Its ability to build brand awareness, engage audiences, and drive conversions makes content marketing an indispensable tool for modern business. Investing in a high-quality content marketing strategy has sparked the debate over whether businesses should manage their content marketing efforts in-house or turn to outsourced content marketing solutions to meet their needs.
In-house content marketing requires building a team of experts within your company to handle all content creation and strategy. This approach offers direct control and alignment with your company’s goals and culture.
Outsourced content marketing involves partnering with specialized agencies or consultants who bring expertise and scalability without the baggage of an employer-employee relationship.
Both approaches have distinct advantages and disadvantages. Whether you’re a small startup or an established enterprise, understanding how each option works helps you make an informed decision that aligns with your content marketing goals and resources.
A brief overview of content marketing
Content marketing involves creating and distributing valuable, relevant, and consistent content to attract – and retain – your ideal customer. Unlike traditional advertising, which directly promotes products or services, content marketing aims to provide useful information that helps solve problems or fulfill needs. This approach builds trust and establishes your brand as a thought leader in its industry.
Effective content marketing strategies increase website traffic and produce higher engagement and conversion rates. Businesses that master content marketing often enjoy a competitive edge in their markets.
The pros and cons of in-house content marketing
One common approach to content marketing is to create an in-house content marketing team to manage all content strategy, creation, and distribution within the company. Each team member is responsible for a specific role in the content marketing process.
Typical content marketing team members include:
- A content manager who oversees the entire strategy and ensures all content aligns with the company’s goals and marketing objectives.
- A content strategist who develops the content marketing approach based on market research, audience analysis, and business goals.
- A content writer or copywriter who produces written content such as articles, blogs, case studies, social media posts, white papers, and website copy.
- An editor who reviews and edits all written content for accuracy, clarity, grammar, and style.
- A graphic designer who creates on-brand visual content such as images, infographics, charts, and other graphics that accompany written content.
- A videographer and video editor responsible for producing and editing video content for all digital assets.
- An SEO specialist who optimizes content for search engines to improve organic reach and drive traffic to your digital assets.
- An analytics and insights manager who tracks and analyzes content performance across all channels to provide insights and recommendations for tweaking the content marketing strategy.
That’s a lot of people completing specific tasks. The cost of maintaining such a large in-house team of experts adds up fast, which is one of the biggest disadvantages of an in-house content marketing team.
The cons of in-house content marketing
The expense of hiring an in-house content marketing team is certainly one of the biggest drawbacks to the approach. By the time you pay for salaries and benefits, in-house workers can cost significantly more than outsourced content marketing alternatives.
Cost isn’t the only disadvantage. Others include:
- Limited capacity and resources. In-house staff have a limit to the amount of work they can handle before quality suffers. Hiring new employees when you need to ramp up efforts is costly and time-consuming.
- Lack of objectivity. Internal teams can struggle to think objectively about the brand, making it challenging to create customer-centric content rather than brand-focused material.
- Limited expertise. In-house teams might become too comfortable with existing strategies and miss new industry trends or innovative approaches.
- Turnover issues. Employee turnover can disrupt marketing efforts, leading to poor performance.
The pros of in-house content marketing
An internal team of content marketing experts isn’t all bad for your brand. One of the biggest advantages of having inside experts is consistency in brand voice to build a strong brand identity across all platforms. In-house teams deeply understand your vision, values, and culture, allowing them to create content that closely aligns with your brand identity.
Some other pros of using an internal team include:
- Control over the creative process. Organizations maintain greater control over the creative process with an in-house team. They can make quick adjustments based on feedback to keep content consistent with company standards and objectives.
- Deep industry knowledge. Most internal teams possess specialized knowledge about your industry and target market, enabling them to create relevant and authoritative content.
- Faster approval process. Proximity to decision-makers and stakeholders can speed up the content approval process, producing quicker turnaround times on projects.
