Which advertising platforms do you manage?

Look for specificity. Any agency can say "data-driven" or "results-oriented." Ask for the mechanism: how do they build content strategy? What happens after a website launches? How do they track ROI on ad spend? Agencies that explain their process in concrete terms — not promises and adjectives — are the ones that actually have a process.

Shared Slack channel, direct access to the people doing the work, and a standing meeting cadence you choose. No account managers relaying messages. The person you talk to is the person building the thing.

SEO compounds. A blog post that ranks on page one continues generating leads for years with no additional spend. Typical ROI for well-executed SEO ranges from 5x to 12x the investment over 12–24 months, depending on the market and competition. The key metric isn't rankings — it's revenue attributed to organic traffic.