This document discusses 7 internal criteria for deciding between using a freelancer or agency for content marketing. The criteria are infrastructure, content strategy, volume, service needs, lead times, complexity/expertise, and budget. It provides descriptions and considerations for each criteria, such as how an agency can handle a higher volume and provide multiple services, while a freelancer may be better for lower volume or a single service need. The document emphasizes evaluating internal resources and needs to determine the right outsourcing strategy.

1. 7 Internal Criteria
for
Deciding Between a
Freelancer and an Agency
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2. 76% of
marketers are increasing
the amount of content
they will produce in 2016
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3. Is your marketing department
structured to handle that volume?

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Help can come from
a content marketing
agency or freelance
writers, but which is
right for your
business?

5. Time to look inward
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Here are
7 Internal Criteria
for
Deciding Between a
Freelancer and an
Agency

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#1: Infrastructure

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#1: Infrastructure
Organized Content
Marketing Team
Limited Internal
Infrastructure
You already have writers, editors,
designers and managers tasked
with keeping the whole process
running on schedule.
Your organization isn’t structured
like a publication with the ability
to edit and manage a high
volume of content.
Freelancers may help if your
issue is merely bandwidth.
An agency that specializes in
content can handle the bulk of
these tasks and deliver you a
finished product without a large
time strain on your internal
team.

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#2: Content Strategy

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Despite marketers
creating more content
than ever before, the
number that have a
documented
content strategy has
actually decreased to
only
32%

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Either create your content
strategy before outsourcing
content marketing, or work
with a marketing agency
that can help you
formulate a strategy.

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#3
Volume

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High Content
Volume
Low Content
Volume
If your content demand is high,
managing a single agency is
easier than managing a
community of freelance writers.
If you have a low need, which a
single writer can handle, a
freelancer may be an easy
option.

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#4: Service Needs

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Single Service Multiple Services
Freelancers usually specialize in
one type of deliverable, whether
it is written content, graphic
design or other marketing.
An agency may have a wider
breadth of services they can
offer you, such as social media
management, content
management services and other
complementary marketing
services.

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#5: Lead
Times

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Predictable
Content Calendar
Unpredictable
Content Calendar
You have a concrete editorial
calendar that allows you to
predict your needs a month or
even a quarter out.
Your blog and other content
relies on commenting on timely
industry news or your web
content often requires quick
revisions.
Either an agency or freelancer
should have no issue meeting
your delivery needs.
A marketing agency can assign
multiple people to your account
and are generally much more
responsive to your needs.

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#6: Level of
Complexity/Expertise

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Understand and clearly communicate this
need before reaching out to either an
agency or a freelancer.
How complex is your product or service?

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#7
Budget

20. B2B marketers allocate an average
28% of their total marketing budget
to content marketing.
The most effective
companies allocate
42% of their
budget.

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Understand the entirety of your content
marketing needs and your internal resources
before determining what mix of freelancers
and content marketing agency is right for
your content community and your
outsourcing budget.

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For more info, check out our
whitepaper “Agency vs
Freelancers: Options for Scaling
and Augmenting Content
Creation”
Learn how to evaluate each option and how
to create a content outsourcing strategy that
fits your needs.
What’s the right mix for your
outsourced content marketing?