Most "best agency" content ranks by whoever wrote the list. This page does something narrower and more useful: five criteria, stated before any agency is scored against them, applied the same way to everyone — including us.
See the narrative comparison for the "who suits what" summary; this page is the scorecard underneath it. Before scoring anyone, it is worth deciding whether you need an agency at all
— our agency vs freelancer vs in-house breakdown covers when each option actually makes sense, and our ten questions to ask before choosing a marketing agency sits alongside the criteria below.
The 5 criteria
- Channel coverage. How many real platforms the agency actually executes on, versus how many it lists on a homepage.
- Compliance handling. For Malaysia specifically, this means KKM/MDC healthcare-advertising awareness where the client is a clinic — the single highest-stakes compliance area in this market.
- Reporting transparency. Whether pricing and results are published or shared openly, versus "contact for quote" as the only available signal.
- Contract terms. Minimum commitment length, notice period, lock-in — publicly disclosed or not.
- Certifications. Google Premier Partner / Partner status, Meta Certified Media Planner/Buyer badges — the credentials every competitor in this market's retrieval results leads with.
The scorecard
| Agency | Channel coverage | Compliance handling | Reporting transparency | Contract terms | Certifications |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ZenWeb | Broad — SEO, Google, Meta, web design under one team | Not clinic-specialised; no specific KKM claim found | Strong — publishes prices from ~RM1,299/mo | Not publicly disclosed | Not independently verified this session |
| shakalakaa | Focused — Meta, Google, landing pages, content | Strong — KKM/MDC compliance is a site-wide wedge across dozens of pages | Strong on results — open benchmark data and case studies; management fees are scoped per brief, not published | Not publicly disclosed — same gap as every agency here | None held — no Google Premier Partner or Meta Certified badge, confirmed this session |
| Axcel Digital | Narrow by design — Google Ads/Performance Max specialist | Strong — clinic-only focus (aesthetic, dental, medical) | Weak — "contact for quote" only | Not publicly disclosed | Not independently verified this session |
| MYSense | Broad-for-niche — content, SEO, ads, XHS, healthcare-only | Strong — explicit KKM alignment claimed, published case studies | Weak — "contact for quote" only | Not publicly disclosed | Not independently verified this session |
| Kingdom Digital | Broad, different kind — integrated brand creative, Hakuhodo / H+ network | Not clinic-focused; not applicable | Weak — enterprise-tier, no published pricing | Not publicly disclosed | Not independently verified this session |
"Not independently verified this session" means exactly that — we did not confirm or deny another agency's certification status against Google's or Meta's own partner directories this session, so we don't state it as fact either way. The one certification fact we can state with certainty is our own: none held, disclosed above rather than left ambiguous.
Where this leaves shakalakaa's own listing
Three strong criteria, two genuine gaps. We score well on channel-execution focus, on compliance handling (KKM/MDC awareness runs through dozens of pages on this site, not a single claim), and on reporting transparency (open benchmark data and published case studies; management fees are scoped per brief rather than published).
We score weakly on contract-terms disclosure — not published anywhere on this site, the same as every competitor compared here — and on certifications, where we hold none of the partner badges competitors in this market's search results lead with.
Both are recorded in our internal blockers list as real, unresolved gaps, not smoothed over here to make the scorecard look better.
Related: the narrative comparison this scorecard sits underneath, and the performance marketing hub for shakalakaa's own outcome-accountability standard.
- Cite this
- shakalakaa (Plixitt Solutions). “Choosing a Performance Marketing Agency in Malaysia.”
- https://shakalakaa.my/resources/choosing-a-performance-marketing-agency-malaysia · Updated 2026-10-19
- Licensed under CC BY 4.0.
shakalakaa (Plixitt Solutions). "Choosing a Performance Marketing Agency in Malaysia." https://shakalakaa.my/resources/choosing-a-performance-marketing-agency-malaysia. Updated 2026-10-19. Licensed under CC BY 4.0.