Marketing keeps sliding to the bottom of your list. The phone's ringing, the crews need you, and the Google profile hasn't had a new photo since spring. So the question comes up: do you hire someone, or pay an agency?
Search it and you'll find plenty of answers. We read four of the top guides on it. All four are written by marketing agencies, and none uses a single number from a government wage survey. This post is written by an agency too, so we did it the other way around. Every wage and benefit figure below comes from the US Bureau of Labor Statistics or Canada's Job Bank. Every tool price comes from the vendor's own pricing page. And the in-house option gets its own section, because sometimes it's the right call.
The short version: a typical marketing hire at a US trade contractor costs about $78,600 a year once benefits are counted, and about $85,600 in the first year with basic tools and the cost of hiring. That's roughly $7,130 a month. The average local SEO provider in the biggest pricing survey we know of charges $1,557 a month. But a retainer isn't a person, and the right answer depends on what work you actually need done.
What a Marketing Hire Actually Costs a Contractor in 2026
Start with the wage. The Bureau of Labor Statistics publishes pay for "market research analysts and marketing specialists" by industry in its Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics. For specialty trade contractors, the industry group that covers roofers, plumbers, electricians, HVAC, painters and most other trades, the median was $58,240 a year in May 2025. Across all industries it was $78,760.
Then add benefits. BLS measures what employers actually spend on top of wages, every quarter, in its Employer Costs for Employee Compensation survey. In June 2026, at private businesses with 1 to 49 workers, wages were 74.1 percent of the total cost of an employee. Benefits made up the rest: paid leave, insurance, retirement, Social Security and Medicare, unemployment insurance and workers' comp. Put another way, benefits added 35.0 percent on top of every dollar of wages. Across the construction industry it was 43.9 percent.
Then the tools. A marketer with no tools is guessing. We priced the smallest useful stack on the vendors' own pages: Semrush's SEO plan at $139 a month for keyword and ranking data, and CallRail's Lead Tracking plan at $50 a month so you can tell which calls came from where. That's $189 a month, or $2,268 a year. Last, the hiring itself. SHRM, the HR association, puts the average cost per hire at nearly $4,700.
| Who you hire | Salary | With benefits | Year one, with tools and hiring | Per month, year one | Per month after that |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Trade contractor, 25th percentile | $45,760 | $61,754 | $68,722 | $5,727 | $5,335 |
| Trade contractor, median | $58,240 | $78,596 | $85,564 | $7,130 | $6,739 |
| All industries, median | $78,760 | $106,289 | $113,257 | $9,438 | $9,046 |
| All industries, 75th percentile | $108,310 | $146,167 | $153,135 | $12,761 | $12,370 |
Two notes on the method. The benefit figure is an average across every kind of job at small firms, applied to one salary, so treat it as an estimate. And ad spend isn't in any of these numbers. You pay Google the same whether an employee or an agency clicks the buttons. If anyone compares a salary with an agency bill that includes ad spend, the comparison is rigged.
The Trades Employ One Marketing Specialist for Every 75 Locations, and Hire at the Junior End
Here's a number none of the guides mention. BLS counts 7,950 marketing specialists working for specialty trade contractors in the whole United States, plus 1,850 marketing managers. The BLS Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages counts 592,340 specialty trade contractor locations. That's one marketing specialist for every 75 locations, or one specialist or manager for every 60. Out of 5,243,000 people working in the trades, it's one in 659.
That isn't the same as saying 1 in 75 contractors has a marketer. Some firms employ several, a location isn't a company, and the count only includes people whose job is coded as marketing. It misses the owner's spouse running the Facebook page and the office manager who answers reviews. What it does tell you is that a full-time, dedicated marketer is rare in this industry.
And the ones who do get hired are paid at the junior end of the profession. Here's where the trade numbers land against the whole job market:
| Marketing specialist pay, May 2025 | Specialty trade contractors | All industries |
|---|---|---|
| 10th percentile | $34,940 | $43,390 |
| 25th percentile | $45,760 | $58,350 |
| Median | $58,240 | $78,760 |
| 75th percentile | $78,790 | $108,310 |
| 90th percentile | $110,010 | $155,480 |
The trade median of $58,240 sits almost exactly on the profession's 25th percentile of $58,350. In plain terms, the typical contractor marketing hire is paid like someone early in their career. The average marketing specialist at a trade contractor earns $67,030, which is less than the $78,821 average for everyone working in the industry.
