We use these just because they look cool.
This week's Pace Notes:
The question I get on about 50% of my sales calls: "Should we just hire someone in-house?"
Sometimes the honest answer is yes. I own an agency, and I've told brands to go hire a videographer instead of signing with us. In fact, I do that somewhat often.
My reasoning is pretty straight forward: for a 8-9 figure brand, a creative agency and an in house team solve different problems.
So here's the breakdown I give on those calls. Where in-house wins. Where an agency wins. And what happens when you learn to love both.
Let's get into it →
The winning line:
In-house wins on volume and flexibility. An agency wins on quality and performance.
Where an in-house creative team wins:
Organic content. Let's be honest. Organic flywheels require extremely high volumes of content for years at a time, often at the expense of "quality." That's not a bad thing. In fact, high-volume low-fidelity creative is an incredible way to make money with organic. Because organic strategies require constant attention, hiring in-house will be far more efficient than hiring an agency that sells organic content services.
Low-spend campaigns. If an ad campaign is spending a few thousand a month, the creative doesn't need to be perfect. It just needs to exist. A hired videographer may not know how to perfect hooks, but at this spend target they don't really need to either.
Flexibility. Your team is in the building. If your creative needs change in a morning, they can pivot that same afternoon. That proximity to the product and leadership has value.
Where an agency wins:
Access to data. A good agency is running ads across a dozen accounts in your category. They've already seen which hook structure works on Meta, and which one is a waste of time. When you hire an agency, all of that information comes with them, meaning you don't waste any time learning what works.
Higher-spend campaigns. Once you're committing over $50k a month to ad spend, the "cost" of creative is no longer about the price of making it. Its in the performance of that asset. At six figures a month in spend, a hero spot with a bad hook will cost you hundreds of thousands of dollars over its lifetime. At scale, quality ads are no longer optional.
Brand building. When you hire a creative agency, you are hiring fractional access to a professional team. Hiring a good agency means you'll get cinema-grade ads, real lighting, sound design, talent, direction, etc. All of that comes together to build real brand trust with your audience.
You want to know the cool part? The best campaigns actually use both. More on that later.
Where most people get it wrong
1. They hire in-house to "save money" on high spend campaigns
The math that may have justified the hire was cheaper cost per asset, but the math that matters on a high-spend campaign is cost per wasted impression. Those are different numbers.
2. They hire an agency for everything, including the work that needs to be fast and rough.
Agencies are external organizations. They are built for depth. For small tasks, they usually come with more operational drag than an in-house hire.
3. They act like they can only pick one.
Hiring an agency does not bar you from hiring someone in-house. Too many teams treat this decision as a one-way door.
The line to remember
Just because you opted to hire an agency doesn't mean you can't also make creative internally. The inverse is also true. If each solution has different strengths, your dream outcome might involve having both.
Some BTS from a recent project.
How to get it right
Give in-house the daily touchpoints. Organic, community, product drops, behind the scenes, lo-fi test ads at low spend. In-house is one of the best ways to keep your cost per customer touchpoint low.
Give the agency the demand capture. Branded creative, paid ads, CTV, any creative that have performance consequences. Agencies are professionals at making you money. Let them.
Combine both efforts. When the audience has already seen your brand twenty times organically, paid creative lands on warm traffic instead of cold, dropping CAC. Having an internal team and an agency work alongside each other means you get the best of both worlds.
That's the dream flywheel. In-house makes the brand familiar. The agency makes it convert. You save money on both ends.
Most of our best clients understand this, so it's common for our team to plug in alongside an existing internal team.
Cheers,
Sterling Voth
Founder, Voth Agency
P.S. - If you want to level up your ad creative, we build cinema-grade digital ads (Meta, Google, CTV, etc.) for 8+ figure automotive brands that are serious about making money. Check it out here.