The Top 14 Ecommerce Marketing Agency Picks [2024]

Partnering with the right ecommerce marketing agency will help you expand your reach and maximize revenue potential. Here is a curated list of the cream of the crop, vetted and reviewed by our team of marketing experts.

It’s hard to imagine a world before online shopping, otherwise known as ecommerce.

Today, a staggering 218 million people shop online in the United States alone. And in just three years, that number is expected to jump to 230 million. 

And  with countless new ecommerce businesses entering the vast online marketplace every year, many are finding it hard to compete. 

The answer? Ecommerce digital marketing. 

Whether your focus is on content marketing or pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, this article will spotlight 14 of the top ecommerce marketing companies to help you increase your revenue potential. Before we get started, here’s a quick peek at that list:

Top 14 ecommerce marketing agencies

1. HawkSEM
2. EXCLUSIVE
3. MuteSix
4. Wpromote
5. Tinuiti
6. Cuker
7. Jellyfish
8. Lounge Lizard
9. Seer Interactive
10. Silverback Strategies
11. Thrive Agency
12. Lead Horse
13. Merkle
14. Trellis

What is an ecommerce marketing agency?

An ecommerce marketing agency is a professional team of marketers who help online businesses promote their products and online store through various digital marketing strategies.

What is ecommerce marketing?

Ecommerce marketing leverages key platforms, tools, and digital advertising channels to increase brand awareness, drive more paid and organic traffic to your website, and connect your business with new and repeat customers. 

A comprehensive ecommerce marketing strategy will include both paid ad campaigns (creation, implementation, management, and optimization) as well as organic growth initiatives such as technical SEO, content marketing, and web design and optimization.

It all sounds great, until you remember that the majority of your day is spent juggling the day-to-day tasks of simply running your business, so a little outside help might be in order. 

Why hire an ecommerce marketing agency?

Nobody knows your business better than you do, so it may feel like the job of promoting your business should also fall on your shoulders. This couldn’t be further from the truth. Running a business and marketing a business are two very different things — and both should be left to the experts.

Sure, you’re smart. You can watch all the YouTube videos, read all the books, and listen to what the industry experts have to say. Likewise, you can tune in to a few tutorials and maybe even figure out how to use the most popular ecommerce platforms and paid search platforms. 

But here’s the thing: ecommerce marketing is a full-time job, and things tend to change rapidly in the digital world. What works one day may not work the next, and unless you have a team of dedicated marketing experts whose job it is to keep pace with the latest tools and advancements, you could get left behind. 

Working with an experienced ecommerce marketing company (a full-service agency or a more specialized ecommerce content marketing company) that understands the unique challenges ecommerce businesses face is the first step toward boosting your conversion rate and increasing sales to your online store. 

What are the top ecommerce marketing agencies?

When it comes to hiring the best ecommerce marketing company for your needs, it’s rarely one size fits all. Some agencies provide a wide variety of services, while others may focus on one or two specific channels, such as ecommerce content marketing services, pay-per-click (PPC) management, email marketing, social media marketing, or search engine optimization (SEO) strategies. 

The key is finding the marketing agency that’s the best fit for your business, meaning they have the right team and the right resources to help you build a winning ecommerce marketing strategy based on your specific goals and needs. 

We’ve put together a list of the top agencies below to help you get started. 

 HawkSEM

Obviously, we’re going to throw our hat in the ring first. 

And not just because HawkSEM is among the top 3% of ecommerce marketing agencies out there, but because we believe that even the best online marketing can be better. 

At HawkSEM, helping our clients achieve ecommerce growth — and a kill online presence — is just the beginning. Once we hit a goal, we’re already sprinting toward the next one.

Whether you’re just starting out with no strategy at all, or you need help with your existing marketing campaigns to take your ecommerce business to the next level, our team is with you every step of the way. 

You can read all about our ecommerce solutions here, but here’s a quick overview of the search engine marketing (or SEM) services we provide for ecommerce brands: 

• Shopping campaign management
• Merchant Center setup + product feed setup
• Merchant Center verification + compliance
• Feed quality + identifying warnings/disapprovals
• Bidding management + optimization
• Dynamic remarketing (display)
• Custom reporting
• Site architecture analysis
• Keyword implementation
• Website optimization
• On-page + off-page SEO
• SEO content topics + competitor gaps
• Inbound marketing strategy
• Conversion optimization
• Content creation + development
• Conversion tracking setup
• UX web optimization

But that’s just the tip of the iceberg. 

