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Customer acquisition or growth marketing agency: what you are really buying
Customer acquisition agency, growth marketing agency: behind the words, what they actually do, what to check, and where to start when you sell to consumers.
Published on · Joh · 6 min read
"Customer acquisition", "growth marketing", "performance": agencies change names every three years, the need stays the same. You want more customers, at a cost that leaves margin. Behind the words, here is what you are really buying.
What these words cover
A customer acquisition agency brings in prospects: paid advertising on Meta and Google most often, sometimes SEO, email, partnerships.
Growth marketing adds a method: test fast, measure, keep what works, across the whole customer journey, not just advertising. On paper it is the most complete approach. In practice, many "growth" agencies mostly do advertising.
What really grows a business selling to consumers
In the order things most often break:
- Conversion tracking. Without it, you steer blind. The pixel and the conversions API.
- The creative. On Meta, it is what finds customers. Structuring a video ad.
- The page or form. What turns a visit into an enquiry. The landing page.
- The call-back. An enquiry called back within the hour isn't worth the same as one called back the next day.
- Measuring all the way to the sale. The cost of a signed customer, not a click. Customer acquisition cost.
An agency that only talks about the first level, campaign settings, leaves out the essentials.
Questions to ask
- What do you measure, and how far? The click, the enquiry, the customer?
- Who produces the creatives?
- Who actually works on my account?
- What happens after the form? Do you help qualify and call back?
- What results in numbers have you achieved for a business like mine?
Where to start
For a business selling projects to consumers, video advertising on Meta, complemented by Google for people already searching, is often the fastest lever. The rest comes once the flow of enquiries is there. Digital marketing, where to start.
That is the scope I cover alone, from the video to tracking cost per enquiry: creative, Meta and Google campaigns, weekly follow-up. No email or SEO: if that is what you want, a broader agency will suit you better.
Further reading: Media buying agency and Outsourcing your ad campaigns.
Want to know where to start in your case? . We look at where your acquisition breaks today.