Comparing agency proposals side by side: a worksheet

Rule one: you fill in the worksheet, not the agency

Send each agency the same list of questions. Then transcribe their answers into your own grid, in your own words. If a row is blank because the agency did not answer, it stays blank and counts against them. Agencies that are vague on paper are vague in delivery.

Do this for three proposals, not seven. Three is enough to see the spread and few enough to read properly.

The worksheet: 24 rows in five groups

Copy this into a spreadsheet with one column per agency.

Group	Row	What goes in the cell
Money	1. Monthly fee	Figure, with or without VAT stated
Money	2. Setup or build fee	Figure or 'none'
Money	3. Recommended monthly ad spend	Figure; 'none' if no ads
Money	4. Software or tool costs	CRM, call tracking, hosting
Money	5. Total month-one cost	Rows 1 to 4 added
Money	6. Total 12-month cost	Row 5 plus 11 further months
Money	7. Pricing model	Fixed, scoped retainer, % of spend, per lead, project
Terms	8. Minimum term	Months
Terms	9. Notice period	Days, and how given
Terms	10. Auto-renewal	Yes or no
Terms	11. Who owns domain, site, profile, ad accounts	Client, agency or mixed
Terms	12. Exclusivity	Area, trade, channel, duration, or 'not offered'
Scope	13. Website work	Pages built, who writes copy
Scope	14. Local SEO and GBP	What specifically
Scope	15. Paid ads	Platforms, who owns account
Scope	16. Follow-up and automation	Missed call text back, review requests, CRM
Scope	17. Reporting	Frequency and metrics
People	18. Who does the work	Named person, team, or subcontracted
People	19. Who is my contact	Named
People	20. Clients in my trade	Number, and any in my area
Proof	21. Case studies for my trade	Named, anonymised or none
Proof	22. References offered	Yes with names, or no
Proof	23. Company checks passed	Companies House, domain age, named people
Proof	24. Guarantees	Exact wording, or 'none'

Getting the money rows right

Row 6, the 12-month total, is the number that matters and the one no proposal states. A £149 fixed fee with no setup and no ad spend is £1,788 a year. A £400 fee with £1,000 recommended spend and a £500 setup is £17,300. Both might be right for different firms, but they are not comparable until written as a yearly figure.

Put VAT on the same basis across all three. Agencies quote inconsistently, as our explainer on trades marketing pricing models notes, and a 20 per cent difference hiding in the small print changes the ranking.

If an agency will not give a figure for row 3, recommended ad spend, enter the minimum they would accept. An agency that cannot estimate spend for your trade and area has not thought about your account yet.

Getting the terms rows right

Rows 8 to 12 come from the agreement, not the proposal. Ask for the standard terms before you decide. A proposal that says 'no contracts' and an agreement that says 'three months' notice' disagree, and the agreement wins. Our guide to contracts and notice periods gives an accept-or-refuse verdict on each clause.

Row 11, ownership, should be answered asset by asset. 'You own everything' is not an answer. 'Domain in your name, site exportable, GBP with you as primary owner, ad account in your name' is.

Scoring: weight before you score

Before looking at the filled-in grid, decide how much each group matters to you out of 100. A firm with no website and no budget for ads might weight Money 35, Terms 25, Scope 20, People 10, Proof 10. A firm with capacity to grow and £2,000 a month to spend might weight Scope 30, Proof 25, People 20, Money 15, Terms 10.

Then score each agency out of 10 on each group, multiply by the weight and add up. The arithmetic is not the point. The point is that you decided what mattered before the proposals could persuade you otherwise.

Worked example: a two-van heating firm

The figures below are invented to show the method. They are not any agency's prices or results.

Agency A proposes a fixed-fee website and local SEO system at £299 + VAT a month, no setup, no ads, rolling monthly, client owns the domain but the site runs on the agency's platform. Twelve-month total: £4,306 including VAT.

Agency B proposes managed Google Ads at £450 a month plus a recommended £1,200 spend, £750 setup, six-month minimum, agency owns the ad account during the term. Twelve-month total: £20,550.

Agency C proposes a growth system at £149 a month including a website, Google Business Profile work, review automation, missed-call text back and a CRM, built before payment, no setup, cancel any time, client owns the domain. Twelve-month total: £1,788.

On Money alone, C wins, then A, then B. On Scope, B delivers the only paid traffic, and A and C deliver a similar organic stack with C adding follow-up tools. On Terms, A and C are rolling monthly; B has a lock-in and holds the ad account. On Proof and People, the worksheet would show whichever agency named a person and a checkable client.

The heating firm's answer depends on its weights. If it needs boiler installs this winter, B's paid traffic is the only proposal that delivers them quickly, and the price of that is £16,000 more a year plus a six-month commitment. If it can wait for organic results to build, A or C at a tenth of the cost is the rational choice, and the difference between them comes down to the follow-up tools and the platform ownership question.

Five things the grid will expose

• Proposals that are mostly ad spend dressed as agency value
• The agency that never named a person
• A 'no contract' pitch sitting on top of a 90-day notice clause
• Case studies that are all for trades other than yours
• Guarantees whose exact wording nobody can produce

After the decision

Keep the grid. In six months, score the agency you chose against what they proposed, row by row. It is the quickest honest review you will get, and it tells you whether to renew.

If you are still at the shortlisting stage, the full comparison of UK trades marketing agencies and the trade-specific rankings, such as the one for extension builders, will give you three names to send the questions to.

Frequently asked questions