Agency sales calls are designed to feel good. A polished deck, a tour of big-name logos, a confident walkthrough of "our proven process", and forty minutes later you have learned almost nothing that predicts whether your quote volume changes next year. The agencies know owners rarely push past the deck. The template shops are counting on it.
This is the interview script that pushes past the deck. Twelve questions, in the order to ask them, with the answers that should satisfy you and the answers that should end the meeting. Use it on every candidate, including us.
Quick answer: Before hiring a B2B marketing agency, ask twelve questions across three areas. Capability: who works on our account, show us your own AI and search visibility, run our buyers' queries live, and write a sample in our voice. Process: what happens in the first 30 days, which of our manual tasks disappear, how do you handle CASL, and how much of our time do you need. Accountability: what numbers do you report weekly, what happens if results stall, who owns the assets if we part ways, and what will you not do. Template shops fail visibly by question four.
Why do you need a fixed interview script?
Because comparability beats chemistry. If you let each agency run its own pitch, you end up comparing presentation skills, and the best presenter is often the shop that invests most in selling and least in delivering. A fixed script forces every candidate onto the same ground, makes weak answers stand out instantly, and keeps the decision anchored to the framework that actually predicts results: capability proof, industry fluency, systems, and accountability, the same pillars laid out in how established companies choose a marketing agency.
Which capability questions should you ask first?
Start here, because a failure on capability ends the conversation and saves everyone an hour.
- "Who exactly will work on our account?" Names and roles, not departments. The senior people pitching you should appear in the answer. If your account will be run by someone you have not met, ask to meet them before signing.
- "Show us your own visibility." Ask them to search their own category the way a buyer would, in Google and in ChatGPT. An agency selling visibility that cannot demonstrate its own has told you what its playbook is worth.
- "Run our buyers' queries live, right now." Give them three real questions your customers ask and watch them work ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google AI Overviews on the call. Capable shops enjoy this. Template shops ask to "take it away and prepare a deck".
- "Write one sample in our voice." One buyer guide on a topic you know cold. You are testing whether they can sound like people who build things, because your buyers and the AI engines both skip brochure-speak.
What process questions reveal how they actually work?
Capability tells you they can; process tells you they will. These four expose whether there is a real operating system behind the pitch.
- "Walk us through your first 30 days." A strong answer is concrete: baseline your AI and search visibility, fix site structure and schema, install lead capture, start the first content wave. A weak answer is "discovery workshops".
- "Which of our team's manual tasks disappear?" An AI-enabled agency should name specifics: posting, review requests, quote follow-up, reporting. If the answer only adds work for your team, you are buying activity, not systems; the difference is unpacked in AI-enabled agency vs traditional agency.
- "How do you keep email and SMS campaigns CASL-compliant?" They should speak fluently about express and implied consent, records, identification, and unsubscribe handling without reaching for notes. In Canada, this is table stakes, and the exposure is yours, not theirs.
- "How much of our time do you need, and when?" The right answer is honest: a few hours of interviews up front, then approvals. Beware both extremes, "none at all" means templated output; "weekly workshops forever" means you are doing their job.
Here is how the answers sort, side by side:
| Question | Answer that should satisfy you | Answer that should end the meeting |
|---|---|---|
| Show us your own visibility | Searches live, discusses results honestly | Deflects to portfolio or "client confidentiality" |
| Run our buyers' queries | Opens the engines on the call, interprets who gets named | "We'll prepare an analysis for next time" |
| First 30 days | Baseline, structure, capture, first content wave | Workshops, brand exploration, mood boards |
| CASL compliance | Consent categories explained unprompted | "Our platform handles that" |
| Weekly numbers | Answered calls, speed to lead, quotes, booked calls | Impressions, reach, engagement |
| If we part ways | You own everything; documented handover | Vague, or assets tied to their accounts |
Want to see how AlphaPixels answers these twelve questions?
Book a free fit call and bring the whole script. We'll run your buyers' queries live in ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google AI Overviews, show you our own visibility, and walk through the weekly scorecard we report against.
Book Free AuditWhich accountability questions separate partners from vendors?
The last four questions are the ones template shops hope you never ask, because they are about what happens after the honeymoon.
- "What numbers will you report weekly, and can we see a sample scorecard?" You want revenue-adjacent numbers: answered-call rate, speed to lead, quotes sent, booked calls, plus visibility tracked against a baseline. A monthly PDF of reach and impressions is a vanity dashboard, one of the classic warning signs covered in marketing agency red flags.
