Going global
How to choose a Vietnam-based agency for international marketing
Decide which job you are buying, ask for proof in the market you are entering, and test with a small paid project before a long contract. The criteria below work whoever you hire.
- International marketing is several different jobs. Name the one you need before you compare agencies, because no single team is strong at all of them.
- A Vietnam-based agency is close to your company and far from your buyer, so ask exactly how it closes that distance.
- Judge an agency by work it can explain, the people who will actually do yours, and how clearly it says what it does not do.
- Guaranteed results, vague deliverables and accounts you do not own are warning signs in any country.
- A small paid first project tells you more than any pitch deck.
How to choose a Vietnam-based agency for international marketing comes down to three things: know which job you are buying, ask for proof that the team can reach buyers in the market you are entering, and start with a small paid project before you sign anything long. Price and a polished pitch matter less than those three.
This guide is written to be useful even if you never work with us. It gives you criteria, questions, warning signs and a scorecard you can copy. It does not cover contracts, tax or trade mark law. For those, ask a qualified adviser.
First, decide which job you are buying
"International marketing" is not one service. A furniture maker in Bình Dương selling to German retailers and a skincare brand selling online to the United States need very different help. Before you talk to anyone, write down which of these jobs you need now.
| Job | Who usually does it |
|---|---|
| Brand and positioning (who you are abroad, the story, the name, the identity) | Brand studio or brand consultant |
| Website and core content (the pages a foreign buyer reads before replying) | Brand studio, content agency, web agency |
| Ongoing content and social | Content agency, or your own team with a system |
| Paid advertising | Performance agency, often one that knows the target country |
| PR and creators | PR agency or local partner in the market |
| Sales and distribution | Your sales team, trade agents, trade promotion bodies |
The last row is not marketing at all. No agency replaces a sales effort. For trade fairs and buyer connections, a body such as the Vietnam Trade Promotion Agency is the official place to start.
What a Vietnam-based agency is good for, and where it is limited
The strengths. The team can talk with your founder in Vietnamese, visit or at least understand your factory, and work in your time zone. It understands how Vietnamese companies make decisions, and why your story matters. A foreign agency often needs weeks to learn what a Vietnamese team grasps in one conversation.
The limits. The team sits far from your buyer. It may not know how a purchasing manager in the Netherlands reads a supplier website, or what sounds cheap to a shopper in California. English written in Vietnam can be correct and still feel foreign.
Neither side decides the question. What decides it is how the agency closes the distance: people who have lived or worked in the market, native reviewers, real conversations with buyers, or a partner on the ground. Ask them to show you, not tell you.
How to choose a Vietnam-based agency for international marketing: seven criteria
- Relevant work they can explain. Ask for two or three projects made for foreign audiences, then ask why each decision was made. A team that did the thinking can explain it.
- Knowledge of your target market. Which country, which language, which kind of buyer. If they have no experience there, a good agency says so and tells you how it will learn.
- Language quality. Read their own website in English. If it reads like a translation, yours will too. Ask who writes and who reviews.
- The people on your project. The person in the pitch is often not the person doing the work. Ask to meet the ones who will.
- A clear process with approval points. You should know what happens first, what you approve, and when you can still say no.
- Clear scope. A written list of what you receive, how many rounds of changes, and what is not included.
- Ownership. Design files, the website, the domain, ad accounts and social accounts should belong to your company, in your name, from the first day.
Day-to-day cooperation matters too. Our guide to working with a Vietnam-based marketing team covers briefs, time zones and approvals.
Questions to ask before you sign
Send these in writing before the second meeting. The answers are easier to compare on paper.
- "Which parts of international marketing do you not do?" A good answer is specific. "We do everything" is not an answer.
- "Who has worked with buyers in our target country, and how?" Listen for names and roles, not "our network".
- "Who writes the English, and who checks it?" You want a named process, including a native or near-native review for important pages.
- "What do you need from us, and how many hours a week?" Honest agencies ask a lot of you at the start. An agency that needs nothing from you will write about a company it does not know.
