Check Out Our 5 Best Tips to Keep Your Marketing Project on Budget

How to Keep Your Project from Going Out of Scope

When working with a marketing agency, perhaps the most dreaded words to hear, for both the agency and the client, is that a project is going “out of scope.” This means that a project is going outside the anticipated estimate in a signed contract due to a number of reasons such as edits going beyond the rounds of agreed-upon revisions, the number of meetings or communication exceeded expectations, or the project direction changed.

We know it is difficult to control all factors going into a project, and things may change in the middle. here are our top tips and best practices for keeping projects on time and on budget with quality work that matches your high expectations.

1. Know Your Goals
Think through all your desired outcomes when requesting a project. This helps your marketing team craft a strategy intended to check all the boxes of your goals and sets creative direction up for success. This also helps avoid midstream redirection.

Keep in mind the following as you engage your marketing team:

• Overall goals
• Strategic tactics
• Deliverables/collateral needed
• Materials/channels
• Artistic preferences
• Deadline

2. Keep it Together
Keep your project organized by sending your content points, design ideas and project feedback all together and within the same information platform. Using a collaboration tool like Basecamp is great so that everyone on the team can see all client information in one place and keep up with any updates. Try not to go back and forth between email and a collaboration platform since this tends to add tracking time to a project and increases the chances of something getting missed.

3. Respect the Time Frame
It’s a general rule that the longer a project drags on beyond the deadline, the more expensive it becomes. This is due to the amount of “touches” the project receives, even if it is stalling out, because your project manager and account director are checking in and updates are getting noted. And perhaps most importantly, YOU are still spending time on it.

4. Avoid Rush Projects
We know there are times when a rush project can’t be avoided, but we also know that errors are more likely to occur when things are moving fast. So, here’s what you can do. If you know that a project is going to “come in hot”, begin communicating with your marketing agency right away with the aspects of the project you do know. That way they can anticipate the production time and begin resourcing their team.

5. Wrangle the Feedback
Don’t let feedback trickle in. If you have multiple stakeholders, wait until you have all feedback received, and then select a point person to communicate any changes. That way your marketing team isn’t making changes multiple times and going outside the rounds of agreed-upon revisions.

As you master these best practices, you’ll notice the process is easier and the partnership with your marketing agency is even more enjoyable!