How we choose agencies
We don't score agencies. Every shortlist on Best Agency Compare ranks agencies by how well they fit the brief the page is about, and every pick comes with the reason it made the list and the places it falls short.
Fit comes first
An agency only makes a shortlist if the page's subject is part of what it leads with. A generalist that lists WordPress as its ninth service doesn't rank on a WordPress page, however good it is at other things. The order of the list follows fit to the brief, then the strength of the evidence below.
What we look at
Craft
The work itself, opened in a browser rather than read about.
We read the case studies and the client list, and look at the kind of work the agency puts its name to. Portfolios are curated by definition, so we also note what is missing from them.
Results
Whether there is evidence the work moved a client metric.
A percentage with no baseline, no window and no absolute number is not evidence. We look for figures we can anchor: a starting point, a date range, and ideally a named client who will confirm it. Where a claim cannot be checked, we report that it cannot be checked rather than repeating it.
Transparency
How much you can learn before you get on a call.
Published rates or ranges, a described process, named senior staff, a real address, and clarity on what is in scope. Agencies that publish nothing until you book a discovery call lose ground here, because opacity at the sales stage usually predicts opacity at the invoice stage.
Communication
The account model, and who you actually get.
Reporting cadence, named day-to-day contacts, escalation path, and the pitch-team-to-delivery-team gap. We weight the last one heavily: being sold by a founder and delivered by a first-year account executive is the single most common complaint in this industry.
Value
What the money buys at their entry price, not their best price.
We compare the realistic entry engagement against what a comparable team costs elsewhere, including in-house and freelance. Expensive is not a mark against an agency. Expensive without a reason we can name is.
Reasons, not ratings
Each agency on a shortlist gets one line on why we picked it, two or three points on what it does best, and two or three on where it falls short. The weak points are there because no agency suits every client, and knowing where one stops being a good fit is often more useful than knowing where it shines.
First-hand versus desk research
Every review carries one of two badges in its first screen. First-hand evidence means we briefed the agency, spoke to named clients, or saw the contract. Desk research means everything came from public sources, each checked and dated. Most reviews are the second kind, and saying so plainly is the point.
We never present desk research as though we had hired the firm. An agency engagement runs for months and costs five or six figures; nobody is running that as a test, and any review site implying otherwise is describing something that did not happen.
When rankings change
Agencies change: people leave, pricing moves, a studio gets acquired. When something material shifts we re-check the shortlist and move the updated date forward rather than quietly editing.