Question 1

Do you offer a free consultation before we commit?

Accepted Answer

Yes. Every engagement starts with a free 45–60 minute discovery call — no deck, no pitch theatre. We ask about your business, your numbers, and what you've already tried, then we tell you honestly whether we're the right fit. If we're not, we'll point you at someone who is. No sales pressure, no automated follow-up sequence.

Question 2

If I'm not from the GTA, can we still work together?

Accepted Answer

Yes. We run engagements across North America and beyond — email, phone, WhatsApp, and video calls on Google Meet, Zoom, or whatever your team already uses. We set up shared dashboards and Loom walkthroughs so remote clients get the same cadence as our in-person ones. Our roster stretches across Canada and the US, with active clients from Vancouver to New York.

Question 3

How do I pay, and what's the payment structure?

Accepted Answer

We accept EMT, bank wire, and all major credit cards. Project work is typically split 50/50: a deposit to begin, final balance on completion. Retainer work (paid ads, social, SEO) is billed monthly in advance. All invoices are itemised, and we never bury fees in addenda or retainer true-ups — what's quoted is what's charged.

Question 4

Is there a contract commitment?

Accepted Answer

For recurring services (paid ads, social, SEO, content retainers), everything runs month-to-month — no long-term contract. We ask for a 90-day window so the strategy has time to show real results, but you can stay or leave any month. One-off projects (branding, website builds, video production) run on a scoped statement of work with no ongoing commitment.

Question 5

How does Creative Scope report results?

Accepted Answer

Every client gets a rhythm — either weekly or monthly depending on the deliverable. Paid ads: weekly performance snapshots + a full monthly deep-dive. SEO and content: monthly rankings, traffic, and conversion reports. Branding and web projects: milestone-driven updates with sign-off gates. Reports are written in plain English, not just exported from the platform — what happened, why, and what's next.

Question 6

What industries and business sizes do you work with?

Accepted Answer

We're industry-agnostic but lean heavily into consumer brands (DTC, hospitality, fashion, wellness), professional services (real estate, legal, financial), home services, and ambitious SMBs scaling into mid-market. We work with founders bootstrapping their first $100K to in-house marketing teams managing multi-seven-figure budgets. The common thread is a willingness to invest in craft, not a headcount or revenue threshold.

Question 7

What makes Creative Scope different from other agencies?

Accepted Answer

Three things: we own the work end-to-end (no outsourced creative, no white-labelled fulfilment), we publish honest pricing and cases instead of gatekeeping, and we've been independent since 2018 — no private equity, no churn-and-burn holding company. You talk to the people doing the work, strategy and execution sit in the same room, and nothing gets pitched that we wouldn't build for ourselves.

Question 8

Can I see case studies or references from past clients?

Accepted Answer

Absolutely. Our portfolio page is a start, but we also send over case studies relevant to your industry or problem on request. References are available during the proposal stage — we'll connect you with current or former clients in your vertical so you can ask about working with us directly, unmanaged by our team.

Question 9

Which ad platforms do you run?

Accepted Answer

We're certified partners on Google Ads (Search, Performance Max, YouTube, Shopping) and Meta (Facebook, Instagram, Advantage+). We also run TikTok Ads, LinkedIn Ads for B2B, Pinterest for lifestyle/commerce, and programmatic display where it makes sense. We don't run every platform for every client — we start with the two or three that match your audience and budget, then expand.

Question 10

Does the agency fee include the ad budget for paid advertising?

Accepted Answer

No. The agency fee covers strategy, creative development, campaign setup, optimisation, and reporting — the people and the platform work. The ad budget (what you pay Google, Meta, TikTok, etc. for media) is separate and goes directly to the platform. We bill these distinctly on every invoice so there's no confusion about where each dollar is going.

Question 11

What's the minimum recommended monthly ad spend to work with you?

Accepted Answer

Our recommended floor is $3,500/month in media spend for a single-platform campaign, and $6,500+ if you want meaningful multi-platform activity. Below that, the learning data is too thin for platforms to optimise effectively, and our fee starts to eat the strategy value. For tighter budgets, we'll often recommend starting with SEO or organic social until the unit economics support paid.

Question 12

I don't know how much to budget. Can you tell me?

Accepted Answer

We'll ask first: "how much have you set aside for this?" It sounds blunt, but it helps us tell you quickly if we can genuinely help or if you're underfunded. If you don't have a number in mind, we'll model backwards from a target CPA and a desired customer volume — e.g. "you want 40 new customers at a $120 CPA, so budget $5,000/mo in media." No number is final until we've run a few weeks of learning data.

Question 13

How quickly can I expect results from paid ads?

Accepted Answer

First two weeks are learning — the platform is calibrating, our team is validating creatives and audiences. Weeks 3–6 we expect the first meaningful optimisation wins. Month 3 is usually where the account hits a stable, compounding ROAS. Anyone promising "results in week one" is showing you vanity data or running on a pre-existing pixel. Honest answer: give any new account 90 days before judging it.

