When looking for a China digital marketing agency to pull off marketing campaigns in China, one of the toughest markets to tackle, you may run across many companies offering you heaven and earth, and everything in between. They will offer to get you millions of hits on Baidu, to get you trending on Weibo, and much, much more. How do you decide between the legitimate claims and the ones which are nothing more than smoke and mirrors? Here are some tips to help you decide:

Top Tips to Find Digital Marketing Agencies

You can search online to find the best digital marketing agencies that offer campaigns for China. Contact at least three or four and inquire about their operation methods. Here are a few things you would want to keep an eye out for:

Take on marketers who can handle China’s social media ecosystem

Digital marketing in China works very differently from digital marketing in the US, UK, or elsewhere in the world. This is because China’s social media needs are broadly met by WeChat and Weibo, as compared to the wide range of social platforms available in other countries. So, when you choose a marketing agency, make sure that they are intimately familiar with the Chinese digital ecosystem. You must also go through the undoctored results and metrics from their previous campaigns to judge their capability in tackling the challenging tasks you might throw at them. Another important thing to keep an eye out for is if the agency has other clients who are in your field, thus demonstrating that they have knowledge on how to market your product.

Don’t just focus on keywords while hiring

Many digital marketing companies these days focus entirely on keywords and putting together long lists of SEO search phrases. But keywords often have little impact on the success of your marketing campaigns. What really works is using those keywords, plus a lot of secondary research, to create ads, landing pages and content that turns those clicks into sales leads. Make sure your marketing agency is not just focused on generating lists of keywords, but also on following up those keywords with the hard work that comes after.

Have a method ready to measure ROI

Reliable digital marketing agencies will prove the return on investment of their efforts, putting in place tools and analytics that will tell you everything relevant to your business growth in China. Some of the common things you can expect to see are:

● Analytics showing metrics and tracking the growth over time of your website traffic and ad effectiveness.

● Call tracking systems to measure how many sales leads you’re getting and closing every day.

● Suggestions on how to reduce your advertising cost per new customer and increase your profit margins.

Approach your marketing goals holistically

Digital marketing agencies often make the misstep of focussing purely on ads and social media sponsored posts. However, in order to reach greater levels of success on digital media, it is important to look at your entire digital footprint and to work on all aspects of your web presence. If you come across an agency that does not just this but also works with you to improve your offline marketing efforts and helps you build your place in the local Chinese community, you can rest assured of quick and stable growth over time.

Last but not least, have a clear plan in mind

Always ask the agency you hire to give you a high-level overview of the marketing plan before they begin any work. Check that the agency has a detailed process to follow and can explain how exactly it all works for you. Here are some things to keep an eye out for:

● They should start with a discussion about your goals, needs, and objectives, as well as developing a good understanding of your business situation.

● They should then let you know of the baseline measurements and analytic data, so you can measure the ROI and track improvements over time.

● They must develop good-looking and effective landing pages to send your ad-traffic to.

● They must improve the SEO and content on your website, revamping if necessary, so as to turn more visitors into sales leads.

● They must work closely with your Chinese social media and email marketing accounts to improve your online visibility and traffic.