How do you know if a marketing agency is actually working?
Social media agencies often lean on excuses and demand patience when results stall, leaving small business owners unable to verify if their payment is delivering real value. This ambiguity makes it hard to distinguish legitimate experts from those who simply collect fees before moving on to the next client.
What people tried
Every workaround mentioned in the threads below. We haven’t tested any of them — and nobody here is claiming they worked.
Found another way around this?
Share your steps and trade-offs so fellow engineers don't have to reinvent the wheel. No account required.
- 1Running ads independently to test how difficult it isDid this help you?
- 2Hiring a content creator for tangible deliverables like photos and videos instead of hiring an agencyDid this help you?
- 3Asking for case studies or referencesDid this help you?
- 4Running small pilot projects with agenciesDid this help you?
- 5Demanding specific performance metrics before entering discussionsDid this help you?
- 6Handling ad spend and product feeds independently through self-service platform toolsDid this help you?
- 7Running basic Google Ads independentlyDid this help you?
- 8Splitting marketing pitches into verifiable piecesDid this help you?
- 9Asking for references from local businesses they have worked withDid this help you?
- 10Running ads directly on Google and FacebookDid this help you?
- 11Testing different marketing agencies through trial and errorDid this help you?
In their words
Unedited, grouped by where they were said, most upvoted first within each place, each linked to the thread it came from.
“why are agencies often hesitant to share even general numbers around conversion rates, costs, or typical results?”source ↗
“What numbers do you usually ask an agency for before deciding to work with them?”source ↗
“I manage a nail salon and recently came across a marketing/scaling company called AAA Agency. I’m considering talking with them, but I wanted to get opinions from other small business owners before spending money on something like this.”source ↗
“I already run Google Ads for my salon, so I’m trying to figure out whether a system like this actually provides something substantially different from what a competent owner/marketing agency could set up themselves.”source ↗
“Has anyone here actually worked with AAA Agency specifically, or used a similar AI automation/scaling agency for a local service business?”source ↗
“I'm not really sure how to take some if these social media marketers seriously.”source ↗
“My real honest question, what does real experts provide.”source ↗
“If you don't see results, they can make excuses, ask for patience and whatever, until you finally fire them and they move on to someone else.”source ↗
“how did you find a good one without just wasting a bunch of money testing different agencies??”source ↗
“Most of the agencies I've talked to either could not accept our services because we are working in the cosmetology industry, or they are not up to our quality standards.”source ↗
“We just run ads on Google and Facebook with a substantial budget of around 3 to 5 lakhs a month, but we are not getting a justified amount of revenue.”source ↗
“Our agency manages our google and meta spend, helps us administer our product feeds, etc.”source ↗
“But my sense is that the ad platforms are increasingly self-service or, depending on your perspective, ai-driven black boxes.”source ↗
“We like our agency but the fees feel increasingly unjustifiable.”source ↗
Where this came up
People with this problem also raised
- 2How to tell if your ad campaigns are actually working
- 3Are social media marketing tools actually good enough for professional use?
- 5Why does scaling ad spend stop working and burn money?
- 5Why does posting daily on social media not bring in customers?
- 2How to measure true profit on email campaigns
- 4Why is ROAS on alternative ad platforms lower than Meta?