Most guides on how to choose an email marketing agency are written by agencies, and this one is no exception. So instead of reasons to pick us, here is the method we would want a careful buyer to use on us: a one page brief, a weighted scorecard, 15 questions asked in writing, the red flags that should end a conversation, the contract terms worth getting on paper and three checkpoints after you hire. Every test works whether you hire EmailMarketingAgency.com or someone else.
How to choose an email marketing agency in five steps
- Write a one page brief. It makes every agency quote the same job.
- Build a shortlist of three to five. Favor agencies that already work in your platform. The HubSpot Solutions Directory and the Shopify Partner Directory both let you filter for email marketing, and referrals from businesses whose emails you like are worth a call. Our guide to what an email marketing agency actually does breaks down the jobs you are paying for.
- Send each one the same 15 questions in writing. Written answers are easier to compare, and they become a record if promises drift later.
- Ask for proof on your own list. A review of your domain records, list health and recent sends shows how an agency thinks before you pay anything.
- Score the finalists, then read the contract. Use the scorecard below, and check the clauses in the contract section before you sign.
What should your brief include?
If one agency prices four newsletters and another prices eight campaigns plus a welcome series, you have nothing to compare. Put these facts on one page:
- Platform. The tool you send from today, whether that is Shopify Email, Brevo, HubSpot or another, and whether you plan to stay on it.
- Volume. Roughly how many subscribers you have and how many campaigns you want sent each month.
- Dates that matter. Launches, sales, events and busy seasons coming up in the next three months.
- Campaigns versus flows. Campaigns are one time sends, like a sale or a launch. Flows are automated series, like welcome or abandoned cart emails. Many agencies price the two separately, so say which you need.
- Who approves. One named person who signs off on the calendar and on each email.
- What stays with you. Product photos, offers and discount codes usually come from your side.
- Budget and the number you will judge. A monthly range, plus the result that matters to you, such as clicks, orders or bookings.
How do you score each agency?
Rate each finalist from 1 to 5 on the six criteria below, multiply by the weight, then divide by 5 for a total out of 100. A 4 on a row weighted 20, for example, earns 16 points. The heaviest weights go to what is hardest to repair after you sign. Weak copy can be rewritten next month. A damaged sending reputation, or a list you do not control, takes far longer to fix.
| Criterion | Weight | What earns a 5 | What earns a 1 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Work quality and fit | 20 | Complete emails it wrote and designed, each with the brief behind it, ideally in an industry near yours | Templates, mockups or a wall of logos |
| Deliverability and compliance | 20 | Explains SPF, DKIM, DMARC and complaint rates in plain words and names the tools it checks | "Our inbox rates are great" and nothing more |
| Ownership and access | 15 | You own the account, list, templates and files; the agency works from its own user seat | Wants your password, or wants your list in its account |
| Process and approvals | 15 | A written calendar, your approval on every email, a fixed number of revision rounds | "We send what works" with no sign off step |
| Reporting honesty | 15 | Leads with clicks, conversions, unsubscribes and complaints, and explains why opens mislead | Open rate alone, or no regular report at all |
| Price and contract clarity | 15 | A flat or itemized fee, a written list of exclusions, a short notice period | Vague scope, surprise setup fees, a long lock in |
How to read the total: 80 or more is a finalist worth a trial month. Between 60 and 79, go back with pointed questions on the weakest row. Under 60, move on. On a tie, pick the agency whose written answers were clearer.
15 questions to ask an email marketing agency
Send these by email. After each one is what a strong answer sounds like.
The work itself
1. Can I see three campaigns you planned, wrote and designed from start to finish? You want whole emails with the brief behind them, not templates or screenshots of famous brands. Our real campaign examples include the brief for each of the 11 emails we are able to share.
2. Which of those is closest to my business, and what would you change for us? A good agency ties past work to your customers. Our Honey Bear By The Sea email in Gold Beach, Oregon, announced 42 new big rig sites, so it was written for owners of large rigs rather than every camper. Listen for that kind of thinking about your own readers.
3. Who writes the copy, who designs, who builds the email, and who is my day to day contact? Outside help is fine. Not knowing who handles your brand is not. Ask how fast that contact usually replies.
