Marketing agency or growth agency? What to ask before you hire anyone
Let's be real about the word "agency." For a lot of home service owners it leaves a bad taste. Big promises. A big monthly bill. A report full of charts. And not much to show for it.
You're not imagining that. In a 2025 survey of 500 small businesses by vcita, 40% of the ones that outsourced their marketing ended up switching or dropping their agency, and 60% pointed to no return on their money as the reason they left.
But the word itself isn't the problem. In plain terms, an agency is just someone who does it for you. A marketing agency does your marketing so you don't have to. A social media agency runs your social media. The real question isn't whether to hire an agency. It's what you're hiring them to do.
Marketing is one piece of growing a company
Here's where a lot of owners get stuck. They hire for marketing when the real problem is somewhere else.
Getting more people to know you exist matters. But more calls don't help if nobody answers the phone. A great ad doesn't help if your website makes you look like you'll leave a mess in someone's house. Five star work doesn't help if your newest review is from last year.
That's why we call Momentum a growth agency. We help you grow the company, not just one channel. That means the website and the Google profile, yes. It also means stopping the spam calls, making sure every call gets answered, answering every review, running the ads and fixing the holes that are quietly costing you good jobs.
We're not going to run the wire, get on the roof or fix the plumbing. That's your craft. We do what we specialize in so you can do what you specialize in.
Coach you, or do it for you?
There are two kinds of help out there. Some people coach you. They tell you what to do and leave the doing to you. Others do it for you and keep you in the dark.
The best answer is usually both. Think of an experienced teammate on your crew. They do the work, and they show you what they did and why, so you're never guessing about your own business. That's how we run it: we do the work, and we're on a call with you every week.
Ask about the minimum
When you're deciding who to hire, a lot of done for you programs, agencies and coaches will ask you to commit for a set number of months "to see results." Six to twelve month minimums are common, and leaving early can mean paying for the months you never used.
A minimum isn't always a red flag. But ask why it's there. We go deeper on this in should you sign a 6 or 12 month contract with a marketing agency? If the answer is "it takes six months to see anything," ask what they'll actually do in month one. There's a lot that can be done in the first month to show you real value.
We're month to month for exactly that reason. We're not afraid to earn it every month. Your peace of mind matters more than a contract.
What month one should look like
Think about how you'd build a house. You don't start with the paint. You start with the foundation.
Growing a business works the same way. Month one isn't about chasing more leads. It's about stopping the leaks, so the leads you already get turn into jobs. For our clients, the first month looks like this:
- A website that looks like the best in your industry.
- A Google Business Profile that's complete and active.
- Spam calls stopped and every real call answered.
- Every review answered, so people can see somebody's home.
That foundation is why we charge a one time setup fee. After that, it's one monthly fee, month to month. Here's what a marketing agency should do in the first 30 days, and why agencies charge a setup fee and what it should cover.
Questions to ask anyone you're thinking of hiring
- Is there a minimum, and what does it cost to leave early?
- What will I actually see in the first month?
- Are my website, Google profile and ad accounts in my name? If you leave, you should keep them. Here's who owns your website and Google profile if you fire your agency.
- Is ad spend included, or billed on top?
- Will you do it, coach me, or both?
- Who will I actually talk to every week?
Why we can say this
We've been on the other side of the table. Our founder AK has coached leaders at private equity backed companies, so we know how the big roll ups grow. Our team has worked inside Google and Microsoft, so we know how big organizations build systems that run without one person holding everything together. And we build systems and automations for companies, because a system that keeps working when you're not there is what turns a job into a company.
Every client goes through the same step by step process. We share it across The Honest Builder network, and every step gets marked off on a scorecard you can see.
Not sure where your business is leaking? Our free Growth Ladder assessment takes about four minutes and shows you the one thing to fix first.
