While digital marketing has become a crucial part of the success of online businesses today, it doesn’t come without risks. Choosing the right digital marketing partner is the first step in ensuring your marketing strategies deliver the best results. But what should you consider when choosing a digital marketing partner?
One field that is often overlooked by businesses is the security aspect. When working with a digital marketing agency, you will be sharing a lot of sensitive data that can wreak havoc when ending up in the wrong hands. Therefore, it’s essential to ask a few important questions about security before settling with any marketing partner.
Four security questions to consider before choosing a digital marketing agency
While there are many marketing agencies who claim to put security first, it can be difficult to determine what these companies do with sensitive data behind the scenes. Here are a few key security questions to ask any agency before starting any work.
How is shared data handled?
When working with a marketing agency, large batches of data is usually shared, including sensitive information about consumers. Data privacy involves the proper handling of this data. This includes consent and regulatory obligations that avoid the misuse or mishandling of data. Typically, data privacy and its safeguarding involve the implementation of processes and policies that ensure:
- Ethical collection of data,
- How data is shared with third parties, and;
- Regulations around the handling and storing of data and sensitive or private information.
What level of security do they offer?
There are a few important parts of this question that should be mentioned.
- Secure Sockets Layer Service (SSL)
Whether they will be working with the design of your website or not, it’s important for a marketing agency to use and encourage SSL certificates. These are digital certificates that authenticate a website’s identity and enable an encrypted connection.
- Email security
Because you will be communicating with the marketing agency, it’s essential for them to have protecting against the risk of email threats, as well as secure message encryption to protect sensitive emails.
- Compliance with POPI
The POPI Act is legislation that safeguards the integrity of private information. Companies a must carefully manage the data capture and storage processes of personal information within the legal framework as set out in the POPI Act.
Where do they redirect customers?
The safety of your customer’s actions is your top priority when interacting with your brand. So, it’s important to know exactly where they are being directed at all times. Your chosen marketing vendor should have the ability to direct your customers to 100% secure sites at all times. These sites should match your brand’s identity, level of security and overall experience.
Are the resources they use secure?
From posting on social media to tracking marketing results, it’s important to confirm that the tools, platforms, and processes used at all times are safe and secure. It can be useful to test these resources out before handing over your data.
Don’t settle for a lower level of security
Today, online security is non-negotiable. Especially when working with an outsourced vendor, it is important to identify the type of security measurements they have in place and not to settle for a lower level of commitment to security you are used to. This ensures the safety of your business, your staff, and your customers.
