How Should You Evaluate a Web or Digital Marketing Agency? 7 Questions to Ask

By Jim McAssey, Vice President, Business Development, Vertikal6

Published November 9, 2026

Evaluate a web or digital marketing agency on seven criteria: business strategy, website design, search and AI visibility, integrations, security, ownership, licensing and measurable ROI. Design quality is the easiest of these to judge from a portfolio, and the other six decide whether the site is still producing value three years from now. Vertikal6 approaches the question the way an IT team reviews any vendor with access to company systems. A modern website connects to the CRM, the ecommerce platform and customer data.

Each criterion below includes the questions to ask and what a strong answer looks like, so you can compare every agency on the same footing.

Your website is often the first interaction a prospective customer has with your business. It can also be an important part of your sales process, customer experience, operational systems and overall technology environment.

Before selecting an agency, consider these seven criteria to determine whether it has the strategic, creative and technical capabilities your business needs.

A Practical Scorecard for Comparing Agencies

Use these seven criteria to consistently evaluate prospective partners. Ask each agency the same questions and request examples that support its responses.

1. Business Strategy, Experience and Marketing Capabilities

A strong agency begins with a structured discovery process, shows relevant results for companies facing similar challenges and recommends the services that fit your business.

An effective agency relationship starts with understanding your business, not discussing website layouts or advertising platforms.

A good agency should learn about your customers, competitive positioning, sales process and business objectives before recommending a solution. It should then translate that understanding into a marketing strategy.

For example, a B2B manufacturer selling complex products to a small number of high-value customers needs a different approach than an eCommerce business selling directly to consumers.

Questions to ask:

• How do you learn about our business and customers before recommending a strategy?
• Can you demonstrate success with companies facing similar business challenges?
• What marketing strategy, content development and campaign management expertise does your team provide?

2. Website Design, User Experience and Conversion Effectiveness

A strong website agency connects every design decision to customer needs and business goals, supports it with relevant examples and has a process for measuring how well the site converts.

An attractive website is important, but appearance alone doesn’t determine success.

Your website needs to communicate your value proposition, help visitors find information and make it easy to take the next step, whether that’s requesting a quote, contacting sales or completing a purchase.

Effective development combines visual design, compelling messaging, content strategy, user experience (UX), mobile responsiveness, accessibility and conversion optimization.

Questions to ask:

• How do you evaluate an existing website and identify opportunities for improvement?
• How do you develop messaging, navigation, content and calls to action?
• Can you demonstrate improvements in engagement, conversions or lead generation from previous projects?

3. SEO, AI Search and Digital Visibility

A strong SEO partner has solid traditional fundamentals, current knowledge of AI-driven discovery and reporting that separates measurable results from emerging indicators.

Even an excellent website provides limited business value if prospective customers cannot find it.

Traditional search engine optimization (SEO) remains essential, including technical SEO, site architecture, keyword strategy and authoritative content.

However, the digital discovery landscape is expanding. Buyers increasingly use AI-powered tools such as ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity, along with Google’s AI search experiences, to research products, services and potential providers.

A capable agency should understand both traditional search and emerging AI-driven discovery. The fundamentals remain important: accessible websites, clear content, technical performance and demonstrated expertise.

An agency’s AI search plan should start with the basics that Google documents. Google’s guide to optimizing for generative AI features (updated July 2026) says a page must be “indexed and eligible to be shown in Google Search with a snippet” to appear in those features. Google also favors content with “unique expert or experienced takes that go beyond common knowledge and the ordinary.”

Reporting also requires a thoughtful approach. Traditional SEO provides established metrics such as rankings, impressions, clicks and conversions. AI visibility may involve brand mentions, cited pages and referral traffic, although measurement capabilities continue to evolve.

A Semrush study with Growth Memo (June 2026) of 115 prompts across four AI engines found that 61.7 percent of citations were “ghost citations,” where the AI platform linked to a page and the brand name never appeared in the answer. Ask the agency to report brand mentions and page citations as separate numbers, across ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity and Google AI Overviews, and to show you the Generative AI performance report in Search Console.

How the agency uses AI in its own work

Gartner’s 2026 CMO Spend Survey (May 2026) found that only 30 percent of marketing leaders report mature or fully developed AI readiness capabilities. A strong agency can explain which tasks it uses AI for, which data it allows into those tools, and how a person reviews every piece before it reaches your site.

Questions to ask:

• How do you develop and execute an SEO strategy?
• What is your approach to improving visibility in AI-powered search tools?
• How do you measure performance across traditional search, AI search and other digital channels?

AMPLIFY Managed Marketing is Vertikal6’s managed marketing program that covers SEO, AI search visibility, content and local search. The company’s SEO services cover on-page, technical, local and AI-driven strategies, and AMPLIFY delivers them with ongoing reporting and review.

