White label marketing services constitute a specific form of outsourcing. The estimated value of the global IT outsourcing market in 2019 was US$ 520.74 billion. The prediction is that it will grow by a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 7.7% until 2027.
White-label marketing agencies bring considerable value addition to businesses of any size.
What Is White Label Marketing?
White-label marketing is a simple concept. Company A specializes in marketing. It produces marketing solutions without claiming a brand name.
You buy those solutions from company A. You then offer those solutions to your customers under your company’s brand name and price tag.
Why Companies Use White Label Marketing Agencies: The Pros
Google uses white-label agencies for its phone and email services in AdWords. Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba used white label services in the beginning.
Countless small and medium-sized companies are using white label marketing agencies, for the irresistible promises of the strategy.
Here are some of these promises:
1. Lower The Cost Of Delivering Services
When you outsource marketing services, you save all the overhead costs necessary to maintain an in-house team. You can also bypass the entire process of recruiting, hiring, onboarding, training, and so on. You save time and other resources there too.
When you save costs, you can pass that on to your customers in the form of a competitive price point that your competitors can’t hope to match.
2. Enhance Your Capacity
By accessing a specialized marketing solutions company, you can expand your capacity. You can start offering services beyond the skill set of an in-house team.
White-label digital marketing experts can offer a wide range of solutions. The most popular ones are:
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- SEO
- Social media marketing campaigns
- Pay-per-click (PPC) services
- Email marketing
- Inbound marketing
- Content marketing
- Website development
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All of these services become yours to offer even as you save on labor and overhead costs.
Let’s take Shopify online store development as an example. Maybe this is not a service you’ve offered to your clients. Some of your existing clients want that service now.
You’d surely not want your clients to look elsewhere and risk losing them. The best solution is to find a white label partner who’ll do this for you. This expertise is yours to offer to other clients also.
3. Faster Innovation
White label marketing agencies are experts in what they do: building state-of-the-art marketing solutions. When you access their expertise and experience, you associate with the latest innovations in the industry.
A white label marketing agency works with teams of some of the most experienced and skilled personnel in the sector. Through them, you gain access to the most up-to-date technologies and tools in the industry.
You can offer innovative solutions faster than your competitors because you have experts creating marketing value on your behalf.
4. Ease Your Entry Into A New Market
To have a white label marketing agency as your partner is to gain access to their resources. With that expanded kitty of resources, you can focus on new markets and fresh customers without losing your current ones.
Let’s refer back to the example of the Shopify e-commerce store development. With that service accessible to you through your white label partner, you can enter a completely new market.
You don’t need to worry about the production aspect of this service at all. Your white label partner will take care of that part. As long as you have an established brand in a related market, expanding through a white label service agency is a path of low resistance.
5. Maintain Your Branding Cohesion
Your clients trust your brand. Trying to explain to them that you will need a 3rd party in the mix to offer more services may unsettle that trust. That is the last thing you’d want.
With a white label marketing agency as your partner, your clients do not even need to know. All your services will go under your brand name.
Your clients may well marvel at your capacity, but they don’t need to be wiser about how you’ve achieved that. That way, you can maintain your branding cohesion even as you offer additional services to your clients.
You can accelerate your brand growth in the process as well. Your white label partner will never stake any claim to branding. Their chosen business model is to produce marketing solutions without branding them.
That’s what makes it a win-win situation for both.
It’s Not Advantages All the Way, There Are Some Cons, Too!
Nothing in life is without its flip side. It’s the same with white label agencies. They offer a range of advantages, for sure, but not without some aspects you need to be wary of.
Here are the few cons you may have to deal with.
1. Liability
Just as you benefit from your white label partner’s products and services, you may have to face the liability when things go wrong for the recipient of these services (your clients). If the services fall short of your clients’ expectations, they will hold you responsible.
This is a problem that you may have to face if your white label partners operate in a situation where quality control standards are not strict enough to match your clients’ expectations. This is a challenge typically associated with freelancers.
The solution lies in choosing a reputed white label agency that swears by its rigorous quality control processes. Prior and/or existing clients should vouchsafe for the quality of your white label partner’s services.
2. Loss Of Control
To outsource some of the services you offer your clients to a white label agency is also to lose control over the production process. If you try to micromanage the workflow of your white label partner, it may well be counterproductive.
In your attempt to micromanage, you may create more disruptions than you realize. Your white label partner will be working on something you are not an expert at. Why try to control that?
Also, you lose the advantage of having more time to focus on core business functions, if you try to micromanage. That’s not practical.
Loss of control over the production process is an integral part of outsourcing to a white label agency. You have to be ready to accept that. Maintain an efficient monitoring system by all means. But do not try to micromanage.
3. Potentially Alienating Customers
You sell services under your brand name, even though a different company has produced them. That is not 100% transparent, strictly speaking. That is where the potential of alienating customers comes in. Some of your customers may not like this practice if they come to know.
But your clients do not need to know. Partnering with a white label marketing agency is part of your business strategy. You don’t need to discuss that with your clients.
It’s Time To Get a White Label Partner
When your clients start asking for services that your in-house team cannot offer, it’s time for you to partner with a white label marketing solutions company.
Find a reputed company with renowned clients as your white label partner. Do a reference check, and relax.
Have a dedicated team to address your marketing solutions needs. That will help you develop a relationship of trust and dependability.
Expand capacity, access expertise, and experience growth as your extended team of white label experts work out innovative solutions for you.