4. Will you work inside the platform I already pay for? For any mainstream tool the answer should be yes. If an agency insists on moving you to a system it controls, ask what happens to your subscribers the day you leave. Here are the email platforms we work inside.
Deliverability and compliance
5. What would you check in my SPF, DKIM and DMARC records during week one? Google requires anyone sending more than 5,000 messages a day to Gmail accounts to set up all three, and Yahoo has matching rules for bulk senders. A strong answer explains what each record proves and what breaks when one is missing. Our email deliverability checklist walks through the checks in order.
6. What spam complaint rate do you aim for, and where do you read it? Google tells senders to keep the rate shown in Postmaster Tools below 0.10% and to never reach 0.30%. Yahoo asks bulk senders to stay below 0.3%. An agency that cannot name a target and a tool is guessing.
7. How do unsubscribes and the footer work in every send? According to the FTC, CAN-SPAM requires a valid physical postal address and a working opt out in every commercial email, and opt outs must be honored within 10 business days. Yahoo goes further for bulk senders: one click unsubscribe, honored within 2 days. Ask how the agency tests both before each send. Our CAN-SPAM compliance checklist covers the full rule set.
8. What happens to subscribers who stopped opening and clicking? Listen for a specific rule, such as a win back email and then suppression after a set quiet period. "We email everyone" is the wrong answer.
Ownership and process
9. If we stop working together, what do I keep? The account, the list, the templates, the copy and the design files should all stay with you. Ask for that sentence in the contract.
10. What access do you need, and will you ever ask for my password? Most platforms let you add a user with a separate login. An agency should ask for a seat, never for your credentials.
11. Can anything go out without my approval? The right answer is no. Then ask how approvals are recorded and what happens when you are slow to reply. Our monthly approval process shows one way to run it.
12. How many rounds of changes come with each email? A fixed number written into the scope keeps both sides honest. Ask what a third round costs.
Reporting and money
13. Which numbers will you report, and how much weight do you give open rates? Apple says Mail Privacy Protection downloads remote content in the background by default, whether or not the reader engages with the email, so open counts from Apple Mail users can run higher than real reads. A strong answer puts clicks, conversions, unsubscribes and complaints first. Our guide to email marketing metrics worth tracking explains which ones to trust.
14. What does the monthly fee include, and what is billed on top? Get the exclusions in writing. Common extras are the platform subscription itself, automated flows, SMS, paid ads and stock photography. If two quotes use different billing models, our pricing page shows how to compare email marketing quotes side by side.
15. How much notice do you need if I want to stop, and what does the handover look like? Month to month, or a 30 day notice period, is a fair ask for campaign work. A long minimum term before you have seen a single send puts all of the risk on you.
What are the red flags when hiring an email marketing agency?
Any one of these is a reason to slow down. Two or more is a reason to walk away.
- Guaranteed open rates or inbox placement. Gmail, Yahoo and Outlook decide where mail lands based on how the sender behaves. No agency controls those filters.
- A request for your password. Shared logins leave no trail of who changed what, and they are awkward to revoke.
- An offer to buy or rent a list. Contacts who never signed up are the fastest way to push your complaint rate past the Google and Yahoo limits in question 6.
- Your list living in their account. If the agency owns the account, leaving means starting over.
- Results you cannot inspect. A revenue figure with no email attached tells you nothing.
- No questions about your business. An agency that pitches before asking about your customers, margins and busy seasons will write generic email.
- Unlimited emails. Unlimited usually means undefined. A fixed count of finished campaigns is easier to hold anyone to.
What should the agency contract include?
A short agreement is fine if it covers the points below. Hiring an agency does not hand off your own legal duty, and the FTC says so plainly in its compliance guide:
"You can't contract away your legal responsibility to comply with the law." (FTC, CAN-SPAM Act: A Compliance Guide for Business)
The FTC adds that both the company promoted in a message and the company that sends it may be held responsible, and its guide lists penalties of up to $53,088 for each email in violation. That is why compliance belongs in the contract as a written commitment from the agency.
| Clause | What it should say |
|---|---|
| Scope | The number of finished campaigns per month, and what finished includes: copy, design, build, testing and scheduling. |
| Approvals | Nothing sends without written approval from your named approver. |
| Revisions | How many revision rounds come with each email, and the price of any extra round. |
| Ownership | The account, list, templates, copy and design files belong to you during and after the engagement. |
| Access | The agency works from its own user seat, which you remove when the work ends. |
| Compliance | Every email follows CAN-SPAM and the Google and Yahoo sender rules, with a working unsubscribe and your postal address. |
| Data use | Your subscriber data is used only for your campaigns, and is never sold, shared or merged with other lists. |
| Fees and exclusions | The monthly fee, what it covers, and what is billed separately, such as your platform subscription. |
| Term and exit | Month to month or a short notice period, plus delivery of all files within a stated number of days. |
| Reporting | How often you receive a report and which metrics it covers. |
How do you know you hired the right agency?
