiring an agency partner is typically a big investment that you expect to yield long-term results and value from, which is best accomplished through relationship building and continued learning.
Consider what the tradeoff is for skipping onboarding. You may save time upfront, but if the work misses the mark or does not align with your goals, the agency team will have to go back and get clarity anyway, whether it’s in the execution with the deliverables or optimization in the future not getting the desired results.
How can we make the most of our onboarding with our new agency marketing partner?
If you’ve worked with an agency before, then rest assured that all of that has not gone to waste. Any data you have from previous onboarding sessions or over the duration of the agency partnership is valuable in guiding your new agency partner’s onboarding sessions. Documents such as market research, buyer performance, previous ad spend results, etc. are all pertinent pieces of information to discuss and dissect during the onboarding process.
While having these items doesn’t justify skipping the onboarding step entirely, they can help to facilitate the conversation and make the process feel less redundant on the big to-dos. Remember that every agency is different and will want to learn things about you that may feel irrelevant. There may be a reason why they are asking you for this information different from the last agency’s approach.
What’s the ultimate goal with agency onboarding?
Onboarding is aimed at aligning agency and client teams so that execution and deliverables over the course of the engagement are uniform with your vision and goals. This does not mean things will be 100% perfect; revisions, iterations, and deeper conversations are a natural and expected part of the process following onboarding.
Onboarding helps agencies deliver work that not only feels like your brand, but is inclusive of your expectations, vision and goals sooner, rather than later. It fosters a positive, collaborative relationship from the start and for years to come.
Every agency will have its own process and timeline for onboarding. Some agencies may be 30 days, others may be 90. It truly depends on the nature of your engagement and the size of the agency. The best thing you can do is to come as prepared as possible and with an open mind, willing to collaborate. The more you and your agency work out up front, the faster and smoother things will come together in the future.
If you’re looking for your next agency partner, reach out to us anytime.
