Marketing is hugely important to a business and you need to think very carefully about who you are going to use to help you. If done correctly, marketing should eventually start to pay for itself and the more you invest the bigger return you should be able to see. Online marketing is vast and there are many areas that you can invest in such as social media, websites, online advertising and directories. Social media marketing, search engine optimisation and pay per click are all forms of marketing that require time and possibly a budget to implement. These can be tailored to suit the size of your business and the budget you have available.
You may decide to keep the marketing in house and utilise existing members of staff to manage it for you or you may decide to use a third party individual or marketing agency. All have pros and cons and who you use, often is driven by budget as a marketing agency will offer you a great service but it can come at a cost.
If you are going to be doing the marketing in house, ensure that the person or people responsible for it have and some sort of training and know how to evaluate the success of what they are doing.