The guide
There is no honest single answer, and any agency that gives you one without asking questions first is quoting a package rather than pricing your problem. What you are buying differs far more than what it costs: a monthly retainer for someone's time, a fee tied to results, a one-off project such as a film or a website, or media spend that goes to the advertising platform rather than to anyone's pocket. Work out which of those you are being sold before comparing a single number.
Updated August 2026
The models differ more than the numbers do. In brief:
What you are buying
They are genuinely different products, and they get quoted as if they are the same.
A monthly retainer buys a certain amount of someone's attention. You are paying whether or not a bed fills.
Usually an enquiry or a move-in. You pay more when it works and less when it does not.
For something that gets made: a family story film, photography, a website. You own the thing afterwards, or you should.
Money that goes to Meta or Google, not to the agency. Blending it into one number is the single most common way quotes become impossible to compare.
Why quotes differ
Because scope hides inside the number. Ask what is actually covered:
Two agencies quoting very different numbers may be offering entirely different work. The number tells you almost nothing until you have that list.
Retainer or results
Neither is automatically better, and the honest variable is accountability rather than model.
A results-based fee
It puts risk on the agency. The risk for you is definition: an "enquiry" can mean almost anything, and a fee tied to a loose definition rewards volume rather than move-ins.
What matters more than either is whether the agency is answerable for beds filled rather than for reports produced. We set out the full argument in results or retainer: how care home marketing should be priced.
What not to pay for
Anything you cannot see the effect of. If nobody can tell you where your last five move-ins came from, no spend is measurable and all of it is faith.
Reports as a deliverable. A monthly report is evidence, not a product.
Being locked in. Long notice periods on work that has not proven itself are a way of pricing risk onto you.
Start here
And they cost nothing, which is why they get skipped.
Note where each one came from, so you can see what is working.
Decide who answers enquiries and how fast, and make it the same day.
Complete your Google Business Profile and reply to every review.
Ask five recent families for a review.
Homes that do these four routinely get more move-ins than homes that add a campaign on top of a leaky process. This matters because occupancy has tightened: CQC's State of Care report for 2024/25 put care home bed occupancy in England at 84 per cent, up from 78 per cent in 2021/22, which makes each private enquiry you already have more valuable, not less.
Where the money goes
said reputation was the single most important factor in choosing a provider.
Reputation, above everything else you could spend money on. Care England and Log my Care surveyed 1,000 UK families who had recently arranged care and found reputation was the single most important factor in choosing a provider at 30 per cent, ahead of staff experience and location.
That should shape where the money goes. Budget spent making a genuinely good home visible tends to outperform budget spent on volume, because the constraint is usually trust rather than reach.
Before you sign
If any answer is vague, the vagueness is the product.
Working with us
It depends on what you need, which is why we do not print numbers in guides. We work on results rather than on selling retained time, and we would rather walk through the specifics on a call than have you guess from a table. If you want the honest version, including the one where we say your money is better spent elsewhere, get in touch.
Choosing between agencies more broadly is covered in how to choose a care home marketing agency.
Common questions
There is no honest single answer, because the models differ more than the numbers do. You may be buying a monthly retainer for time, a fee tied to results, a one-off project such as film or a website, or media spend that goes to the platform rather than the agency. Understand which of those you are being sold before comparing any figures.
Scope and production. How many homes are covered, whether film or photography is included, whether someone is handling enquiries as well as generating them, and whether media spend sits inside or outside the fee. Two quotes can differ enormously and both be reasonable if those things differ.
Neither is automatically better. A retainer buys consistent attention and suits homes wanting a long relationship. A results-based fee ties cost to outcome and suits homes that want accountability. The real variable is not the model but whether the agency is answerable for move-ins rather than activity.
It should at least be separated and visible. Media spend goes to the advertising platform, not to the agency, so a quote that blends the two makes it impossible to tell what you are paying for the work. Ask for the split in writing.
The free things first, and they matter more than most paid work. Recording where every enquiry comes from, answering enquiries the same day, completing your Google Business Profile and replying to reviews cost nothing and routinely produce more move-ins than a new campaign would.
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