As a full-service digital marketing agency, HawkSEM is made up of experts in multiple digital channels, including ecommerce SEO, PPC management (including Google Ads, Microsoft Advertising, and Facebook Ads), conversion rate optimization (CRO), and content marketing to improve your messaging and rise up the rankings.

With 17 years of experience and a team of top-of-their-field digital marketing experts, we have the tools and the resources to help your ecommerce sales soar. How do we know? Because our proprietary ConversionIQ technology allows us to use real-time data and discover key insights that are guaranteed to bring results. 

But hey, don’t just take our word for it. Check out these impressive results from some of our happy clients. You can even request a free consultation here. 

 EXCLUSIVE

EXCLUSIVE is an ecommerce marketing agency dedicated to helping online retailers grow and scale by optimizing at every point in the ecommerce funnel. In business for more than 25 years, they are a 10X honoree in the Inc. 500 fastest-growing private companies list as well as an official partner with more than two dozen industry leaders in ecommerce. 

EXCLUSIVE offers a broad range of both managed services and consulting services, including paid search and shopping ads, marketplace ads and services, organic search and SEO, email marketing and SMS, social ads and marketing, and conversion testing. Well-known clients of EXCLUSIVE include Hewlett-Packard, Jelly Belly, and Neiman Marcᴜs. 

 MuteSix

MuteSix specializes in full-funnel performance marketing for direct-to-consumer (DTC) brands. They combine both ecommerce marketing services — including a custom omnichannel strategy tailored to each client — and award-winning creative services. Clients of MuteSix (including Disney, GNC, Ring, and nutribullet) praise the agency’s fast turnaround time, innovation and creativity, and availability. 

Also to their credit, MuteSix maintains key partnerships with top-tier paid media platforms and ecommerce technology providers. They were the first agency to partner with TikTok. 

 Wpromote

The largest independent digital marketing agency in the country, Wpromote takes pride in being “not your average marketing agency.” They offer three unique tiers of services designed to help their clients drive growth and stay ahead of the competition: paid media, earned & owned media, and digital intelligence. 

Wpromote has won multiple Fastest-Growing Digital Agency and Agency of the Year awards, as well as awards for Best Search Campaign (Digiday Awards) and Most Effective Use of Data (The Drum Digital Advertising Awards USA). They also won a Google Premier Partner Award for Brand Awareness.

Standout clients of Wpromote include Adobe, KitchenAid, Instacart, and Samsung. 

 Tinuiti

With $3 billion in media managed, Tinuiti has the results to back its claim of being “the largest independent performance marketing firm across Streaming TV and the Triopoly of Google, Facebook, Amazon.” The agency’s client list includes popular brands such as Olly, The Vitamin Shoppe, Liquid I.V., and e.l.f. Cosmetics, and a robust collection of case studies can be found on the Results page of their website.

Tinuiti utilizes a proprietary technology suite called Mobius to unify all performance marketing data in a single location so that clients can instantly see and respond to changing metrics—allowing them to optimize in real time so they can increase brand awareness and drive growth.

 Cuker

Cuker does it all, from digital marketing and branding to UX design services and content creation. In fact, if content is where you’d like to direct your marketing efforts, Cuker has you covered with video, photography, animation, illustration, and copywriting.

The recipient of more than 180 awards and the creative minds behind the brand campaigns of Callaway, Vans, Vuori, Sony, and Oakley, the full-service digital agency specializes in brand growth and offers an impressive list of services, including the creation of high-performance ecommerce platforms to drive online sales. 

But more than an ecommerce content marketing company, the team of strategists at Cuker can also help online businesses with paid search and paid social campaigns, influencer marketing, SEO strategies, email and SMS marketing, as well as data science and analytics. 

 Jellyfish

London-based Jellyfish specializes in “giving brands a platform to perform.” Their proprietary J+ media suites bring together all aspects of digital marketing, from graphic design and content creation to building and managing paid advertising campaigns, tracking and analyzing data, and accelerating growth on leading ecommerce platforms. 

Jellyfish worked with Greenpeace to create a wildly compelling creative campaign to tackle the problem of food poverty in France. It resulted in two million impressions across social media, earned seven industry awards, and ultimately received 22,000 petition signatures. In addition, the campaign has been archived in the Museum of Decorative Arts in Paris, where it will be part of a future exhibition. 

 Lounge Lizard

Making our way back across the pond, New York-based Lounge Lizard is a multi-channel digital marketing agency. Its team delivers a full-spectrum digital marketing service platform, along with brand storytelling, app development, and ecommerce site design, development, and maintenance.