That matters because of what the job usually asks for. Google Ads. Local Services Ads. The Google Business Profile, the website and SEO. Call tracking, review requests, photos and social posts. A good junior marketer can do some of that well. Expecting one person on a junior salary to be strong at all of it, with nobody above them who knows the work, is a big ask of anyone. When a hire like that doesn't work out, it usually isn't the person's fault.
The Top Guides on This Question Were All Written by Agencies. So Is This One.
We read four of the leading pages on "in-house marketing vs agency": Hook Agency (the only one written for contractors), WebFX, CodeWCG and Clicks Geek. All four sell marketing services. None cites the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Statistics Canada or any other wage survey. Here's how their numbers line up against the sources that measure this.
| What the guide says | Source given | What the data shows |
|---|---|---|
| CodeWCG: "Add 20 to 30 percent for benefits and payroll taxes" | None | BLS: 35.0% at firms with 1 to 49 workers, 43.9% in construction |
| CodeWCG: "$500 to $2,000/month in tools." Clicks Geek: "$1,000-3,000 in monthly software costs" | None | $189 a month for an SEO tool and call tracking, on the vendors' own pricing pages |
| CodeWCG: "$50,000 to $80,000 in base salary" | None | BLS: $58,240 median at trade contractors, $78,760 across all industries |
| WebFX: "An average-sized marketing team (3 people) can cost $200,000+ per year, not including tools" | None | Plausible. Three trade-median hires with benefits come to about $235,800 |
| Hook Agency: "the average cost per hire is nearly $4,700" | Credits SHRM, links to a news site | Matches SHRM's own figure. This one holds up |
So the guides understate what an employee costs in benefits and overstate what the tools cost, and the two errors partly cancel out. A fuller tool stack can cost more than our $189, to be fair, but a contractor doesn't need $1,000 a month of software on day one. CodeWCG draws its line for when a hire makes sense at revenue: below "$1M/year in revenue," CodeWCG says, you "almost certainly can't afford to hire an in-house marketer and get real results." No math is shown. Hook Agency never says when in-house is the better choice at all.
What the Same Money Buys From an Agency
The largest pricing survey we know of comes from Ahrefs, which polled 439 SEO providers (last updated August 2024). Providers serving local clients charged $1,557.08 a month on average. Agencies across all markets averaged $3,209. The most common retainer was $501 to $1,000 a month. That survey covers SEO, not full-service marketing, so treat it as a reference point.
Our own prices are on our site. Google Ads management starts at $500/month, separate from ad spend, and our Local SEO Management plan is $349/month. Together that's $849 a month, or $10,188 a year. Here's how each option compares with a trade-median hire in year one:
| Option | Cost per year | The year-one hire costs this many times as much |
|---|---|---|
| Trade-median marketing hire, year one | $85,564 | 1.0x |
| Average agency retainer (Ahrefs survey) | $38,508 | 2.2x |
| Average local SEO provider (Ahrefs survey) | $18,685 | 4.6x |
| Our Google Ads management plus Local SEO plan | $10,188 | 8.4x |
On cash alone, the agency comes out ahead at every level we priced. But cash alone is the wrong test, and it's the part agency pitches tend to skip. A retainer isn't a person. No agency stands in the driveway taking before-and-after photos, asks the homeowner for a review while the crew packs up, or picks up the office phone. If that's the work your business is short on, an agency won't fix it at any price.
Not sure whether to hire or outsource? Book a free 20-minute call. Bring your current marketing bills and the list of work that isn't getting done. We'll split it into specialist work and on-site work and price both sides, including the side we don't sell.
Book a Free Strategy Call →The Canadian Math: Job Bank Wages Plus CPP and EI
We're based in BC, so here's the same question north of the border. Job Bank lists a median wage of $35.58 an hour for marketing coordinators across Canada and $33.65 in British Columbia, from the Labour Force Survey for 2023 to 2024, updated November 2025. At 40 hours a week that's $74,006 a year nationally and $69,992 in BC.
