5 Tips for Choosing the Best San Diego Advertising Agency

Looking for an advertising agency that matches your vision—and your budget—can be difficult. You may not know what you’re looking for or where to even start finding an agency. Fear not. Here are the top ways you can choose the best advertising agency for your business so that your company can reach its full potential.

1. Where Do You Start?

If you don’t even know where to start looking for an advertising agency, the best place would be to look at other companies or businesses like yours that you want to emulate. For instance, if you have a casino, hotel, restaurant, or boutique, look at what other businesses like yours have as far as advertising, especially in your area. Check out their websites and ads in trade magazines or publications. Try reaching out to your network to see if anyone knows about the advertising agencies they have worked with and been happy with.

Once you have a few names or leads, check out their websites. Advertising agencies often have a portfolio of work or a list of clients available for your perusal. With this, you can see what their strengths are and if there are any particular ad campaigns you admire that they handled.

2. Location, Location, Location

It’s important that the agency you go with can handle your business and knows the territory where you’re located. Have you ever read a book that’s set in the city you live in, but the author gets details wrong? Doesn’t it bother you and take you out of the story? It might make you think that the author should have done more research or had an editor who knew the area.

An ad agency that makes the same mistake could turn potential customers off your product or service, not realizing that the ad agency you use is not your company itself. Potential consumers may think, That business doesn’t know what they’re doing. This may lead them to take their business elsewhere.

In our age of video conferencing, FaceTime, and email, you may think that going with a cheaper option farther away will be good for your bottom line. But if it turns out you have to visit the agency, you’ve lost some time and money with all the travel—time and money you could have spent being productive elsewhere.

3. What Type of Advertising Do You Need?

Each business is different, not just in what they sell, but in what type of advertising they want to do. For example, do you want to focus on print ads in trade magazines? Do you need a new, dynamic website? Do you want to branch out into video production? Does your branding need an upgrade? Determining which of these things you require and in what order to do them is half the battle. Our world changes so quickly that advertising must change quickly too. When you start interviewing advertising agencies, make sure that you ask them about their resources and techniques for staying ahead of the curve to help you stand out. There are many platforms available to advertise your product or service, so you want to find the right agency to represent you on several platforms at the same time.

Also, be sure to check whether they can help you reach your specific audience. People of different demographics need to be advertised to differently, so being able to reach multiple groups will work for you in the long run.

4. Do Your Ideas Match?

When you start looking for ad agencies, you’ll meet with the representatives, and they’ll pitch ideas to you. When you have that first meeting, prepare a list of what you want them to help you with. What ideas or images do you already have that you want to hold on to? What is the target audience you want to reach? Are there any key messages you want to bring to the front or taglines or key phrases you want your audience to associate with your business? What about your goals for your business or product? Your prepped list will help you accept or reject the ideas these agencies pitch to you.

The agency’s expertise and experience will help you convey your business’s message, so be sure to ask them about what other campaigns they may have worked on too.

5. Budget Needs

Matching your budget with the correct San Diego advertising agency should be one of the most important things you consider before deciding who you want to work with. You don’t want to partner with a company that will take all your cash flow right now, but you also don’t want a company that operates on a shoestring budget. You’re looking for a stable agency with a good track record for delivering on the budget they promise.

You also want to consider that it’s important to have a relationship with an ad agency. When you start with your new ad agency, they might get you started with graphic design, branding, and a new website, but you want to think about the next ad campaign as well. Having your ad agency already on the same page with you means you don’t have to explain yourself all over again with a new agency, and they can easily get started with your new campaign six months down the road. Aim to work with your ad agency for a year and then reassess if their budget and ideas are still working for your business.

At InnoVision, we partner with clients whose passion for their business and industry is something we can match. Being able to see inside the mind of our clients and understand their brand, goals, and direction is what makes us unique and gets us excited about coming to work with you every day. We’re located in San Diego, CA, and plan on opening an office in Phoenix, AZ, soon. Contact us today to see how we can help you reach your goals.