4. Integration with Business Systems

A strong agency can show a documented map of every system the website connects to, tested integrations and a named owner for ongoing maintenance.

For many organizations, a website is no longer a standalone marketing tool. It’s part of the company’s broader technology environment.

Websites frequently connect to customer relationship management (CRM) systems, enterprise resource planning (ERP) platforms, marketing automation tools and eCommerce applications.

These integrations can improve efficiency, automate workflows, enhance customer experiences and provide better business intelligence.

When they fail, the consequences can be significant. Leads may never reach sales, inventory information may become inaccurate or orders may fail.

Not every digital agency has the technical expertise to develop and maintain these connections.

Questions to ask:

• What experience do you have integrating websites with CRM, ERP and other business applications?
• Do you have software developers and integration specialists on staff?
• How do you document, monitor and maintain integrations after launch?

Vertikal6 builds these connections through its software development team, which offers system integrations designed to “connect your tools into one seamless workflow.” Its website development work uses WordPress for informational sites and Shopify, BigCommerce and WooCommerce for eCommerce.

5. How Do You Evaluate an Agency’s Security Practices?

Evaluate an agency’s security practices by asking for documented procedures, appropriate access controls, proactive maintenance, reliable backups and clearly defined support responsibilities.

Your website is an important business asset that may connect directly to customer information, operational systems and critical business processes.

Website agencies often have privileged access to hosting environments, content management systems, analytics accounts and integrated applications. Those relationships should be managed with the same care applied to other technology vendors.

According to Verizon’s 2026 Data Breach Investigations Report (May 2026), breaches involving a third party accounted for 48 percent of all breaches, and third-party involvement rose 60 percent. The same report found that nearly a third (31 percent) of breaches began with vulnerability exploitation, the entry point an unpatched plugin or content management system creates.

Security also requires ongoing attention. Website platforms, plugins and connected applications change regularly, and vulnerabilities can emerge long after launch.

Ask each agency for the following in writing:

1. Multifactor authentication on every admin login to the site, hosting, domain registrar and analytics accounts.
2. Named individual accounts for each person on the agency team, with access removed the day someone leaves the project.
3. A patching schedule for the CMS core, themes and plugins, with a named owner.
4. Backups stored separately from the production site, with a restore test on a set schedule.
5. A written process for notifying you of a security incident, including a time frame.
6. Any independent security attestation the agency holds, such as a SOC report.

Ongoing support after launch

A website needs regular care once it goes live. Plugins and platforms release security updates, connected systems change and content needs to stay current. Ask who performs updates and how often, what the response time is for an urgent issue such as a checkout outage, and how you submit a request.

A ticketing system gives both sides a record of every request and its resolution. Ask, too, whether the team that supports the site includes the people who built it, since they know how it was put together.

Questions to ask:

• How do you manage administrative access, multifactor authentication and website security?
• What processes exist for software updates, vulnerability management, backups and recovery?
• Who maintains and supports the website after launch, and how are urgent issues handled?

Vertikal6 combines website development and hosting with broader cybersecurity, managed IT and technology support capabilities. This helps organizations address website security, performance and reliability within the context of their overall technology environment. Its website team offers “secure, high performance website hosting with proactive maintenance, reliable backups, and expert support.” Buyers who need broader protection can review the company’s cybersecurity services, which include security assessments, threat detection and vCISO services.

One Vertikal6 client is a group of seven culinary and hospitality companies serving the senior living industry. Before working with Vertikal6, their websites were managed by several agencies, hosted with different providers and built on different technology stacks. Each agency contributed a strength, such as development, design or support, and none combined all three with an understanding of the business. Leadership chose a single partner for web, digital marketing, hosting and support. Vertikal6 was already the group’s managed IT provider, so one strategic technology partner gave them a more efficient and more collaborative way to work.

6. What Do You Own, and What Do You License?

A strong agency documents who owns each asset, what rights you hold to use it and what transition support it provides if the relationship ends.

Your website content, domain name, customer data, analytics and advertising accounts represent important business investments. While it is everyone’s goal to create a long-term partnership, before entering an agency relationship, understand who owns these assets, who can access them and what happens if the relationship ends.

Not every technology component can or should be owned by the client. Websites often rely on licensed software, commercial plugins or proprietary platforms.

Ownership models vary. Your company should hold its domain, business content, customer data and its analytics and advertising accounts. Many agencies, including Vertikal6, retain ownership of the website they build and the hosting account behind it, and grant the client the right to use the site in perpetuity. Hosting and support are bundled and invoiced to the client. Ask each agency to put its model in writing.

What’s important is having clearly documented ownership, licensing and access rights that protect your organization’s long-term interests.

Agreements should also address custom development, recurring expenses and transition responsibilities.

