Internet Marketing Retainer

What is Marketing Retainer?

A marketing retainer is for people that just need general updates to websites, blogs, etc. If you only charge people when they need the service, it is very hard to build a sustainable business and people will usually want quick service which interupts your usual activities. By having a formal retainer, you expect to do a certain number of hours of updates each month, and you can then guarentee service in a certain number of hours or the update is free.

This has a big benefit to clients, and also helps you have a more predictable workflow and income.

Why do people buy Marketing Retainers?

Businesses sometimes only need a few hours of web work each month to keep things updated. They want to be sure people are avaialbe when they need the services. Many small web designers are no where to be found after they set up the website. The other advantage of a retainer is that it forces a client to pay attention to the website every month or lose their fee. This can be good encouragement to keep working on the website.

Setting Goals for Marketing Retainer

The goals of this service are to make a very easy system that you and the client can use to coordinate tasks. For example, for under $6 per month you can go to www.outstandahosting.com and chose the Linex hosting option and set up one of the free open source project management options.

The other big issue to achieve your goals is to clearly let clients know what activities the retainer covers. For example, it could include writing, HTML updates, Image Modification, Social Bookmarking, etc. - Or it could be HTML only. I had one client not understand the different between Flash and normal images. One takes 10 minutes, the other takes hours.

Client Benefits of Marketing Retainers

The benefits of a retainer are:

Quick Website Updates
Reason to work on website each month
Trusted Advisor relationship

Pricing Marketing Retainers

I recently saw a very successful marketing retainer program. It was $199 per month, up to 3 hours per month. Use it or lose it - no roll over. Most of the work is done by interns, and they guarentee 72 hours or free. The person said about 50% of the hours every month go unused.

My only comment on the unused portion is that it might be good for profits short term, but you certainly do not want someone to go several months without using any hours. At some point they will cancel. It might be better to contact them and recommend some updates if they have not used the retainership after several months.