Then the employer's share of payroll costs for 2026. CPP is 5.95 percent on earnings above $3,500, up to $74,600. CPP2 adds 4 percent between $74,600 and $85,000, which a median wage doesn't reach. EI costs the employer 1.4 times the employee's 1.63 percent, on insurable earnings up to $68,900.
| Marketing coordinator, 2026 (CAD) | Canada median | BC median |
|---|---|---|
| Median hourly wage | $35.58 | $33.65 |
| Yearly, at 40 hours a week | $74,006 | $69,992 |
| Employer CPP (5.95%) | $4,195.13 | $3,956.27 |
| Employer CPP2 (4% above $74,600) | $0.00 | $0.00 |
| Employer EI (1.4 times 1.63%) | $1,572.30 | $1,572.30 |
| Wage plus statutory costs | $79,774 | $75,521 |
That's a floor, not the full cost. It has no health or dental plan, no WorkSafe premium, no tools and no hiring cost, because we couldn't find a Canadian survey that measures total benefits the way the BLS one does. Statutory costs alone add about 7.8 percent. Add any group benefits, tools and the cost of finding the person, and a Canadian hire ends up in the same range as the American one, only in Canadian dollars.
When Hiring In-House Is the Right Call
There are real cases where a hire beats an agency. Here's how to spot them.
- The work you're short on happens on site. Photos, short videos, review requests at the end of each job, fast replies to messages, follow-up on quotes. That's daily work that needs someone in the building. An agency can set up the system, but it can't be there.
- Your agency bills already run past about $7,130 a month. That's what a trade-median hire costs per month in year one, with benefits, tools and hiring. If you're paying several vendors more than that for work one capable person could do, a hire starts to make sense. Ad spend doesn't count toward that number.
- You have more than one location or trade, and a steady stream of content to make. Volume is where a salary beats paying by the project.
- You have someone who can manage them. A marketer reporting to an owner who can't judge the work is on their own.
For a lot of contractors, the answer is a mix. A part-time coordinator at the trade median of $28.00 an hour handles the on-site work: photos, reviews, posting and chasing quotes. Ten hours a week is about $1,213 a month in wages. A specialist handles the work that punishes inexperience, like Google Ads and SEO, where one wrong setting can burn a month of budget. That's the split we'd suggest to most small contractors.
Five Questions to Answer Before You Post the Job or Sign the Contract
- What work, exactly? Write the list. Split it into on-site work (photos, reviews, replies) and specialist work (ads, SEO, website, tracking).
- How many hours a week does it really take? If the honest answer is ten, you don't need a full-time hire.
- Who will manage this person or this agency? Someone has to judge the work. If that's you, block an hour a week for it.
- Who will own the accounts? Whoever you hire, your business should own the Google Ads account, the Business Profile, the domain and the tracking. Run our 7-asset ownership check before anyone starts.
- How will you measure it? Use cost per booked job, not cost per lead. Here's how to track marketing ROI so you can tell in 90 days whether the hire or the agency is working.
We sell the agency side of this decision, through Google Ads management, local SEO and Google Business Profile management, so weigh our advice accordingly. The wage data is the government's, and the tables above show the math either way.
How we did this: wages come from the BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics for May 2025, pulled through the BLS public API on October 12, 2026 (occupation codes 13-1161 and 11-2021, all industries and specialty trade contractors, NAICS 238). Benefit ratios come from the BLS Employer Costs for Employee Compensation for June 2026. Location counts come from the BLS Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages, 2025 annual averages, private NAICS 238. Canadian wages come from Job Bank (NOC 11202, marketing coordinator), with 2026 CPP and EI rates from the federal government. Agency prices come from the Ahrefs survey and our own published pages. Tool prices come from the Semrush and CallRail pricing pages on October 12, 2026, billed monthly. Google's Keyword Planner shows about 140 US searches a month for "in-house marketing vs agency" and 1,300 for "hire a marketer".