The pros and cons of outsourced content marketing
Outsourced content marketing has become an increasingly popular strategy for budget-savvy organizations interested in enhancing their digital presence and reaching their target audience effectively. This approach involves hiring external content marketing agencies or freelancers to handle all aspects of your content marketing strategy.
Organizations striving to maintain a competitive edge in the market may find outsourcing their content needs a flexible and cost-effective solution.
The pros of outsourced content marketing
One of the most significant advantages of outsourcing content marketing is gaining access to a broad range of skills and industry expertise. External agencies and freelancers often specialize in content creation and marketing, staying up to date with the latest trends and best practices. Organizations with tight budgets can access high-quality content creation without breaking the bank.
Another perk of outsourced content marketing is scalability. External agencies and freelancers can quickly adapt to changing project requirements, allowing businesses to scale their content production up or down as needed. This flexibility is valuable for companies experiencing seasonal fluctuations or rapid growth.
Outsourcing enables businesses and other organizations to maintain a consistent content output without the challenges of hiring and training new staff during busy periods or managing excess capacity during slow times.
The cons of outsourced content marketing
Outsourced content marketing offers several advantages. However, it also comes with its own set of challenges. Understanding these potential downsides helps your organization make an informed decision.
One of the biggest disadvantages of subcontracting the work is less control over the content creation process and overall strategy. Businesses working with external agencies or freelancers may find it difficult to oversee every detail of the content development process. This lack of control can lead to a misalignment with your company’s brand voice, goals, vision, and standards.
Other cons include:
- Possible communication delays and misunderstandings can impact the content creation process and the quality of the final product.
- Becoming too dependent on external providers is risky for any business. If an agency or freelancer becomes unavailable, underperforms, or fails to meet deadlines, it can disrupt your content strategy and impact your marketing efforts.
How to decide between in-house and outsourced content marketing
Knowing the pros and cons of in-house and outsourced content marketing is just one piece of the puzzle when deciding which solution works best for your organization. Other key considerations include the size and stage of your business, available financial resources, the volume and complexity of the content needed, and long-term marketing objectives.
Budget and cost-effectiveness
Your budget is the most critical consideration when choosing between in-house and outsourced content marketing. Choosing to subcontract your content work avoids the long-term financial commitment of maintaining a full-time team.
In-house teams have higher fixed costs for salaries, benefits, training, and equipment. Outsourcing is more cost-effective, especially for small businesses because it allows for flexible spending based on project needs.
Business size and stage
Small and medium-sized enterprises or startups may lack the resources to build and sustain an in-house content marketing team. Outsourcing provides access to expertise and scalable solutions without the burden of managing a larger team.
Larger enterprises with ample resources and established processes might benefit from the control and alignment that an in-house team offers.
Additionally, the stage of your business matters. Early-stage companies might prioritize flexibility and cost-savings, while mature businesses may focus on maintaining brand consistency and internal alignment.
Volume and complexity of content
Organizations with high content demands – frequent blog posts, social media updates, and videos – may find it challenging to meet these needs with a small in-house team. Outsourcing provides the scalability needed to handle large volumes of content production efficiently.
Content requiring specialized skills such as graphic design, technical writing, or video production is best left to external agencies that can deliver higher-quality results.
An in-house team is more sufficient and manageable for businesses with less frequent or simpler content needs.
Long-term marketing objectives
Your long-term marketing objectives should guide the decision-making process. An in-house team provides better alignment of content with your other business functions. However, if your strategic goals include rapid growth, entering new markets, or scaling content production, outsourcing offers the flexibility and expertise needed to support the effort.
Choose your content marketing solution wisely
There’s no right or wrong answer to whether in-house or outsourced content marketing works best for your brand. The best approach depends on your individual needs and circumstances. Budget, business size, content output requirements, expertise, and strategic goals all play a critical role in your decision.
Assess your resources, identify your content requirements, and align your decision with your long-term objectives.