It’s pretty simple. No matter how good things look going in, one day you’re going to want a divorce from your marketing agency. While I appreciate the trust that you put in your marketing partner to “just handle things for you,” it’s simpler if, just like in a marriage, you keep things separate from the beginning. So, let’s start with website ownership.
Should My Marketing Agency Own My Website?
Short answer: No. Here are four reminders to maintain control and still get the support your most important marketing asset needs:
1. The business owner should always own the domain registration.
Website domain registration is really simple and once you set up an account at Godaddy.com, HostGator, Network Solutions or a myriad of other suppliers, it is yours to keep. Over time you may have inspiration to buy dozens of domains, so keeping them all in one place in an account of your own is crucial. Don’t let your agency offer to grab one for you.
2. You don’t have to allow your webmaster to provide your website hosting.
In fact, there isn’t any huge benefit beyond the stickiness it affords the website development company to keep you overpaying for the hosting account, maintenance and patch application without actually doing any work. Eventually you’ll want to upgrade your website and having access to the hosting environment will be a requirement.
3. Website ownership includes full administration credentials.
These are separate from your domain registration and your hosting. Admin access is what allows you to edit your website. Don’t let your website development firm tell you that only they need administrative rights and that it is sufficient for you to only obtain contributor or editor rights. One day you will want to make a change to the web design or copy without paying them to do so. Make sure you have the full access credentials.
4. Maintain ownership of marketing assets like Google Analytics.
Many business owners pay little attention to who owns their Google Analytics login and related tracking codes. Likely the account was set up when their first or perhaps second website was created. The web developer of the day included “analytics” as part of the site and included a Google Analytics tracking code on your website. They may have even turned on the reporting function inside of Google Analytics to push traffic metrics to you on some kind of regular frequency.
The problem for many small businesses is that most of those codes were conveniently set up inside the service account of the outsourced website development company, not an in-house marketing team of your own. Once you separate from that firm, bye-bye codes.
Sure, you can create a new code inside of a new account but then you lose that history and there is no going back. Instead, login to Google Analytics and create your own account and your own code. Then share that code with your web developer or agency partner. If you can’t figure it out, ask them for advice but don’t ask them to just do it for you.
Do it right from the start
Your website is the foundation of your digital presence and, like any foundation, it should be built on something you own and control. Domains, hosting, administrative access and analytics aren’t technical details to delegate and forget; they’re core marketing assets that protect your flexibility and future growth. Getting this right from the start doesn’t mean you trust your agency less. It means you’re setting the relationship up to work better for everyone.
In the next post in this series, we’ll shift from websites to another set of business assets companies often underestimate until it’s too late: social media accounts and the risks of letting an agency completely own your online presence there.
This blog is courtesy of Jennifer Koon, MMC Founder and Principal Consultant.