Agency, in-house, or do it yourself?
The short answer: if you already know which problem is costing you money, hire the cheapest competent person to fix that one thing. If you do not know, buy a diagnosis before you buy any implementation, from us or from anyone with no stake in the answer. Most wasted marketing spend comes from solving a problem the business did not have.
The four options, side by side.
| Option | What it costs | Speed | Suits you if | Where it fails |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Do it yourself | Your time | Slow | Under about $500k, or an owner who genuinely enjoys it | The month you get busy |
| Hire in-house | A salary, tools and your time managing them | Fast once trained | Enough volume to keep one person fully occupied | One person rarely covers marketing, systems and data |
| Traditional agency | A monthly retainer | Steady | A clear, single channel you already know works | Nobody owns the relationship on your side |
| Fieldstone | Fixed where scope is fixed, scoped where it is not | Diagnosis in days, build over months | You do not yet know which problem is costing you most | You already know exactly what you want built |
Costs vary by market, so check the local numbers rather than taking anyone’s word, ours included. Our own fixed prices are published on the pricing page.
Each one, including what goes wrong.
Three of these four are things we do not sell. We have tried to describe them the way someone who chose them would.
Doing it yourself
Hiring in-house
A traditional agency
Fieldstone
When Fieldstone is the wrong answer.
A comparison where the author always wins is an advertisement. Here are the cases where we would tell you to hire somebody else, and mean it.
- You know exactly what you want built and just need hands. Hire a contractor or a freelancer; you will pay less and get it sooner.
- You want ads managed at scale and nothing else. That is a specialist job and there are people who do only that.
- You want somebody to promise a ranking or a lead number before looking at anything. We will not, and you can find someone who will.
- You need it fixed this week. Diagnosis takes days and implementation takes months; anyone promising faster is guessing.
- You are looking for the cheapest option. We are not it, and cheap marketing that does not work is the most expensive thing on this page.
A short way to decide.
- Under $500k and you enjoy it
- Do it yourself, and keep the Google Business Profile and reviews current.
- You know the channel that works
- Hire in-house or a specialist agency for that one channel.
- Enough volume for a full-time person
- Hire in-house first, then buy in the skills they lack.
- You cannot name the biggest problem
- Start with a diagnosis, from us or from anyone independent.
- Leads arrive and go nowhere
- That is a systems and follow-up problem, not a marketing one.
- You are preparing to sell or hand over
- Start with operations and clean numbers, not with marketing.
Questions people actually ask.
Is an agency worth it for a small business?
It depends entirely on whether you already know what is wrong. If you do, an agency or a freelancer executing that one thing is usually good value. If you do not, a retainer tends to buy activity in whichever channel that agency happens to sell, which is how owners end up spending heavily and seeing nothing. Get an independent diagnosis first, from us or from anyone with no stake in the answer.
Should I hire someone in-house instead?
Often yes, and we will say so when it is true. One person who knows your business and is present every day beats an outsider on most things. The catch is coverage: marketing, website, CRM and reporting are different skills, and one affordable hire rarely has all four. A common good answer is to hire in-house for the day-to-day and buy in the specific skills they do not have.
How is Fieldstone different from a marketing agency?
Two things. We diagnose before we prescribe, so the first deliverable is a graded assessment rather than a proposal, and the answer is sometimes that your marketing is fine and your follow-up is broken. And we work across marketing, systems and operations rather than one of them, because the constraint is usually not where the owner expects.
What does it cost compared with an agency retainer?
Fixed where the scope is fixed: the website score is free, the Digital Visibility Audit is $49, the Google Business Profile audit is $99, Review Growth and monitoring are $299 a month each, Profile management starts at $399 a month and Fieldstone Build starts at $299 a month. Anything with a variable scope is quoted in writing on a growth call before you spend. We publish the fixed ones so you can compare them without a sales call.
Can I just buy the audit and take it elsewhere?
Yes, and people do. The $49 audit is graded by the same published methodology for everyone and it is yours to act on however you like, including handing it to another agency or your own team. Buying implementation from us never changes the grade, which is the only way an independent audit means anything.
When would you tell me not to hire you?
When you already know exactly what you want built, when you need one specialist channel run at scale, when you need it done this week, or when the real problem is a management one that no amount of marketing will fix. We would rather say that on the first call than take the money and disappoint you in month four.
Start with the diagnosis.
The free website score takes a minute and grades any public URL. If it says your marketing is fine, that is a useful answer too, and it costs you nothing to find out.