What are the top things you look for when choosing a marketing agency? A portfolio of stunning creative work is almost always high on the list. Technological know-how and industry knowledge are usually highly desired as well. One thing you might not initially consider, however, is the agency’s quality assurance (QA) process.
At Bulldog, we think quality assurance plays a critical role in our agency because it allows our creative and marketing technology departments to shine. In other words, our QA process helps us put the finishing touches on creative pieces and automated wizardry before they go out the door. Our clients’ best interests are always at the forefront of everything we do, so paying extra-special attention to quality enables us to provide them with exceptional work that fulfills—and even exceeds—their expectations.
While quality assurance is often perceived as merely glorified proofreading, it goes much further than that in today’s marketing world. But is it actually that important? Everyone is so busy now—does it really matter if an email goes out with a typo in the subject line or if a website doesn’t render correctly? In a word, YES. Here are four reasons why:
- You only get one chance to make a good first impression. If potential customers run into an issue with one of your products the first time they experience it, they will associate your company with that error rather than focusing on your potential to produce great work in the future.
- Spending time on quality now will save you time and money in the future. No one likes rework—especially when you have to redo something on your own company’s dime. By doing things the right way from the beginning and resolving problems early, your marketing department will become more agile, and thus, more successful.
- Focusing on quality establishes your reputation for stellar work. When you produce top-notch work time after time, people begin to notice. They’ll come to expect your work to be free of errors. And if you do slip up at some point? Customers will be more likely to toss it off as an anomaly rather than the regular way you do things.
- Quality assurance positively impacts your creativity. While QA teams often get the reputation for slowing down the creative process, they can also help companies create more compelling materials. This is because the best QA teams keep up with industry trends and understand what end users are looking for.
As you can see, quality assurance is an essential part of marketing success. If you’d like to start implementing some QA processes at your own company, here are a few best practices:
- Have quality assurance in mind from the start. As I mentioned earlier, you’ll save time and money by finding and resolving issues before they become bigger problems later.
- Allow time for quality assurance throughout the development process. By building quality checks into each step of the process, your company can test things periodically rather than rushing through a major QA session during the final stages of a project.
- Communicate expectations about quality. Provide your QA team with the scope of projects ahead of time so they are aware of the types of errors that absolutely need to be corrected versus minor issues that can be left as is due to time and/or budgeting constraints.
While quality assurance may not be the most glamorous work (unless you’re fond of singing Weird Al’s “Word Crimes”), it plays an important role in marketing today. By focusing on producing top-quality materials, companies can reach more customers with the best work possible.
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