Lounge Lizard has an unmistakably fun vibe, and their team of “brandtenders” and “marketing mixologists” has served up some notable case studies. The iconic New York City sweet shop Dylan’s Candy Bar saw an “unprecedented increase in conversion rates, lower customer acquisition cost, and impressive ROI” after Lounge Lizard built them a new Shopify ecommerce website. 

 Seer Interactive

Seer Interactive is a data-driven ecommerce marketing agency that focuses on three key elements to help clients overcome their challenges and achieve their goals: Uncover (market intelligence and consumer insights), Build (creative, paid media, and SEO services), and Improve (analytics and conversion rate optimization). 

Their interactive, cloud-based data platform, Supernova, integrates data from both paid traffic campaigns and organic search efforts to provide an at-your-fingertips view of how their clients’ campaigns are performing so they can confidently move forward or rethink their current digital marketing strategies. 

 Silverback Strategies

Virginia-based Silverback Strategies is a full-service digital marketing agency that works with businesses of all sizes to deliver custom-built solutions that drive growth. Their three primary service tiers include Paid Media, SEO + Content, and Strategy + Analytics.

Silverback takes pride in being a people-driven agency, recognized by both Ad Age and Inc. magazine for their workplace culture. They believe success has its foundations in collaborative client relationships, and they strive to be “an extension of your marketing team.” 

LexisNexis Digital Marketing Manager Nancy Weaver said, “I’ve worked with a lot of agencies over my 21 years in digital, and Silverback is fantastic. We’ve seen phenomenal growth.” 

 Thrive Agency

Boasting hundreds of 5-star reviews on Google, Clutch, and UpCity, Thrive is a results-driven B2B and B2C web marketing agency with an impressive track record.

The recipient of numerous industry awards, many of them for their expertise in SEO, the team at Thrive handles virtually all aspects of online marketing and brand building. Their core services include digital marketing, social media marketing, ecommerce marketing, Amazon marketing, web development and design, and reputation management. 

Thrive has earned multiple certifications, including Google Premier Partner status, and has been featured in numerous industry publications. The agency’s Thrive Growth Insider newsletter reaches more than 3,000 subscribers and spotlights the latest news in digital marketing. 

 Lead Horse

Founded in 2012, Lead Horse is an all-in-one digital ecommerce marketing agency based in Atlanta that delivers “big brand expertise to growing companies and savvy start-ups.” They specialize in paid search, paid social, SEO, Google Shopping, Amazon Ads (they are an Amazon Ads Verified Partner), real estate marketing, and website design. 

In one case study, the team at Lead Horse helped an online bedding retailer increase their revenue by a whopping 273% with just a 21% increase in ad spend. As a result, the client saw a 200% return on investment (ROI). 

 Merkle

Ranked #2 on LinkedIn’s list of top companies for marketing and advertising, Merkle is a leading customer experience management company that does business in more than 30 different countries worldwide. With over 14,000 employees across the globe, their list of awards is as broad as their reach. 

Most recently, Merkle was selected as one of the “Eight Providers that Matter Most” in The Forrester Wave™: Customer Data Strategy and Activation Services, Q2 2022 report. Their clients include highly recognizable brands such as Neutrogena, Cancer Treatment Centers of America, Royal Caribbean, Humana, Citibank, and Nestlé. 

Merkle’s services run the gamut from digital marketing to data solutions to promotions and gamification. 

 Trellis

Boston-based Trellis is a full-service ecommerce company that specializes in delivering data-driven strategies to help businesses grow online. From strategy and planning to deployment and post-launch support, they work with clients in myriad industries and at every stage of the marketing funnel to drive traffic, boost engagement, and increase conversions. 

Not only are they experts at Shopify, Magento, BigCommerce, and other leading ecommerce platforms, but the team at Trellis has written an impressive library of downloadable ebooks on everything from navigating the holiday season to the ecommerce customer lifecycle. 

The takeaway

Ecommerce businesses have a historically high failure rate, especially within the first few months after launch. 

Why?

Because while creating an online storefront may be easy, promoting your ecommerce business is a different story altogether. 

Lack of a clear marketing strategy, poor website design and development, and low-quality content are just a few top mistakes that plague online startups. Not to mention a complicated checkout process or poor user experience that can significantly impact conversions. 

Working with a qualified, competent ecommerce marketing agency can help ecommerce stores avoid these common pitfalls and increase their profitability online.

This article has been updated and was originally published in April 2023.