North America
Digital agency services in the United States
The largest and most competitive market here, with no single privacy law, real accessibility litigation risk, and search auctions that punish generic positioning.
The United States is the biggest opportunity and the hardest place to be found. Search auctions in most commercial categories are contested by companies with budgets that make head-term competition futile for a new entrant, which pushes strategy toward specific, lower-competition terms and geography rather than volume.
The regulatory picture is a patchwork rather than a regime. There is no comprehensive federal privacy law; instead a growing set of state statutes with differing thresholds, rights and definitions, plus sector rules and two federal statutes on electronic communications that carry real penalties.
United States at a glance
| Legal status | Federal system; no comprehensive national privacy law |
| Language | American English; Spanish significant in several states |
| Currency | US dollar (USD) |
| Privacy regulators | State attorneys general; California Privacy Protection Agency |
| B2B email | CAN-SPAM permits opt-out sending with strict content requirements |
| SMS and calling | TCPA requires prior express written consent; heavily litigated |
| Accessibility | ADA litigation risk; WCAG 2.1 AA is the practical benchmark |
| Working week | Monday to Friday; 5–9 hours behind central European time |
The market
Buying culture rewards confidence in a way that would be counterproductive in the Nordics. Specific claims stated plainly land well; hedging reads as uncertainty about your own capability. The register that works in Stockholm actively underperforms here, and the reverse is also true.
Sales cycles in enterprise B2B are long and involve procurement, security review and legal, frequently with a SOC 2 report requested before a technical conversation proceeds. For a supplier without one, the practical consequence is that mid-market and SMB are the accessible segments.
Web accessibility is a genuine commercial risk rather than a compliance abstraction. ADA-related litigation over inaccessible websites is a substantial and continuing phenomenon, and WCAG 2.1 AA is the practical benchmark used to assess exposure.
What changes here
These are the rules and conventions that alter how we scope, build and price work for United States. They are the reason a campaign or a system cannot simply be copied across a border.
| Area | What applies in United States |
|---|---|
| Privacy | No comprehensive federal law. State statutes including the CCPA as amended by the CPRA in California, plus Virginia, Colorado, Connecticut, Utah and a growing list of others, each with their own thresholds and rights. The general model is opt-out rather than the EU’s opt-in. |
| Email marketing | CAN-SPAM permits sending until the recipient opts out, provided headers are not deceptive, the message is identifiable as advertising, a valid physical postal address is included and unsubscribe requests are honoured promptly. |
| SMS and calling | The TCPA requires prior express written consent for automated marketing calls and texts, and it is among the most litigated consumer statutes in the country. Class-action exposure is real and substantial. |
| Accessibility | ADA Title III has been applied to websites in a large body of litigation. There is no single federal technical standard for private sites, but WCAG 2.1 AA is the benchmark generally used in settlements and assessments. |
| Advertising disclosure | FTC endorsement guides require clear disclosure of material connections, including for employees posting about their own employer, not only for paid influencers. |
| Sector rules | HIPAA for protected health information, GLBA for financial data, COPPA for children under thirteen, and FERPA in education. These determine architecture far more than general privacy law does. |
| Security assurance | SOC 2 Type II is the de facto requirement for selling software to US enterprises. It is not a legal obligation but it functions as one commercially. |
| AI | No comprehensive federal statute. Several states regulate automated decision-making, particularly in employment, and sector regulators have been active. Colorado has enacted broader AI legislation with obligations phasing in. |
Not legal advice. This summarises how we scope and build, current to our latest review. Confirm the operative text with qualified counsel in United States before relying on it.
Language and localisation
American English spelling and conventions matter more than they appear to. British spellings, day-month date order and metric-first measurements identify a supplier as foreign, which in some segments is neutral and in others costs credibility.
Spanish is the second language of the market at meaningful scale, particularly in Texas, Florida, California and the south-west. For consumer-facing businesses in those markets a Spanish locale is a commercial decision worth modelling rather than dismissing.
