It’s a simple question, really: how much time does your Web provider actually devote to your online marketing campaign?

Unless you have an in-house team that is planning and executing your firm’s online strategy, you probably make regular payments to a company that works on and updates your website.

In most cases, one person from that company should be your main point of contact. That person is in charge of your site and your Web marketing campaign. He or she may be called account manager, online marketing consultant or something else entirely, but chances are, at your firm he or she is known as your “Web person” (or one of your “Web people.”)

So what are you actually getting in return for your firm’s steady outflow of cash? How much time does your “Web person” spend working on your campaign, your website and talking with you about strategy? Are they spending time developing reports, being proactive by planning upcoming content efforts or communicating with you? How much time is your “Web person” dedicating to your firm?

While you think back about the last time you actually spoke with someone who works for your online marketing vendor (and not just someone from accounts receivable), let’s consider the following.

Online marketing agencies have various structures and operate in different ways. At some companies, your main point of contact may be responsible for a large number of clients, from around 40 or 50 to as many as 400! Here’s some simple math for the sake of illustration:

For argument’s sake, if you are engaged in such a business relationship and are paying $1,000 a month for services, that would come out to over $38 a minute for your “Web person’s” time, or more than $2,300 an hour! Granted, there may be other employees at the company who are also contributing some work to your site, but if your main contact can only spare 6 minutes per week for you, what kind of value are you actually getting?

Additionally, some agencies give their account managers sales goals. That means that on top of working on your website, and myriad others, they also have responsibilities for bringing in new clients. That type of agency structure could further limit your account manager’s ability to bring you any real value for your investment.

Even if that account manager was servicing 40 clients, he or she could only devote one hour per week to spend on your firm’s online marketing efforts. Is one hour per week enough time to successfully develop and implement an online strategy, maintain and improve website technical health and improve content and user experience?

A successful campaign is multi-faceted and should be individually tailored to the firm based on its:

• Brand, personality, team members, and other aspects that make it unique

• Practice areas, growth objectives and goals for the future

• Location, market, competition and current online presence

• On- and off-line community involvement, charitable endeavors and philanthropy

We believe your “Web person” should:

• Speak with you during regular meetings about your website, your results, your ROI and be proactive in terms of strategy

• Reply to questions and emails in a reasonable timeframe

• Send detailed reports about your campaign and informative emails about developments in the industry

• Discuss how your campaigns may be affected by changes to algorithms and search listings, disruptive technologies and how to make adjustments to maximize effectiveness and efficiency

• Work toward optimizing current content and developing new high-quality resources for users

• Monitor campaign performance, refine strategy and maintain your site’s technical health

Most importantly, your “Web person” should be getting to know you and your firm in depth, earning your trust through their understanding of your circumstances and goals and learning the ins and outs of your practice and the communities in which you operate.

Incorporating all your firm’s unique characteristics, as well as planning and executing a custom strategy, is the only way for your “Web people” to effectively create value for your online marketing efforts. And guess what… it takes time to do these things!

After you’ve worked with a Web marketing company for a little while, it should seem as though you have an in-house department that is focused on your firm. It should feel, to you, as though you have a partner, not just a vendor.

That would be an awful lot to expect from any “Web person” in just 6 minutes a week.