How much should a marketing agency cost?

Agency quotes are hard to compare because each one bundles different things. Once you separate the parts of the bill, it becomes much easier to judge value.

The three parts of the bill

• Management fee: what you pay the agency for strategy, execution and reporting.
• Ad spend: what goes to Google, Meta or other platforms to show your ads. This should be paid directly to the platform.
• Setup or onboarding: a one-time fee for audits, tracking, account builds and strategy in month one.

Common pricing models

• Flat monthly fee. Predictable, and the agency has no incentive to inflate your spend.
• Percentage of ad spend. Common in paid media, but it rewards the agency for spending more rather than spending well.
• Pay per lead. Sounds low-risk, but lead quality can suffer and you may not own the campaigns.

What drives the price up

The number of channels managed, the volume of content produced, how competitive your market is, how deep the reporting goes and how senior the people on your account are.

Red flags

• The agency owns your ad accounts, pixel or website
• Ad spend is billed through the agency with an undisclosed markup
• Long lock-in contracts before any results
• Reports full of impressions and clicks but no leads or revenue
• Guaranteed rankings or guaranteed AI mentions

Questions to ask before you sign

• Who owns the accounts and data if we part ways?
• Is ad spend billed directly by the platform?
• Who will actually work on my account?
• What exactly is in the monthly report?
• What is the notice period?

How Aurleo prices

Flat management fees published on every plan, ad spend paid directly to the platforms, every account owned by you, and month-to-month terms. See the full breakdown on our pricing page.