Register is more assertive than in Europe. Specific, confident claims perform well; the understated Nordic style reads as a lack of conviction. This is a real localisation change, not a stylistic preference, and it works in both directions.
Where the demand is
A continental market with genuinely distinct regional economies. Targeting the whole country at once is how budgets disappear; targeting specific metros is how a foreign supplier gets traction.
- New York
- Finance, media, advertising, fashion and a very large technology sector. The most expensive market for both talent and advertising.
- San Francisco Bay Area
- Technology and venture capital, with the most sophisticated software buyers and the most saturated supplier market.
- Los Angeles
- Entertainment, media, e-commerce and a substantial consumer brand sector with high creative expectations.
- Chicago
- Manufacturing, logistics, finance and a large corporate base, with more accessible procurement than the coasts.
- Austin and Dallas
- Fast-growing Texas technology and corporate relocation destinations, with lower costs and less saturated competition.
- Boston
- Life sciences, biotechnology, education and enterprise software, with technically demanding buyers.
- Miami
- Latin American trade gateway, finance and a growing technology presence, with substantial Spanish-language commerce.
- Seattle and Denver
- Cloud, aerospace and outdoor industry, with strong engineering bases and slightly less contested markets than the Bay Area.
We publish a dedicated page for one of these cities:
Sectors that buy this work
- B2B SaaS
- The largest addressable segment, buying growth marketing, engineering capacity and infrastructure — and requiring SOC 2 for enterprise deals.
- Healthcare
- HIPAA constraints determine architecture before anything else, and vendor due diligence is thorough.
- Financial services
- Heavily regulated, with GLBA obligations and demanding security review.
- E-commerce and DTC
- Sophisticated buyers with high creative volume requirements and mature paid media operations.
- Professional services
- A large, fragmented segment where document automation and knowledge assistants have clear returns.
- Manufacturing and logistics
- Midwest and south, frequently with dated systems and strong automation cases.
What we are most often asked for in United States
Digital Marketing
The layer above the channels: what the funnel is, which campaigns run, what each is meant to produce, and whether it did.
Read more →Paid Advertising
Buying attention at a price that works — with the tracking, creative volume and landing pages that decide whether it does.
Read more →Search Engine Optimisation
Getting found for the things people actually search — technical foundations first, then structure, then content that deserves the position.
Read more →Custom Software & Platforms
Building the system when nothing off the shelf fits — and telling you honestly when something off the shelf does.
Read more →CRM & Sales Systems
The system of record for revenue: where leads land, how they are routed, what happens next, and whether anyone can see the truth of the pipeline.
Read more →AI Automation Systems
Putting language models to work on real processes — with the boundaries, evaluation and human checkpoints that make them safe to rely on.
Read more →Typical projects in United States
Shapes of work we are asked for repeatedly here. They are described as project types, not as case studies — where we publish a client outcome it will be named, dated and with the client's permission.
- State privacy compliance programme
- Consent, opt-out mechanisms and data subject request handling across the states you actually operate in, rather than a one-size EU-style banner.
- WCAG 2.1 AA accessibility remediation
- Reducing ADA litigation exposure on a consumer-facing site, with audit evidence retained.
- TCPA-compliant SMS programme
- Express written consent capture, record keeping and suppression built correctly, given the litigation exposure.
- SOC 2 readiness engineering
- Logging, access control, change management and monitoring built to satisfy an audit, which unlocks enterprise sales.
- Metro-specific search strategy
- Targeting winnable regional terms rather than national head terms, which is how a new entrant actually gets traffic.
- Spanish-language locale
- A properly separated Spanish locale for consumer businesses in Texas, Florida, California and the south-west.
Every service, available in United States
The full offering is delivered into United States, scoped around the rules above.
