The marketing agencies worth hiring — and the ones to avoid.
We vet marketing agencies across 26 disciplines: what each is good at, what the catch is, and who we cut. Neutral, cited, current — no directory, no pay-to-rank, no chatbot guesswork.
Describe the job. We'll rank our set against it.
Including the agencies we reject, and why — the rejections are usually the useful part.
Ranked from our set, with the ones we reject shown in the open.
Type any agency name — if we've already vetted it you get the full evaluation, free. Not in the set yet? Tell us and it goes on the research queue; what buyers ask for is how we decide what to vet next.
This is what one verdict looks like.
Every agency gets the same treatment, published in full and free to read.
Belkins
Strong fit · 3.7- Good at
- Best-in-class deliverability and data. 230+ Clutch reviews at ~4.9 — the most-reviewed agency in the category — and Folderly, an in-house deliverability product.
- The catch
- Staffing seniority at the ~$5k floor, where you get a junior pod, not the strategists who pitch you.
- Still unknown
- Published no-show and meeting-to-opportunity rates.
Or start from your industry, and see who we cut.
All evaluations →The cuts are published alongside the recommendations. Same review, same evidence.
Every marketing discipline, vetted the same way.
Most directories are paid placement. Ours is a set we cut from.
Nobody buys their way in. The only way onto the list is to survive the review, and the reviews are public. We're a buyer's agent — if we broker a hire for you, you pay us, and we never take a fee from the agencies we rank.
Who vets this, and how.
Most places that "rank" agencies are paid by the agencies. Directories sell placement, review sites sell badges, and you end up with a leaderboard of whoever spent the most. Koolav is the inverse: the agencies pay us nothing, buyers do, and every verdict is analysis of public evidence you can trace and check yourself.
Think a call is wrong — including if you are the agency it is about? Write to hello@koolav.com. We re-review and publish the result either way, and there is no paid path to a different answer.
The standard, using outbound as the example
Every discipline has its own published rubric, weighted so the things that actually decide that engagement count most — deliverability decides an outbound engagement and is irrelevant to a CRO one. The weights below are the outbound rubric, shown as an example. See the full method and every rubric →
What counts as evidence
Only public, checkable sources: the agency's own site, case studies, and aggregated reviews from G2, Clutch, Trustpilot, and Reddit. Every factor shows its sources. Where a claim is the agency's own and we couldn't independently confirm it, we mark it inferred rather than verified.
Kept current, dated honestly
Each evaluation shows the real date it was last vetted. An old date shown honestly beats a fresh one that is decorative. We never stamp "updated today" on stale work. When evidence shifts, the verdict moves and the record says what changed.
How we stay neutral
Agencies never pay — not for a listing, not for placement, not to change a verdict. Reading the whole vetted set is free. We never take a cent from the agencies we rank, and the ones we cut are named in the open, which is the part a paid directory can never do.
The limits
Every evaluation is informed opinion based on public information, not a statement of fact, and not a guarantee of your results. Any agency can respond to its evaluation and we publish the response alongside. If you are an agency and think we got something wrong, email us — we will re-review and publish the result either way, and there is no paid path to a different answer.
Now put it to work: tell us what you're hiring for and see the shortlist, free.
Finding the agencies in our set that fit your brief.
A moment — we're ranking our vetted set against your brief.
We haven't vetted this one.
Put your top two head-to-head on the factors that matter for your brief. Free — they're all vetted.
Considering one we don't cover? Name it and it goes on the research queue →
Belkins
Factors, weighted — the ones that decide the hire come first.
Have Koolav act as your buyer's agent: we reach out, pressure-test them on your specifics, negotiate a scoped start, and hand you a ready decision. You approve everything. We agree a flat fee upfront and never take a cent from the agency.
Saving also watches: we re-check saved agencies and email you if the evidence shifts.
Send us what we got wrong and the link that shows it. We re-read the site and reply either way.
Evidence moves a verdict. Money never does — no agency pays us for a listing, a placement, or a re-review. Whatever we conclude we publish, including that the verdict stands.
Analysis of public information, vetted on the date shown — opinion, not a statement of fact. The vendor may respond to this evaluation; vendor responses are published alongside.
Comparing your top two
Both vetted and scored on the same factors.
Saved & watched
Add your email and we'll message you the moment a saved agency's evidence shifts. Only material moves, no spam.
Have Koolav act as your buyer's agent — we do the outreach and broker the engagement for a flat fee, and never take money from the agency. Or go direct; either way the vetting is yours to keep.