- "If we stop working together, what do we keep?" Everything you paid for, with access and source files.
Warning signs
None of these proves bad intent. Each one is a reason to slow down and ask more.
- Guaranteed outcomes. Nobody controls search rankings, how an ad platform behaves or whether a buyer signs. If someone promises a first-page position, read the Google SEO Starter Guide yourself first so you know what is realistic to ask for.
- No questions about your buyer. If the first meeting is all about deliverables and nothing about who buys from you, the work will be generic.
- A portfolio you cannot check. Logos without projects, or projects nobody can describe.
- Accounts in their name. If the agency registers your domain or ad account under its own company, leaving becomes painful.
A scorecard you can copy
Score each agency from 1 to 5 on every line after the second conversation. Compare totals, then look hard at any line where an agency scored 1 or 2.
| Criterion | What a 5 looks like | Agency A | Agency B |
|---|---|---|---|
| Fit with the job we need | This is their main work, not a side service | ||
| Work for foreign audiences | Shown, explained, and checkable | ||
| Knowledge of our target market | Named people with direct experience, or a clear plan to get it | ||
| Language quality | Their own English reads naturally; review process is named | ||
| Team we will work with | We met them and they understood our business | ||
| Process and approvals | Steps are written; we approve after each | ||
| Scope and price clarity | Written deliverables, revision rounds, exclusions | ||
| Ownership | All files and accounts are ours | ||
| Honesty about limits | They told us what they do not do |
Start with a small paid project
Skip the free pitch. Agree a small paid first step with a clear end instead: a positioning document for one market, one rewritten product page in English, or an audit of your current website from a foreign buyer's point of view. You see how the team thinks, how it handles feedback and whether deadlines hold. Then you decide about the larger project.
Common mistakes
- Choosing on price alone. The cheapest quote often leaves out research and review, which are the parts that make work fit a foreign market.
- Hiring for tactics before the brand is clear. Ads and posts multiply whatever message you already have. See our localization checklist for going global for what to fix first.
- Treating "the world" as one market. Pick a country first. Our guides to entering European markets and entering the US market explain why.
- Leaving legal questions to a marketing team. Trade marks, labelling and advertising rules belong with a qualified adviser. The WIPO Madrid System is the official place to read about international trade mark registration.
What Bunchasake does and does not do
It would be unfair to give you this list and not apply it to ourselves. Bunchasake is a brand builder and growth partner: a Vietnamese studio working between Vietnam and Italy, in Vietnamese and English.
What we do. We work in four steps, and you approve after each one: listening, positioning, identity and touchpoints. That means the brand story and key messages, the name if needed, logo, colours, typography and voice in usable guidelines, then the website and other touchpoints. As an add-on, we set up a social media automation system that your own team runs.
What we do not do. We do not run ads. We do not sell SEO as a service. We do not post or manage your community every day on your behalf, book influencers, or do photo and video shoots. We are not lawyers, and we do not find distributors. If one of those is the job you need most right now, another kind of partner is the right first call.
If the job is making a Vietnamese brand clear and believable to buyers abroad, you can read about our brand work for Vietnamese companies going international and score us with the same card.
Frequently asked questions
Is a Vietnam-based agency or an agency in the target country better?
It depends on the job. Work that depends on understanding your company, such as positioning and brand story, often goes well with a team that speaks your language. Work that depends on local relationships, such as PR, usually needs someone in the market. Many companies use both at different stages.
What should the contract make clear?
At a minimum: the list of deliverables, the number of revision rounds, the timeline, who owns the files and accounts, and how either side can end the work. Have a qualified legal adviser read it before you sign.
Can an agency guarantee sales or leads abroad?
No honest one can. An agency controls the quality of its work, not the decisions of buyers or the behaviour of platforms. Ask instead what it will deliver, how you will judge it and what it will report.
What should we prepare before the first meeting?
One page is enough: what you sell, which country you want first, who the buyer is, what you have tried, and which job from the table above you need. The clearer this page, the more useful every agency's answer will be.