- Brand Strategy & Development
- Brand Management
- Social Media Strategy
- Social Media Management
- Content Creation & Creative Production
- Digital Marketing
- Paid Advertising
- Website Design & Development
- Search Engine Optimisation
- Email, SMS & WhatsApp Marketing
- CRM & Sales Systems
- Business Process Automation
- AI Automation Systems
- AI Knowledge Bases & RAG
- AI Voice & Customer Communication
- Lead Generation & Prospecting
- Custom Software & Platforms
- Data Engineering & BI
- Cloud, DevOps & Infrastructure
- Systems Integration
- Digital Transformation Consulting
- Maintenance & Ongoing Support
What foreign suppliers get wrong here
The most common European mistake is competing on head terms. United States search auctions in most commercial categories are contested by companies with budgets that make national head-term visibility unattainable for a new entrant. Metro-specific and long-tail targeting is not a lesser strategy here; it is the only one that works from a standing start.
The second is bringing a European register. Understatement reads as a lack of conviction, and hedged claims are interpreted as uncertainty about your own capability. Specific, confident statements land well — which is the exact inverse of what works in Sweden, and both directions of that adaptation get skipped routinely.
The third is treating accessibility as a compliance formality. ADA-related web litigation is a substantial and continuing commercial risk, and WCAG 2.1 AA is the benchmark used in assessments. It is worth budgeting for rather than discovering through a demand letter.
A fourth is underestimating procurement friction in enterprise sales. Security review, vendor onboarding and legal can add months, and a European supplier without a SOC 2 report will find that mid-market and SMB are the realistically accessible segments rather than the Fortune 500.
Finally, suppliers treat the United States as one market. It is a continental economy with genuinely distinct regional characters, cost structures and competitive intensities, and a national strategy is usually a more expensive way of achieving what a focused metro strategy would have delivered sooner.
How we work with clients here
We work remotely with US clients across a five to nine hour time difference from Europe. In practice that means European mornings overlap with nothing and European afternoons overlap with the US morning, so we schedule meetings in our afternoon and yours.
Contracting is in US dollars, fixed-price per phase against a written scope. We are comfortable with the security questionnaires, mutual NDAs and vendor onboarding processes US buyers typically require.
We will be direct about the time zone rather than pretending it is a non-issue. For work needing daily synchronous contact with a West Coast team, we would tell you to hire locally.
Questions
Is there a US equivalent of the GDPR?
No single one. There is a growing patchwork of state laws — California, Virginia, Colorado, Connecticut, Utah and others — with differing thresholds and rights, plus sector statutes such as HIPAA and GLBA. Compliance is assembled state by state rather than adopted wholesale.
Can we cold email in the US?
CAN-SPAM permits it on an opt-out basis, with honest headers, identification as advertising, a valid physical address and prompt unsubscribe handling. This is far more permissive than the EU — but a list built under these rules cannot be mailed into the EU or Canada.
How real is website accessibility litigation?
Real and substantial. ADA claims over inaccessible websites are filed in large numbers annually, and WCAG 2.1 AA is the practical benchmark used in assessments and settlements. It is a commercial risk worth budgeting for.
Do we need SOC 2?
If you sell software to US enterprises, effectively yes — it is requested routinely before technical evaluation proceeds. It is not a legal requirement, but it functions as a commercial gate.
Can a European supplier work with US clients?
Yes, with realism about the time zone. Asynchronous and afternoon-overlap working is fine for most project work; daily synchronous collaboration with a West Coast team is not, and we would say so rather than take the engagement.
What does it cost?
Fixed-price phases in US dollars against a defined scope, quoted after a discovery call. We do not publish a rate card.
Can a European agency realistically serve US clients?
For project and retainer work with afternoon overlap, yes, and many do. For engagements requiring daily synchronous collaboration with a West Coast team, we would tell you to hire locally rather than take the work and under-serve it.
How should we approach US search given the competition?
Narrowly. Metro-level and long-tail targeting, specific service terms, and lower-competition regional markets. National head-term strategies for a new entrant consume budget and produce positions that earn nothing.
Do we need a US entity?
For selling services cross-border, frequently not initially. It becomes relevant for hiring, certain enterprise procurement and state tax nexus questions. Those are matters for a US accountant and attorney rather than for us.
Nearby markets
Working in United States?
Tell us what you are trying to build or grow. We will tell you what the local constraints mean for scope, and whether we are the right people for it.
Get in touch