Question 14

Do you handle creative for ads, or do I provide it?

Accepted Answer

We handle it by default — static ads, carousels, UGC-style reels, long-form YouTube cutdowns, all designed in-house. If you have existing brand creative you want us to use, we will. If you have a content studio already producing assets, we'll build ad campaigns around that library. Either way, creative is never outsourced to a freelancer we haven't worked with before.

Question 15

What reporting do I get on paid ad performance?

Accepted Answer

Platform metrics (impressions, CTR, CPC, CPM, conversions, CPA, ROAS) per campaign; multi-channel attribution showing how Meta, Google and organic intersect; cohort-level retention for ecommerce clients; creative-level fatigue analysis; and month-over-month pacing against spend and target. Weekly snapshots are 1-page; monthly deep-dives include a written narrative of what changed and why. Everything lives in a shared dashboard you can open any time.

Question 16

How do you measure campaign success?

Accepted Answer

Success is defined per-client, not per-platform. For ecommerce: ROAS and blended CAC. For lead gen: qualified leads (not just form-fills) and close-rate on those leads. For brand campaigns: incremental traffic lift and branded search growth. We don't optimise toward whichever metric looks best in a deck — we optimise toward the one that affects your bank account.

Question 17

How long does it take to create a full branding deck?

Accepted Answer

A full brand identity system — strategy, visual identity, typography, colour, logo suite, guidelines — typically runs 4–8 weeks from kickoff to final delivery. Timelines flex based on how much discovery your brand needs (new company vs. established business), the number of stakeholders involved in sign-off, and the depth of the system (e.g. do you need packaging, brand voice, motion, or just a mark and a palette).

Question 18

What's included in a logo design package?

Accepted Answer

Every logo package ships with: a primary logo (original + reversed colourway), a secondary logo / lockup, a submark or icon (original + reversed), transparent PNGs at multiple sizes, SVG vector files, a print-ready PDF, and the original Illustrator (.ai) source. You also get a mini usage sheet covering minimum size, clear space, and what not to do with the mark. Larger brand engagements include a full brand guidelines PDF.

Question 19

Can you refresh or evolve an existing brand instead of starting from scratch?

Accepted Answer

Yes — and honestly, it's what we recommend for any brand with real equity. A rebrand from zero is expensive and risks throwing away recognition you've spent years earning. We do brand refreshes regularly: modernising type, tightening the colour system, evolving the mark without breaking the silhouette, and updating the applications (web, social, signage) so the whole thing feels current without alienating existing customers.

Question 20

Does Creative Scope offer printing services?

Accepted Answer

We don't run our own print shop, but we handle the entire design and file-prep side — press-ready PDFs, bleed and trim marks, Pantone specs, and vendor-specific templates. We have trusted local and national print partners we regularly hand off to, and we'll manage the relationship if you want us to. If you already have a printer you love, we'll prep files to their exact specs.

Question 21

Do you cover the entire GTA for videography and photography shoots?

Accepted Answer

Yes, anywhere in the GTA is included at our standard rates. Beyond the GTA, we travel regularly to shoot in Montreal, Vancouver, New York, LA and Miami — travel, per-diem, and additional crew costs scale with the location, but the creative team moves together so the output stays consistent. We've shot on three continents; nothing's off the table with the right budget.

Question 22

How much does a website cost?

Accepted Answer

There's no single price — every site is quoted against scope: the number of page templates, CMS and content work, integrations, and whether it sells online. Our Toronto website cost guide on the blog lays out typical 2026 market ranges by site type. Every project begins with a free scoping call — we'll quote a fixed price, not an hourly ambush.

Question 23

How long does it take to build a website?

Accepted Answer

A tight landing page: 1–2 weeks. A standard 5–8 page marketing site: 4–6 weeks. A full CMS-driven site with blog and custom templates: 6–10 weeks. A Shopify store or web-app: 8–16 weeks. These assume timely client feedback — every round of delayed sign-off extends the timeline by roughly the same number of days. We'll build you a Gantt chart on day one so there are no timeline surprises.

Question 24

What platforms do you build on?

Accepted Answer

WordPress (for content-heavy marketing sites where editors need freedom), Shopify and Shopify Plus (for product businesses), Webflow (for design-led sites with lighter CMS needs), and fully custom-coded builds using modern stacks like Next.js, Astro, or Remix (for speed-critical or app-like experiences). Platform choice is always a recommendation based on your team, budget, and long-term ownership preferences — never dogma.

Question 25

Do you offer hosting?

Accepted Answer

Yes. We run a cloud hosting stack with unlimited bandwidth, 6 GB RAM, 4 CPU cores, daily backups, SSL, CDN, and 24/7 monitoring — priced at a flat monthly fee with no surprise overages. Alternatively, if you prefer to own your hosting (e.g. WP Engine, Shopify, Vercel, Cloudflare Pages), we'll help you configure and migrate, then hand the keys over. Never locked in.

