A 90-Day New Hire Onboarding Checklist for Marketing Agencies

Hiring at a small agency is expensive in ways that don’t show up on the payroll report. Every hour a senior strategist spends answering “where is the brand guide?” is an hour not spent on clients. And if a new hire feels lost for a month, they may start looking elsewhere before they ever hit their stride.

Good onboarding fixes both problems. It gives new people the access, context and confidence they need, while protecting your team’s time. It doesn’t require an HR department. A clear checklist, a few templates and a named buddy go a long way.

Below is a practical 90-day plan built for agencies of roughly 3 to 30 people.

Why agencies struggle with onboarding

Agencies have a few quirks that make onboarding harder than in a typical company.

• Client context is everywhere. History lives in email threads, call notes, old decks and people’s heads.
• Tool sprawl. A single account manager might need logins for a CRM, ad platforms, analytics, a design tool and several client systems.
• Everyone is billable. The people best placed to train a new hire are also the busiest.
• Pressure to staff accounts quickly. New hires often get thrown onto client work before they understand how the agency operates.

The plan below addresses each of these directly.

Before day one: remove the friction

The week before a new hire starts is the easiest time to make a strong impression, and the easiest time to drop the ball.

Admin and access checklist:

• Employment paperwork sent with a return deadline
• Laptop ordered, set up and tested
• Email, calendar and chat accounts created
• CRM user created with the right permissions
• Access to shared drives, project tool and password manager
• Client platform access requested (ad accounts, analytics, CMS), with a list of what is still pending
• Buddy assigned and introduced by email

Welcome checklist:

• Welcome note from the owner or team lead
• First-week schedule shared
• Short team directory with roles and what each person can help with
• Link to the agency handbook or wiki

Here’s a welcome email an invented agency, Lantern Street Studio, sends three days before a start date:

Hi Tomas,

We’re really looking forward to Monday. Your laptop is ready, and your logins will arrive in a separate email on Friday. Your buddy for the first month is Keisha. She’ll meet you at 9:30 for coffee and a tour of how we work.

Your first-week schedule is attached. Nothing to prepare, just bring questions.

See you soon, Rachel

Week one: context before client work

Resist the urge to put a new hire straight onto billable tasks. The first week is about understanding how the agency thinks and works.

Day 1: Welcome and setup

• Morning with the buddy: tour, tools check, lunch with the team
• Meeting with their manager to review the role, expectations and the 90-day plan
• Afternoon to settle in, fix access gaps and read the handbook

Days 2–3: How we work

• Walkthrough of the agency’s service lines and ideal clients
• Tour of the CRM: how clients, pipelines, tasks and notes are organized
• Shadowing two client calls with a senior team member
• Review of your standard processes: kickoff, reporting, approvals

Days 4–5: Their accounts

• Handover sessions for the clients they’ll support, with a written account brief for each
• Introduction to client contacts, ideally on a live call
• A small, low-risk first task, such as drafting a report section or reviewing campaign settings
• End-of-week check-in: what’s clear, what’s confusing, what’s missing

The account brief template

Client context is the hardest thing to transfer. A one-page brief per account saves hours of digging. Keep it on the client record in your CRM so it stays current.

Field	What to include
Client snapshot	Business, locations, main services, key competitors
Contacts	Decision maker, day-to-day contact, preferred channel
Goals	What success looks like this quarter, in measurable terms
Services we provide	Scope, cadence and anything explicitly out of scope
History	Key wins, past problems, sensitivities to avoid
Access	Where logins live and who owns each platform
Current priorities	The next two to four weeks of work

With SaaSVisionary’s custom CRM, you can add these as custom fields on each client, so the brief is always one click away from the full conversation history.

Days 30, 60 and 90: build toward ownership

Set clear goals for each checkpoint so both the new hire and their manager know what “on track” looks like.

By day 30: contributing with support

• Comfortable with core tools and processes
• Handling routine tasks on assigned accounts with review
• Has met every client contact on their accounts
• Has one 1:1 with each teammate they work with regularly

By day 60: owning pieces of work

• Running recurring deliverables, like monthly reports, with light review
• Leading at least one client call with a senior person present
• Suggesting one improvement to an account or process

By day 90: fully ramped

• Owns day-to-day work on assigned accounts
• Leads client calls independently
• Knows when and how to escalate issues
• Has a development plan for the next six months

Hold a structured review at each checkpoint. Ask what support they need, and ask what your onboarding got wrong. New hires spot broken processes that long-time staff no longer notice.

Make onboarding repeatable

The first time you run this plan, it will feel like a lot of work. The goal is to make every future hire easier.

• Template the tasks. Turn the checklist into a task list that gets created automatically when a new hire is added. Workflow automation can assign admin tasks to the right people and send reminders at day 30, 60 and 90.
• Record walkthroughs once. A 10-minute video of how you run a kickoff call or build a report can be reused for years. Some agencies organize these into a private internal course using a course builder.
• Keep a living FAQ. Every question a new hire asks twice goes into the wiki.
• Rotate the buddy role. It spreads the load and builds leadership skills.

Common onboarding mistakes

1. No access on day one. Nothing says “we weren’t ready for you” like a morning spent waiting for logins.
2. Information overload. Spread training across weeks instead of cramming it into day one.
3. No clear owner. Onboarding needs a named manager and a named buddy.
4. Skipping culture. Explain how decisions get made, how feedback works and what good looks like.
5. Stopping after week one. The real risk of disengagement shows up in months two and three.

Frequently asked questions

How long should onboarding take at an agency?

Plan for about 90 days until a new hire is fully independent on their accounts. The first week focuses on context and setup, the first month on supported contribution, and months two and three on building ownership. Senior hires may ramp faster, but they still need client context and an understanding of your processes.

What should a new agency employee do in their first week?

Focus on setup, context and relationships rather than billable output. Get tools working, learn the agency’s services and processes, shadow client calls, meet the team and review briefs for the accounts they’ll support. End the week with one small, low-risk task and a check-in with their manager.

How do I onboard a remote agency employee?

Use the same plan, but make connection more deliberate. Ship equipment early, schedule short video calls with each teammate, pair them with a buddy for daily check-ins in the first two weeks and record key walkthroughs. Written account briefs and a well-organized CRM matter even more when people can’t ask across the desk.

Who should be responsible for onboarding new hires?

The hiring manager owns the plan and the checkpoint reviews. A buddy, usually a peer, handles day-to-day questions and introductions. An operations or admin person can handle paperwork, equipment and access. Naming all three avoids the common situation where everyone assumes someone else is looking after the new person.

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