What You Need to Know Before Hiring a Digital Marketing Firm: Tip #7-Who owns What? Not every Digital Marketing firm is as legitimate as they would have you believe. So how can you separate the charlatans, scammers and incompetents from the professionals? With a little basic homework, and armed with the right questions, you stand a pretty good chance of partnering with the right marketing firm. Who will own your assets? If you pay for it, it’s yours…right? It’s your website, it’s your social media, and it’s your created assets. If your digital marketing firm demands ownership, run fast and run far. When you meet your contractual obligations you should own all the work product that is ownable. If it’s not “ownable” in the classic sense (like social media and Google Analytics), then you should have access to your digital assets should you ever part ways. Don’t assume that everything your digital marketing company does for you belongs to you. I’ve seen amateurs and unscrupulous professionals inadvertently, or strategically lock their clients into their services by registering everything under THEIR name or tying you into proprietary situations that are not easy to untangle. Also available at the end of this presentation is access to the Free eBook and checklist "The Digital Marketing Smell Test...How to hire agency that doesn't stink.

1. How to Evaluate a Digital Marketing Agency
What You Need to Know BEFORE Hiring a Marketing Firm
by Chuck Bankoff
Digital Marketing Strategist
kreative webworks

2. What’s in Your Contract?
tip #7 – who owns what?

3. Not every Digital Marketing firm is as
legitimate as they would have you believe. So
how can you separate the charlatans, scammers
and incompetents from the professionals?

4. With a little basic homework, and armed with
the right questions, you stand a pretty good
chance of partnering with the right firm.

5. Who actually owns your

6. your domain name?
Who owns

7. Your Domain Name is the
Center of your Online Brand

8. Who registered it for you?
Your web designer?
An x-Employee who disappeared?
Do you even know?

9. Doesn’t really mater as long as YOUR
company is the registered owner and
YOU have ACCESS to it.

10. Make sure that you are listed as the
“Registrant”

11. Here’s how you find out
www.whois.com/whois

12. your social media?
Who owns

13. Technically Social Media is not
“ownable” in the traditional sense.

14. It’s about ACCESS

15. I’ve seen an Ex-employee who started a competing
business hijack his former employer’s social media
accounts and direct the traffic to his OWN business.

16. It doesn’t matter who set up your
Social accounts as long as YOU have
Administrative control

17. code & proprietary platforms?
Who owns your

18. Sometimes it’s necessary to develop
custom applications and functionality
that is unique to YOUR business.

19. Unlike commercially available plug-ins
& modules, ensure that any CUSTOM
code that is developed on your behalf
is transferable to YOU should you
part ways with your agency.

20. Copy?
Images?
Graphics?
everything your visitors see?
Who owns

21. You don’t want to find out after the
fact that your agency will pull these
elements as a special parting gift,
claiming they own all work product.

22. And by the way, if your agency is
providing imagery such as stock or
custom photos, make sure the images
are licensed properly and that license
extends to YOU!

23. If not, you can get a nasty-o-gram
attached with a bill that far exceeds the
actual value of the image.

24. the actual website?
Do you even own

25. Don’t ASSUME that you own your website.

26. If it’s a website that can be hosted
anywhere, make sure you have
access to the files should you ever
move on from your agency.

27. If the website is built on a SAS
(Software As a System) platform, just
make sure that you can have the
hosting transferred to you.

28. Keep in mind that taking ownership
of the website may be contingent
on you meeting YOUR contractual
obligations. (this is totally ligit)

29. that doesn’t Stink
How to Hire an Agency
the digital marketing smell test
For the full eBook of questions to ask BEFORE hiring a Digital Marketing or
Web Development firm, download that here for Free:
Download the Free eBook Here