How is IMPACT Different From Other Agencies?

At IMPACT, we have a unique view of the entire inbound marketing landscape.

We speak with organizations every day who tell us the same story: “We believe in inbound marketing, but our past experiences with agencies haven’t delivered results.”

We get it. After all, the principles behind inbound make perfect sense, but the execution has always been the challenging part. 

At the same time, we speak with agency owners who are equally frustrated. “We’re trying to satisfy our clients’ expectations, but we’re operating at razor-thin margins and we keep churning clients.”

Enough is enough.

We believe very strongly that the way inbound marketing has been done in the past doesn’t work. It doesn’t work for the client, and it doesn’t work for the agency. All too often it leads to squandered resources and wasted time.

We know that there’s a better way.

For starters, we believe organizations should take care of the majority of their marketing efforts in-house — especially content production — and their agency should direct and support these efforts.

We don’t write our clients' blogs, film their videos, or schedule their marketing emails.

We teach companies to do these things themselves because we know that they have expertise an outside agency could never feign. They just need the skills and the strategy to do it. 

We use our They Ask, You Answer framework to help our clients produce better content that actually drives revenue. Once they’ve learned what they need to know, they stop paying us. No more endless dependency on an outside agency for your success. 

At the same time, we train agencies to use They Ask, You Answer with their clients, producing the same results we’ve seen from all kinds of businesses in dozens of industries. 

Sound different? It is. Very different. 

Below, you’ll learn:

• How IMPACT equips clients to own their digital marketing success.
• How we train sales teams to improve close rates.
• How we guide agencies to run more profitable, stable businesses.

If you’re interested in understanding why our method works so well — and why IMPACT is so different from any HubSpot partner you’ll talk to — keep reading.

What makes IMPACT different?

Although IMPACT stands among the most distinguished HubSpot partner agencies, we are unlike every other agency out there. 

Here’s why: We think the traditional agency-client model is broken. We believe agencies should help companies like yours be responsible for their own success. 

In our opinion, too many agencies create relationships in which the client is forever dependent on the agency to survive. The agency is the HubSpot portal expert, the agency is the email marketing expert, the agency knows how to optimize and publish blog posts, and the agency is writing the content that will drive the organic traffic to capture leads and create sales.

A company like yours is dependent on the agency for its success, paying handsomely for the expertise that keeps it growing. 

This doesn’t truly benefit the client or the agency.

At IMPACT, we think this kind of relationship is unhealthy and inefficient. Why should you pay an agency in perpetuity for tasks you can take in-house? Why should your success be always tied to an outside organization?

Taking your marketing in house is less expensive, more efficient, and way more effective. 

We imagine a different kind of relationship

We believe you’re fully capable of maintaining your HubSpot portal, updating your website, drafting and sending your own marketing emails, and optimizing blog posts. And, we believe you can write your own content. Indeed, we believe you must. 

Content represents the very soul of your business, and having an outside author write about what makes you who you are will never be as authentic and compelling as when you do it yourself.

At IMPACT, our goal is to coach you to own and improve your digital sales and marketing. We want you to reach a point where you no longer need us. 

Our team will help train your team

At IMPACT, we don’t believe in marketing initiatives. If something only drives traffic but doesn’t increase your sales and revenue, it is not a wise investment. That’s why we work with your sales and marketing teams to make sure you reach your revenue goals. 

That means forming a blended revenue team with representatives from marketing and sales. This way, messaging is consistent throughout a buyer’s experience and your marketing team is producing content that helps your sales team close deals. 

What’s more, we know that company initiatives only work with buy-in from the highest levels, so we meet with company leaders as well. 

When you combine leadership coaching with sales training and marketing strategy, you get your whole team pulling in the same direction — and the results will be tremendous.

IMPACT’s They Ask, You Answer Mastery program

We bundle our coaching and training services in our They Ask, You Answer Mastery program, providing a personalized experience for your team. 

A dedicated coach and account manager will work with your team to determine the best training program for your needs.

Your coach will begin by leading a strategic planning session with your business leaders and heads of sales and marketing.

This will allow for a deep dive into your company’s health and goals. Your IMPACT team will utilize the inbound marketing scorecard to help set priorities, determine goals, and build a quarterly roadmap that will be used by your team and ours. 

Expert coaching and training sessions

After onboarding and strategy building, your team will work with IMPACT’s subject matter experts to develop their role-specific skills. 

Over the course of your journey, you will work with several members of IMPACT’s staff:

• Content trainers specialize in both written and video content and will teach your team how to create content that educates customers before and during a sales conversation.
• HubSpot trainers will help you set up HubSpot (or clean up your existing HubSpot portal) so that your content efforts can be measured effectively. They teach you how you can best leverage HubSpot within your company.
• Website services experts strategize, design, and develop your website if you need a new site built or your existing site updated.
• Paid media specialists deploy omnichannel paid media campaigns across search and social media that are specifically tailored to your business goals.
• Video production experts train your internal team to produce videos that can be used in the sales process to close deals more effectively. 

Every 90 days, you and your coach will revisit your scorecard to monitor progress and decide your new priorities and next steps.

You will have access to additional resources to help your learning

IMPACT has produced thousands of articles, podcasts, videos, content pillars, and reports covering all aspects of cutting-edge digital sales and marketing. These resources are available free on our website, which draws millions of visitors each year.

In addition, we offer IMPACT+, an online educational platform with courses, keynotes, discussion boards and more — all designed to help you learn and implement They Ask, You Answer.

You can learn from IMPACT’s experts and connect with other industry leaders, and you can get started for free. New courses are added every month.

IMPACT+ courses

Paying IMPACT+ members (called “Pro”) get access to more than a hundred exclusive recorded event sessions from such industry leaders as Brian Halligan, David Meerman Scott, Rand Fishkin, and Ann Handley.

Recorded session from Maia Singletary

Also, mastermind groups bring together sales professionals, content writers, videographers, company leaders, and more to connect and speak frankly about wins and lessons learned with others in the same role. 

IMPACT helps agencies, too

The traditional agency/client model is not just detrimental for the clients, who become dependant on outside marketers to control their future. It's hard for agencies as well. Many inbound marketing agencies are squeezed, trying to deliver success to their clients with razor-thin margins. 

To achieve our mission of helping thousands of businesses thrive with They Ask, You Answer, IMPACT now offers a coaching certification program. We train agencies to become certified They Ask, You Answer coaches, empowering them to better serve their clients.

You can work directly with me, as well as a small handful of coaches I’ve trained directly. We'll help you improve the way you work with clients so you can operate at better margins, your clients can be more profitable, and your employees are happier.

To learn more about our coaching certification program, set up a time to talk to one of our advisors. 

The future of content marketing is in-house expertise

As a small business owner myself, I understand the mindset of most entrepreneurs: You want to control your own destiny. You went into business on your own because you had a vision that, matched with your ambition, has led you to where you are today.

If something is not going well in your business, you want to be able to fix it. You want to take charge. 

Yet all over the country, businesses are beholden to marketing agencies who are doing tasks the businesses could do themselves if they had the right coaching. 

You don’t need an agency to make updates to your website, provide you with traffic reports, and schedule your emails. And you certainly don’t need an agency to write the content that describes the very heart of who you are and what you do. 

You can be doing these things yourself. IMPACT can help teach you.

If you believe the traditional agency model is broken, you’re in the right place. Let us help you take control of your sales and marketing destiny.

(image credit: Seshu from connecticutheadshots.com)