- "What happens if results stall after two quarters?" A partner describes the review honestly: re-baseline, diagnose, reallocate effort, and if it is still not working, an easy exit. A vendor points at the contract term.
- "Who owns the assets, accounts, and data if we part ways?" The only acceptable answer is you: the website, the content, the structured data, the contact lists, the ad accounts. Get it in writing. Agencies that hold assets hostage are financing renewals with your leverage.
- "What will you not do for us?" The most revealing question on the list. A serious agency names limits: no guaranteed rankings, no promised revenue figures, no results by a fixed date, because signals compound and nobody honest promises domination. A shop that promises everything has just told you its promises are worthless.
How should you run the interview itself?
Three candidates, same script, one week. Send the twelve questions ahead of time; there is no advantage in ambush, and preparation quality is itself a signal. On the call, hold the order, take notes on a simple three-point scale per question, and resist the pull of charisma. Afterwards, weight capability and accountability answers double: process can be fixed, but a shop that cannot demonstrate visibility or will not commit to real numbers does not improve after you sign.
Two closing checks before you decide. First, call their office at 4 p.m. on a Thursday and see what happens; you are previewing every urgent moment of the relationship. Second, ask yourself whether anything in the meeting was custom to your company. If the deck, the plan, and the case studies would fit any business in Canada, you met a template shop that happens to have good manners.
Frequently asked questions about interviewing B2B marketing agencies
What are the most important questions to ask a marketing agency before hiring?
Twelve, in three groups. Capability: who works on our account, show us your own visibility, run our buyers' queries live in ChatGPT and Google, and write a sample in our voice. Process: describe the first 30 days, which of our manual tasks disappear, how you handle CASL, and how much of our time you need. Accountability: what you report weekly, what happens if results stall, who owns the assets if we part, and what you will not do.
What is the single fastest way to expose a template shop?
Ask them to run your buyers' real questions through ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google AI Overviews live on the call. A capable agency does it comfortably and interprets the results. A template shop stalls, deflects to a portfolio, or promises a follow-up deck, because live work cannot be templated. Asking for a writing sample in your company's voice is a close second.
Should an agency guarantee rankings or specific results?
No, and a guarantee should count against them. Search and AI visibility are built from compounding signals, content, structure, reviews, and mentions accumulating over months, and no honest operator controls the outcome on a fixed date. What an agency can commit to is the work, the sequence, and transparent weekly numbers against a baseline. Guaranteed rankings are a sales tactic, not a deliverable.
What numbers should a B2B agency report every week?
Numbers an owner can tie to revenue: answered-call rate, speed to lead, quotes sent, booked calls, review count, and movement in search and AI visibility against the baseline. Reach, impressions, and engagement are activity measures, fine as context, useless as accountability. If a sample scorecard is not available on request, assume reporting is an afterthought.
Who should own the website, content, and data in an agency relationship?
You, without exception: the website and domain, the content library, the structured data, the contact lists, and the ad and analytics accounts. Confirm it in writing before signing, along with a documented handover process if you part ways. Asset lock-in is one of the most common ways weak agencies manufacture renewals, and it is entirely avoidable at contract time.
How many agencies should we interview, and how long should it take?
Two or three candidates, one fixed script, about a week of calendar time. More candidates add noise, not signal, and a longer process mostly delays the work. Send the questions ahead, score answers on a simple scale, weight capability and accountability double, and finish with a reachability test: call their office unannounced and note what happens.
How does AlphaPixels answer these questions?
On a free fit call we run your buyers' queries live, show our own visibility, and walk through a real weekly scorecard: answered-call rate, speed to lead, quotes sent, booked calls. Every engagement is custom-scoped after we understand your goals, you own every asset we build, and we will name plainly what we do not promise: rankings, fixed-date results, or anything else nobody honest guarantees.
Related reading
- Freelancer vs Agency for an Established Business: When Each Makes Sense
- Marketing Agency Red Flags Established Companies Should Not Ignore
- How Established Canadian Companies Choose a Marketing Agency in 2026
The bottom line on interviewing agencies
A marketing agency is one of the few vendors that can quietly waste a year of your growth, and the interview is where that year is won or lost. Twelve questions, asked in order, sort the field fast: template shops fail on live capability, vendors fail on accountability, and the partners left standing will respect you more for asking. Your company took decades to build. Forty minutes of disciplined questions is a small toll to protect it.
Whenever you are ready to put us on the other side of the table, book a free fit call with AlphaPixels, or start with the AI visibility audit so the interview starts from evidence instead of decks.