Ask three questions. First, what rights does the contract give you to use the site and its custom code, and for how long? Second, who holds the hosting account, and what do hosting and support fees cover? Third, who is the registered owner of paid themes, plugins and software licenses? Have your attorney confirm the language.

These answers cost the agency nothing to give at the start of a relationship. An agency that hesitates on any of them is telling you how the exit will go.

Questions to ask:

• Who owns the website code and design, and do we hold a right to use them in perpetuity?
• Who holds the hosting account, and what do the hosting and support fees include?
• Who controls our domain, analytics, advertising accounts and customer data?
• What happens to our site, content and data if we change providers, and are transition terms documented?

7. How Do You Measure ROI From a Web or Digital Marketing Agency?

Hold the agency accountable for business results such as qualified leads, pipeline and revenue, with realistic expectations, transparent reporting and a commitment to continuous improvement.

Ultimately, website and digital marketing investments should be evaluated based on the business objectives they’re intended to support.

Traffic, keyword rankings and advertising impressions provide useful information, but they rarely represent the ultimate measure of success.

For B2B companies, more meaningful indicators often include qualified leads, sales opportunities and pipeline contribution. For eCommerce businesses, they may include conversion rates, customer acquisition costs and revenue.

An agency cannot control every factor affecting business results. Pricing, competitive conditions, sales effectiveness and other internal factors also influence outcomes.

However, a strong agency should help establish realistic objectives, agree on appropriate KPIs and provide transparent reporting that demonstrates its contribution. A strong agency will ask for your current baseline, propose targets with a timeline and name the attribution method it will use to connect each result to a channel. Set a formal checkpoint at 90 days to compare progress with the plan and adjust spend.

Reporting should explain not only what happened, but what’s working, what isn’t, and what should change.

Analytics access and reporting

You should hold admin rights to every measurement account from the first day of the engagement. That includes Google Analytics 4, Google Search Console, Google Tag Manager, Bing Webmaster Tools and each advertising platform.

Full access lets your team check the numbers in any report, keeps the history intact if you change partners and lets a future agency pick up where the last one stopped. Ask the agency to show you a sample monthly report during the evaluation. A useful report connects traffic to form fills, calls, qualified leads and closed revenue, and it explains in plain English what changed and why.

Questions to ask:

• How will we establish business objectives, performance baselines and measurable KPIs?
• How will you connect website and marketing activity to leads, opportunities or revenue?
• What reporting will we receive, and how frequently will we review progress?
• How do you recommend improvements based on performance?

Vertikal6’s AMPLIFY Managed Marketing program combines ongoing marketing execution with performance measurement and regular client reviews, helping organizations connect their digital activities to business objectives. The program delivers a plain-English performance report and a monthly review call, and at its highest tier reporting extends to channel attribution and revenue outcomes.

How to Score and Weigh Agency Responses

Score each agency from 1 to 5, where 5 represents demonstrated expertise with strong supporting evidence and 1 indicates an inability to meet the requirement.

Consider weighting criteria according to your priorities. For example, a company with complex eCommerce operations may emphasize integrations and security, while an organization focused on customer acquisition may prioritize marketing strategy, visibility and conversion performance.

Certain requirements, including essential security controls, access to critical accounts and necessary technical capabilities, should be nonnegotiable regardless of the overall score.

The goal isn’t simply to choose the agency with the highest score. It’s to identify the partner best equipped to meet your business and technology needs.

Choosing an Agency That Can Deliver Long-Term Business Value

Choosing a website development or digital marketing agency should be viewed as a business investment, not simply a creative or technical purchasing decision.

The right partner should understand your business goals, create effective digital experiences, protect your technology and data investments, and demonstrate how its work contributes to measurable results.

Ideally, you’ll find an agency that will become a trusted advisor and perform like a member of your team. Agencies with a track record of long-term client relationships are most adept at supporting your organization as its needs evolve.

At Vertikal6, we approach website development and digital marketing as connected components of a company’s broader business and technology strategy. Our combined capabilities in web development, digital marketing, systems integration, cybersecurity and ongoing technology support honed over 20+ years allow us to address requirements that often extend beyond the scope of a traditional creative agency.

This integrated approach can reduce the challenges of coordinating multiple providers, improve accountability and help ensure your digital initiatives work effectively with the systems and processes supporting your business.

Evaluating a new agency, or questioning whether your existing website and marketing investments are delivering the results they should?

Contact us to discuss your business objectives, current challenges and opportunities to improve your digital presence.

Quick Answers

Should a B2B company use one partner for its website, marketing and IT?

One partner makes sense when the website connects closely to business systems, such as a CRM, an ERP or customer data, because a single team is then accountable for how those pieces work together and how they are secured. Companies with a strong internal IT team can still apply the same scorecard to separate vendors.

How many agencies should be on a shortlist?

Three agencies is a practical number. It gives you enough comparison to see differences in the scorecard answers while keeping the evaluation to a few weeks.