The scorecard predicts. The first three months confirm. Hold the agency to these checkpoints and compare what arrives with its written answers to the 15 questions.
| Checkpoint | What you should have |
|---|---|
| End of month one | A written review of your SPF, DKIM and DMARC records and your list health, an approved calendar, and first sends on the agreed dates. Nothing went out without your sign off. |
| End of month two | A report that leads with clicks, conversions, unsubscribes and complaints, compares the month with the one before, and names the next test. |
| End of month three | A three month trend you can follow, a rule for subscribers who stopped engaging, and campaigns that read as if they were written for your customers rather than lifted from a template. |
Judge the trend and the work, not a single send. If month three still looks like month one, raise it against your scorecard, and use the notice period in your contract if nothing changes.
How does EmailMarketingAgency.com score on its own checklist?
Here are our answers, so you can score us next to everyone else on your shortlist.
- Price and scope. $1,000 a month, flat, for 8 finished campaigns. Planning, writing, design, testing, deliverability monitoring and a monthly report are included. Every line item is listed on our monthly email marketing package page.
- Exclusions. Your platform subscription, paid ads, SMS, and automations like a welcome series or cart reminders, which we can quote separately.
- Ownership. We work inside the account you already have, on any of seven platforms from Klaviyo to Shopify Email. The account, list and templates stay yours.
- Data use. We use your subscriber data only for your campaigns and reports and never email your list for ourselves; see our privacy policy.
- Approvals. You approve the monthly calendar, then every email, with 2 revision rounds per email.
- Term. Month to month. No long contract.
- Exit. Everything is built in your own account, so there are no files to hand back; you remove our user and keep the list, templates and history.
- Your time. About an hour a month.
Where we are the wrong pick: if you need more than eight campaigns a month, ongoing flow builds, or SMS and paid ads under one roof, an agency with a wider scope will serve you better. Our email campaign management service spells out exactly what the monthly work covers.
Our free email audit reviews your list health, your SPF, DKIM and DMARC records, your recent campaigns and the opportunities you missed, then adds a sample calendar. Ask your other finalists for the same thing and compare what comes back.
Frequently asked questions
How many email marketing agencies should I talk to before hiring one?
Three to five is a workable number. Fewer leaves you little to compare, and more turns into weeks of calls. Send all of them identical written questions so the replies line up side by side.
Should I hire an email marketing agency, a freelancer or an in house marketer?
A freelancer can suit one skill, such as copy or design, on an occasional basis. An in house marketer makes sense once email is big enough to fill a full time role and someone on your team can manage that person. An agency fits the space between: planning, writing, design, building, testing and reporting from one accountable party every month. Whichever you pick, run them through the same scorecard.
Should I pick an email marketing agency that specializes in my industry?
It helps, but it is not a requirement. What matters more is whether the agency asks about your customers, margins and busy seasons before it pitches. Ask for one example from a business close to yours and listen to how the agency explains the thinking behind it. Our own deepest experience is with campgrounds and RV parks: seven park campaigns across Utah, Texas, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Missouri and Oregon.
Does a HubSpot or Shopify partner badge mean an agency is good?
It means the agency belongs to that vendor's partner program, which is a fair sign it knows the tool. A badge cannot show you how the agency writes, how it treats your list or whether it waits for your approval before sending. Use partner directories to find candidates, then score every one on the same criteria.
How do I switch email marketing agencies without losing my list?
If the account is in your name, switching is mostly paperwork: remove the old agency's user seat, collect the template and design files, and give the new agency its own login. If the old agency owns the account, request a full export before you give notice, including unsubscribed and suppressed contacts, so nobody who opted out gets emailed again.