#zehner

Their Mastery Of Technology

If you’ve gotten as far as interviewing digital agencies, you’ve at least done your homework. You might not know the new platform, but you know what you want and what you don’t. You’ve also likely figured out the names of the major e-Commerce platforms that might be under consideration.

With this in mind, get the agency talking about their experience. What are the pros and cons of any recommended platforms? Based on their responses you might be able to discern how familiar they are with that technology. And if you can’t, let them take you into the weeds a bit to try to impress you. Alternately you can do a little testing of your own by posing scenarios and asking how the new platform might respond.

Most importantly, get them to talk about data migration. This piece is critical for a business with many years’ worth of data. What’s their level of expertise in this area? If they outsource this to a third party, you want to know about their working relationship with their vendor. Ask for examples of unexpected issues they’ve encountered and how they handled it. How many times did it take for them to migrate data to the new platform?

Their Familiarity With You

If you have, in fact, done your homework then you’ve likely chosen an agency with experience in your vertical.

This is important because user flows and behavior are not the same across all categories or verticals. Time spent on the site, how many pages are viewed during a session, as well as average order value and other data points can vary wildly from one vertical to another.

An agency partner with deep experience working with fashion brands might, on the surface, seem like a perfect match. However, if you are a men’s fashion brand the work of an agency whose only fashion experience is working with women’s brands will likely be at a disadvantage. Women’s online shopping behavior is very different from men’s in terms of user flow and behavior.

You really want an agency that has worked in your specific vertical.

Their Track Record

Be sure to review their prior work. Look for a successful track record of delivering quality digital experiences. Does the site design allow the brand’s unique selling propositions to be clearly presented? Is the conversion funnel smooth and free of unnecessary distraction? Is the site fully-featured but also intuitive? And do you like the overall look and functionality of their prior work in your space?

Determining their level of expertise and understanding of the digital space — and expertise in your specific vertical — is essential. You want to choose an agency partner that will not only support your business but help it grow from launch.

Post-Launch

What’s just as important in building your digital experience is what you do after launch. How are you going to get visitors to your site, and how will your site evolve to improve the user experience and maximize conversions?

You’ll want to make sure your agency partner has a keen understanding of digital marketing and conversion rate optimization. Talk to them about their strategies around SEO, paid search, email marketing, organic/paid social, retargeting and affiliate marketing. Discuss their track record for increasing conversion rate and what UX/UI or functionality changes were applied to get there.  

Also, don’t be shy about asking about the capacity or size of the team behind the curtain and who the resident experts are. These days you need a team of specialists with laser focus operating your digital marketing and CRO program. If your agency is relying on just one or two people for all their digital marketing services, you’re going to have a hard time getting their attention. What’s worse, the changes you want to effect on your business may take longer.  

To wrap your head around all of this, sit down with the account director or key strategist and have them walk you through their programs, proposed strategies and techniques at a high level. You’ll need to understand how you’ll work with their team (e.g. points of contact, frequency of updates, meetings, schedule of deliverables, etc.).

You don’t have to be an e-Commerce expert to find the right e-Commerce agency partner, but you do need to know what qualifications to look for and what to ask. After all, your business depends on it.