Question 26

Will I be able to edit the site myself, or do I need a developer?

Accepted Answer

Yes — editability is a deliverable, not an afterthought. WordPress and Shopify builds come with a CMS your marketing team can actually use (we build custom block libraries so edits don't break the design). Even our custom-coded sites ship with a lightweight headless CMS (Sanity, Contentful, or similar) so copy, images, and blog posts stay editable without touching code. We record a screen-share handoff walkthrough for your team on launch.

Question 27

Is my website mobile-responsive, fast, and accessible?

Accepted Answer

Yes to all three — these aren't add-ons, they're minimum standards. Every site ships responsive-first (designed for mobile, enhanced for desktop), targets a Lighthouse score of 95+ on both mobile and desktop, and meets WCAG 2.1 AA accessibility baseline. We test on real devices, not just Chrome DevTools. Performance and accessibility audits are included in the final QA checklist.

Question 28

Do app design projects include a landing page?

Accepted Answer

No — app design and marketing-site design are scoped separately. That said, clients engaging us for both usually get a bundled discount, since the visual identity and brand system are already established on one side. If you're launching an app, we typically recommend a companion landing page for launch marketing and App Store / Play Store conversion support.

Question 29

What's the ideal word count for blog posts to rank?

Accepted Answer

For competitive commercial keywords, 1,500–2,500 words is the sweet spot — enough depth to outrank thinner competitors without padding for its own sake. For branded or long-tail informational posts, 800–1,200 words is usually plenty. Length alone doesn't rank — structure (H2s, H3s, lists), internal linking, topical authority, and genuine answer-completeness matter more. We write to be useful first, then optimise, not the other way around.

Question 30

Does social media marketing include DM management?

Accepted Answer

No — and it's a deliberate call. DMs touch customer service, sales, and personal brand voice, and they're better handled by someone inside your organisation who can make same-hour decisions. We cover strategy, content creation, scheduling, community comments on posts, and paid amplification, but we'll train your internal team on DM response protocols and flag anything that needs escalation.

Question 31

Does website speed affect my SEO?

Accepted Answer

Yes — significantly. Google's Core Web Vitals (Largest Contentful Paint, Interaction to Next Paint, Cumulative Layout Shift) are direct ranking factors. More importantly, slow sites drive bounce rate, which Google reads as a quality signal against you. Every 1-second improvement in mobile load time correlates with measurable uplift in both conversions and rankings. Speed is a competitive moat we take seriously on every build.

Question 32

For video and photo production, do you provide studio, models, and actors?

Accepted Answer

Yes, all of it — on request, at additional cost. We have our own Toronto studio for tabletop and smaller shoots, and partnerships with larger sound-stages for film and multi-set days. Talent casting (models, actors, UGC creators) runs through vetted agencies or our in-house creator roster. If you'd rather supply talent, locations, or props yourself, we'll scope the shoot around what you already have.

Question 33

How long does SEO take to show results?

Accepted Answer

Realistically, 3–6 months to see meaningful ranking movement on competitive terms; 6–12 months to build durable traffic. Quick wins on branded search, long-tail informational queries, and technical fixes can show up in weeks. Anyone promising first-page rankings in 30 days is either lying, targeting zero-volume keywords, or buying links that will get you penalised. SEO is a compounding asset, not a campaign.

Question 34

Do you handle both technical SEO and content SEO?

Accepted Answer

Yes. Technical (site architecture, Core Web Vitals, crawlability, schema, internal linking, canonicalisation) is the foundation; content (keyword research, editorial production, topical clusters, backlink earning) is what actually moves rankings. We run them in parallel — there's no point writing 50 great blog posts on a site Google can't crawl, and there's no point fixing 200 technical issues if you have no content to rank. Audits map both in the first 30 days.

Question 35

Can you do a one-time SEO audit without a retainer?

Accepted Answer

Yes. Our standalone audit covers technical health (Lighthouse, Core Web Vitals, crawl analysis, schema coverage), on-page content (title tags, metas, H-tag structure, internal linking, thin content), off-page (backlink quality, anchor distribution, toxic links), an AI visibility baseline (who ChatGPT, Gemini, and Perplexity currently recommend in your category), and a prioritised 90-day action plan. It is priced as a fixed fee that scales with the size of the site. No retainer required, no upsell pressure.

Question 36

What is AIEO, and is it included in your SEO programs?

Accepted Answer

AIEO (AI Engine Optimization — also called GEO or answer-engine optimization) is the work of getting your business recommended when people ask ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, or Google's AI Overviews who to hire. It covers entity and brand signals, structured data, citation-ready content, and authority across the sources AI engines cross-check — plus monthly tracking of who the engines actually name. It's included in every Creative Scope SEO retainer (one program, both surfaces), and our SEO clients are already reporting customers who found them through AI recommendations.

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