Business growing pains — it’s one of those problems many entrepreneurs love. However, being stretched too thin by a growing client list creates management issues and can quickly become a massive strain on your existing staff.
You’ve probably already pruned a few problematic clients to help alleviate the burden on your business. But no entrepreneur likes to turn away business.
One solution could be to hire more staff to keep up with the growing demands of your business. However, there are some issues with this approach.
First, hiring more employees means hiring more management, which cuts into your bottom line. Secondly, if your business hits a rough patch or can’t sustain its growth, you’ll need to lay off employees, which is detrimental to morale. Finally, retaining high-level talent can be difficult, and the number of qualified employees after a certain point will start to dip, especially in less densely-populated cities and regions.
One surefire solution to help you overcome growing pains is to outsource or white-label the work you simply can’t accomplish. Similarly, white labeling can be an effective solution to fill critical labor or technical gaps so that you can offer your clients a broader range of services at a premium.
With this in mind, here are the benefits of white labeling some of your digital marketing services with a third-party agency to improve your business’s bottom line.
1. Proven business model
At its core, white labeling is just a form of outsourcing, common in all business industries. For digital marketers, the white label formula is simple: You charge a client a premium for various work, such as blog writing, and outsource that work to a third-party agency and keep the difference in rates as a profit.
Now, having more hands-on a project can cause confusion in some cases. However, white labeling simplifies your role as an agency to a liaison between your client’s needs and the work being produced.
Instead of hiring a content writer to pump out dozens of blogs in a month or produce a multi-page whitepaper, all you need is an SEO (search engine optimization) department head to coordinate communication between your client and your white label partner.
The best part is that you get all of the credit, as you can pass off all white label work as your own. Everyone is satisfied and better off from the business opportunity you’ve provided.
2. More trustworthy than freelancers
Chances are, if you’ve experienced some of these growing pains, you’ve probably tried your hand with a few freelancers. However, as someone who’s worked with hundreds of freelancers throughout the years, they can be notoriously unreliable. Furthermore, you may only find one or two that stick for every 20 freelancers.
So why not reach out to an external firm specializing in the areas you’re selling?
While more expensive than freelancers, working with a qualified white-label partner ensures that:
- Deadlines are met.
- All work is edited and double-checked.
- Projects are completed to the highest standards.
- Communication is timely and responsive.
In addition, you can gauge the quality and trustworthiness of a white label partner by their reviews, case studies, previous client lists and testimonials.
Even if you find a short-term freelancer, they may quickly move on to new opportunities if you can’t keep them metaphorically fed or find full-time employment elsewhere.
On the contrary, white-label partnerships can be long-term relationships that help grow both of your companies.
3. Fill specialization needs
Similarly, white label partners can be great ways to fulfill projects you don’t have the time or talent to fill. This includes labor-intensive projects, such as white papers, ebooks, website redirects, audits, display ad campaigns, etc.
For this reason, white-label partnerships are beneficial for both boutique and general agencies that don’t specialize in one particular field. In fact, partnering with another agency allows boutique agencies to provide a full suite of products, relying on the specialization of another firm to fill the work their internal staff is not qualified to serve.
4. Access advanced tools and software
One of the biggest challenges to early marketing startups is financing various tools and software solutions to power their business.
For example, a subscription to SEMrush could cost up to $500 at least for a single business subscription, and an enterprise subscription to tools like Hubspot could run your business for thousands of dollars.
When you partner with a white label agency, you get access to advanced tools like keyword trackers, content research tools, backlinking software, etc.
Not only does a white label partner have access to tools like Ahrefs and SEMrush, but they may also have specialized tools like Adobe Photoshop, Canva and Hootsuite, which can help you fulfill various client tasks you literally don’t have the tools to fulfill.
In addition, you can also contract white label firms to conduct internal projects, using the software and tools they provide in-house, to complete various projects for your own benefit.
5. Save resources for internal growth
Finally, focusing resources on external goals like sales, client management, reporting, and the things that make clients feel special is another great benefit of white labeling. Surely automation assists in this field, but having that personal touch makes all the difference in the world.
White labeling frees up labor and resources to work on internal growth and expand your company further.
In addition, white labeling also allows you to focus more time on strategy and progress monitoring on a client-by-client basis.
Added up, white labeling is as proven of a business model as any other aspect of digital marketing. For this reason, I recommend white labeling a good portion of your clients you find difficult, monotonous or don’t have the immediate resources to address.
Most importantly, if a white label partnership doesn’t work out if you no longer require their services, it’s easy to end an engagement. But, alternatively, laying off an employee because your company has slowed in growth is much tougher and can have even greater consequences.
