Short answer: Choose a digital marketing agency in the Philippines by checking who will actually do the work, insisting that every account stays in your name, asking for an audit before a retainer, and avoiding 12-month lock-ins. Compare proposals on deliverables and reporting, not package names or ranking guarantees.
What should I check before hiring an agency?
What questions should I ask a digital marketing agency?
- Who will work on my account, and how senior are they?
- What will you deliver in month one, specifically?
- How will you measure success: leads, revenue or rankings?
- Will all accounts be created in my name, with me as admin?
- What happens to my data and accounts if I leave?
- Can I see an example monthly report?
- What would you fix first on my site, and why?
What are the red flags in an agency proposal?
- Guaranteed rankings or results. No one controls Google or Meta's algorithms.
- 12-month lock-in contracts. Good work keeps clients without lock-ins.
- Senior pitch, junior execution. The expert in the meeting never touches your account.
- Accounts owned by the agency. This makes leaving painful and is a common reason businesses feel stuck.
- Reports nobody explains. If the report has 30 charts and no next steps, ask what changed and why.
How do I compare agency proposals fairly?
| Compare | What good looks like |
|---|---|
| Scope | Named deliverables per month, not "ongoing optimization" |
| Reporting | Leads, revenue and next steps, explained in plain language |
| Evidence | Findings backed by data you can verify. See how to prove an SEO finding is real |
| Ownership | Every account in your name from day one |
| Terms | Month-to-month or a short notice period |
| Price | Published or fixed in writing before work starts |
Agency, freelancer or consultant: which should I hire?
Hire a freelancer for a defined task with a small budget. Hire an agency when you need many people producing content or ads at volume. Hire a senior consultant when you need someone to diagnose root causes and set direction, then either execute or guide your team. remar.digital is a consultancy that also does the work, so the strategist who plans is the one who delivers.
How much does a digital marketing agency cost in the Philippines?
For SEO alone, Philippine SME retainers commonly run ₱25,000 to ₱60,000 a month (about $500 to $1,200), as covered in our SEO cost guide. Ad management is a separate fee on top of ad spend, explained in the Google Ads cost guide. Our own prices are published on the engagements page.
How do I switch agencies without losing results?
Move account ownership first, audit what was done, then fix what is critical within 30 days. A before and after comparison at day 60 shows the switch worked. When a site change is involved, follow a website migration SEO checklist so rankings carry over.
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Remar Barquilla is the founder of remar.digital and the developer of SiteAud!tLint. He writes about technical SEO, AI search and measurable growth. More articles by Remar ↗