You have three open proposals in three tabs. One agency charges a set price every month. Another one breaks everything out into tiers named things like “Growth” and “Scale.” The third won’t give you a number until you get on a call. They all guarantee outcomes and they all use the word “strategy” forty times.

If that rings a bell, you’re not being tough. It’s really impossible to compare social media advertising packages, because no two agencies talk about the same work in the same way. Here’s an easy way to compare social media advertising packages so you can choose the proper social media marketing agency, not the one with the slickest deck.

Why It’s Difficult to Compare Social Media Advertising Packages

One agency’s “package” might mean three Instagram posts each week.

Another’s might be paid campaigns on meta and TikTok, custom creative and weekly reports. They both call it social media marketing. They both do invoicing. They are not the same product.

So compare what you receive before you compare rates. A cheaper bundle that covers only half the work is not simply cheaper, it is just incomplete.

Decide what you need first. If you are buying social media advertising you are buying leads or sales. If you want solid brand presence and community, you’re buying organic management. But lots of firms need both and they are different jobs and different expenses.

What to include in every package

Check these lines regardless of what the tiers are labelled. Put them in a spreadsheet with a column for each agency.

• Platforms covered: Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn? Or Facebook? Trying to cover all of them means often not covering any of them properly.
• Campaign setup Audience research, tracking & account structure: That groundwork defines if your adverts can be measured in any way at all.
• Imaginative: Who makes the commercials, and how many versions per month? Paid social is often about success vs failure, and being creative makes the difference.
• “Tuning and testing: A decent standard is weekly. No detail means it’s ‘ongoing’, not.
• Reporting: A PDF that pops up when someone remembers, or a live dashboard?
• Communications: Someone you can hold accountable with a response time.

A reputable social media marketing agency will cheerfully answer these. A vague one changes the subject.

The ad spend conundrum that no one explains

There are two distinct fees to social media advertising, the management charge you pay to the firm and the ad expenditure you pay to Meta or TikTok for the ads itself.

Some agencies will only quote the cost and expect you to budget the ad spend on top. Others combine all that into one number. Some take a portion of ad expenditure, which rewards them for spending more of your money rather than obtaining better outcomes.

None of these things are automatically bad but you have to know what you are looking at Is ad spend included and who is the ad account named? Insist the account belongs to you. If you ever leave your data and campaign history should come with you.

Contracts and the tiny print

Most social media advertising packages have a minimum period. You should expect 3-6 months, as paid campaigns take time to learn. Something else is a twelve month lock-in with no departure clause.

Before you sign, verify the notice period, the set up fees, what happens to your work and accounts if you leave and how success is defined. That last is the most important. If a proposal uses the words “views” and “reach” but never mentions leads or income, you are being offered activity, not outcomes.

Questions to ask each social media marketing company

Email the identical list to each social media marketing agency and see what response you get.

• Can you demonstrate exemplary achievements from a business like mine?
• Who will be working on my account?
• What does a realistic first 90 days look like?
• What if the Campaigns are not working in month two?
• Do I have ownership of the ad accounts, creative and data?

If you’re looking at a paid social ad agency, add: “How do you decide when to kill an ad, and when to scale it?” The answer will indicate whether they actually have a testing process.

Red signals that should slow you down Certain consequences.

• Meta’s algorithm is not owned by anyone. In Australia, misleading claims can also breach consumer law, and the ACCC’s advertising advice sets out what reasonable claims look like.
• A pricing much below anyone else’s. Social media advertising takes real hours of real individuals. See what did not get included.
• Your ad account is not available. A social media marketing agency worth employing will provide you complete access to
• Reports were filled of vanity metrics. Likes are part of social media advertising but they shouldn’t be the story.
• The pressure to sign today.

Social media advertising bundles to suit your circumstance

Small neighbourhood shop?
5 done badly is worse than 1 or 2 done correctly. If your consumers are local, seek for a social media marketing business that knows your area, like a reliable social media agency in Sydney or one that understands how Gold Coast and Sunshine Coast purchasers behave.

Looking for an Instagram marketing agency to work with?
Ignore how many followers they have. Ask to see an ad creative they’ve done and the outcomes behind it.

Got an online store?
Tracking is all. Ensure the social media marketing agency you hire can connect ad spend to real sales.

One more thing, just so you know: some social media marketing agencies don’t have a local office, and that’s fine. What counts is good communication, your time zone and concrete outcomes. At Duo Digital, we work remotely with Australian firms, and we plan calls around AEST – and we’d rather tell you that upfront. You can learn how we tackle this on our social media marketing services site and view some examples on our case studies page.

The last call

On a scale of one to five, rate each social media marketing agency’s social media advertising package on four things: clarity of what’s included, transparency on cost, quality of examples and how comfortable you felt on the call. Add it all together and weigh your intuition against the numbers. You’re going to be working with these individuals for months, so don’t discount a hasty or unclear call.

Social media advertising works best when it is backed up by a solid website and search presence, thus our SEO services work well with it. You can see all our services on our services page. Need a simple explanation of what we would accomplish and what it costs? Contact us for a free audit.

Common questions:

What is a social media marketing firm?

It designs, generates and manages your brand’s presence on platforms like Instagram, Facebook and TikTok, normally involving content, community management and paid social media advertising, with reporting on what’s working.

What are the prices of social media advertising packages in Australia?

It is contingent upon the number of platforms, how creative and whether ad budget is packaged. Get each agency to break out its quote and isolate the management cost from your ad budget.

Are retainers better or one-off projects?

Retainers work for ongoing campaigns since paid social gets better with consistent testing. One-off initiatives are suited to launches or single events. Many companies start with 3 months then reassess.

How long does it take for social media advertising to work?

Expect a few weeks to gather data and a few months to settle into a consistent performance. Beware of a man who says he can provide you immediate results.

Remote vs Local Social Media Marketing Agency: What is Better?

Not really. Judge on results, communication and openness not post code.

What to expect from an Instagram marketing agency?

Real ad creative. Real results. Clear ownership of your ad account. And a testing procedure you can see.