What should you pay a marketing agency? UK prices explained

Marketing pricing is opaque in a way most professional services aren’t. Two agencies can quote for the same brief and differ several times over, and both can be quoting honestly. Usually that’s because they aren’t quoting for the same thing.

The pricing models below apply wherever you are. The indicative prices are for the UK only.

The five pricing models

Monthly retainer. A fixed fee for an agreed scope each month. The standard arrangement for ongoing work such as SEO, content and paid media management. Predictable for both sides, and the model most prone to quiet scope drift in either direction.

Project fee. A fixed price for a defined piece of work with an end — a website, a brand identity, a campaign. Good when the scope is genuinely knowable up front. Read the change-request terms, because that’s where fixed prices stop being fixed.

Day rate. You buy time. Common for consultants, fractional roles and specialist help. Flexible and honest, but you carry the risk on how many days the job takes.

Percentage of ad spend. The agency takes a share of what you spend on advertising, usually with a minimum monthly fee. Simple, and it scales with the account. The incentive problem is worth naming: the fee rises when spend rises, whether or not spend should rise.

Performance or commission. Fees tied to leads, sales or revenue. Attractive in principle, difficult in practice: it needs measurement both sides trust, and disputes start when a sale was influenced by several channels or arrived by phone. Where it works, it’s usually a lower base fee plus a bonus rather than pure commission.

Indicative UK prices

Real prices move with seniority, location, sector, competition and how much of the work is strategy rather than execution. Senior teams in London often sit at the top of these ranges or above them.

Two things these ranges hide. A £750 SEO retainer and a £3,000 one are rarely the same service at different margins — the cheaper one is usually fewer hours from someone less experienced. And a quote near the bottom of a range often assumes you’ll supply things yourself: copy, images, product information and quick approvals.

If you’re not in the UK

The pricing models are the same, but the numbers aren’t. Rates vary by country and city, and we haven’t published equivalent ranges for the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand or Ireland. The most reliable benchmark is two or three like-for-like quotes from the same brief.

Tax also differs. UK quotes may exclude VAT at 20%. In Ireland, check whether quotes include VAT (the standard rate is 23%). In Australia and New Zealand, check for GST — 10% and 15% respectively. In Canada, quotes may add GST or HST, and some provinces add their own sales tax. In the US there’s no national VAT, and whether state sales tax applies to marketing services depends on the state.

What sits outside the fee

This is where quotes diverge most, and where surprises arrive in month two.

• Ad spend. Management fees almost never include the advertising budget. If a proposal says “£2,000 a month” for paid search, ask whether that includes what goes to Google. Usually it doesn’t.
• Software and licences. SEO tools, scheduling tools, stock imagery, fonts, plugins, call tracking, email platforms. Some agencies absorb these, some pass them on, some assume you already have them.
• Hosting and domains. Small, ongoing, and often forgotten in website quotes.
• Photography, video and illustration. Almost always extra unless named.
• Print and production. Design fees aren’t production costs.
• Tax. Check whether figures include VAT or the local equivalent.

Comparing quotes properly

Two quotes are comparable only if they answer the same brief. So control the brief, not the proposal.

Give every agency the same:

1. The outcome you want, and how you’ll measure it
2. Your total budget, split into fees and ad spend
3. The timescale
4. What you can supply in house

How to write a marketing brief covers this in detail.

Then compare on:

• Hours, and whose hours. Ten junior hours and ten senior hours are different products at the same price.
• Deliverables in units — not “content”, but how many pieces, of what length.
• Who is accountable, and how often you’ll hear from them.
• What’s excluded. Read that section first; it’s the most informative part of any proposal.
• The exit: term, notice, and what you keep.

If one quote is far cheaper, find out why before assuming it’s a bargain. Usually it’s fewer hours, more junior staff, a narrower scope, or work subcontracted at a margin. Any of those can still be the right buy — as long as you know which one you’re buying.

The trouble with the cheapest option

At the bottom of the market the problem isn’t usually bad work so much as too little of it. A retainer that buys four or five hours a month can’t cover strategy, execution, reporting and a monthly call. Something gets dropped, and it’s usually the thinking.

Below a certain point, it’s often better to spend less often: one well-scoped project can do more than a year of a retainer too thin to change anything. To work out what you should be spending overall, see how much to spend on marketing.