In-House Marketer or Agency? A Practical Way to Decide
3 Minute Read
We hear this question constantly from business owners…
Should we hire an in-house marketer or hire an agency?
It’s a stressful decision for a simple reason. It’s expensive either way. And if you choose wrong, you don’t just lose budget. You lose time.
Before we talk about “in-house vs. agency,” we start with a simpler question: what problem are you trying to solve?
Step 1: Name what you are actually missing
Most marketing problems fall into one of these buckets. If you can name the primary constraint, the rest becomes clearer.
- Direction
- Priorities aren’t clear
- Messaging feels generic
- Channels are chosen based on habit
- Execution Capacity
- You know what you want to do, but you don’t have the resources
- Everything takes too long
- Output is the bottleneck
- Accountability
- Unclear KPIs
- Reporting that doesn’t drive decisions
- No feedback loop to improve performance
Step 2: Don’t let the obvious need hide the real need
When marketing feels urgent, most businesses do what any practical team would do…
They focus on what they can see.
They see the missing pieces and think:
- We need more posts
- We need a brochure
- We need better design
- We need website updates
That instinct is understandable. Deliverables are tangible, and they feel like progress.
The problem is that deliverables are the last step, not the first.
When strategy is unclear, the business often hires for output (a doer, a designer, a social person) and then expects that hire to also have a plan.
Sometimes that works. More often, it creates a cycle…
- More content goes out
- More money gets spent
- The results remain unclear
- Everyone concludes marketing doesn’t work
This is why we push to start with the foundation work, even if it feels less exciting.
- Who are we targeting?
- What do they care about and what do they resist?
- What stage of the buying journey are they in?
- What touch points matter most?
- What should the message and offer be?
- What does success look like, and how will we measure it?
Start with the goal and strategy…like choosing the destination before you start driving.
Not because specialists aren’t important. They’re critical.
But specialists do their best work when the foundation is already clear.
Step 3: Understand what one in-house hire can and can’t be
A lot of owners want one person who “handles marketing.”
Sometimes you can find a strong generalist, but modern marketing spans too many lanes for one person to be excellent at everything…
- Strategy and planning
- Messaging, copy, creative direction
- Design and content production
- Channel execution (organic, paid, email)
- Web and conversion
- Budgets, KPIs, reporting
So the question is not only in-house vs agency…
It’s also what strength you need first.
When in-house tends to make sense
In-house is usually strongest when the business needs ownership and internal alignment.
Pros
- Deep business context
- Faster internal coordination and decision-making
- Consistency over time
Cons
- One person rarely covers every lane at a high level
- Execution can become bottlenecked without specialist support
In-house tends to be a good fit when…
- Direction and prioritization are the biggest gaps
- Approvals and internal coordination are a major part of the work
- You need a steady rhythm that compounds over time
When an agency tends to make sense
Agencies tend to be strongest when you need specialist depth and speed.
Pros
- Access to specialists across multiple disciplines
- Faster ramp-up than hiring
- More production capacity
Cons
- Agencies struggle when the business expects them to replace internal decision-making
- Without clear goals and approvals, you can get activity without momentum
An agency tends to be a good fit when…
- You need quality execution across multiple lanes quickly
- You need specialist skills that you can’t hire fast enough
- You need strategy and deliverables to move together early
A strategist-first path we often see work well (but not the only path)
This sequence is common because it puts strategy in the right place early and reduces wasted spend.
- Start with an agency that can do strategy and execution together
- Get clarity and momentum at the same time
- Learn what works before you hire too early
- Hire an in-house strategist or marketing lead once you have traction
- Own goals, priorities, and internal alignment
- Keep the plan consistent
- Continue using external specialists for execution (creative, media, web, measurement)
- Add in-house specialists as volume and ROI justify it
- Design
- Social or content manager
- Paid or analytics in-house, if it makes sense
No offense to specialists. They are needed.
The point is sequence. The work needs to start before specialists enter the conversation.
The takeaway
If you’re choosing between an in-house marketer and an agency, start by naming what you need most right now…
- Direction
- Execution Capacity
- Accountability
Once you know that, the right model becomes clearer.
Prioritize strategy early. It reduces wasted spend, makes creative more effective, and gives specialists something clear to execute against.
