What are the three options?
Every practice owner marketing a med spa is really choosing between three models: do it yourself, hire someone in-house, or partner with an agency. None is universally “best” — they trade money, time, and expertise in different proportions.
What does DIY marketing really cost?
DIY looks free, but the real price is time and mistakes. Running your own ads, landing pages, and follow-up means learning several specialties while also running a clinic. The opportunity cost is steep: hours spent troubleshooting a Meta campaign are hours not spent with patients, and early-stage ad budgets get burned learning what an experienced operator already knows. DIY can work for the earliest, lowest-budget stage — but it rarely scales, because one person can’t be strategist, copywriter, designer, and analyst at once.
What does an in-house marketer cost?
Hiring in-house buys you dedicated attention, but at real expense. A capable marketing manager runs $50,000–$100,000+ per year in salary alone, before benefits, software, and ad spend. And you’re hiring one person with one primary skill set — a great social media manager is rarely also a paid-ads expert, a CRM builder, and a copywriter. You often end up supplementing the hire with freelancers or tools anyway.
Annual salary for one in-house marketing generalist, before tools and ad spend.Source: U.S. marketing salary benchmarks
What does an agency give you?
An agency trades a monthly fee for a whole team and a system that already works. Instead of one generalist, you get specialists across paid media, landing pages, nurture, and reporting — plus tooling and playbooks built from running many practices. Med spa agency fees typically run $2,000–$10,000 a month depending on scope, which often lands below the fully loaded cost of a single senior hire while covering more ground. The tradeoff is less direct control and choosing a partner who genuinely knows aesthetics.
When does each option make sense?
- DIY: very early, minimal budget, and you have time to learn — a stopgap, not a growth engine.
- In-house: larger, established practices with enough volume to keep a full-time marketer busy and the budget to surround them with tools and freelancers.
- Agency: practices that want a complete system and fast results without building a department — especially those growing from one location or launching new services.
What should you ask any agency?
If you go the agency route, pressure-test fit before signing:
- Do you specialize in med spas and aesthetics specifically?
- Do you build the full funnel — ads, landing page, and follow-up — or just run ads?
- Is ad spend separate from your fee, and what’s the minimum?
- How fast is lead follow-up, and is it automated?
- What does reporting look like, and who owns the accounts and data?
The best answer to “which model?” is whichever gets a complete, fast-following system live soonest for your budget. Compare the real costs or book a consultation to talk through your situation.