If you’re struggling to gain momentum with your marketing efforts, it could be due to an insufficiently detailed plan. Avoid viewing your marketing as merely a secondary task; it’s essential to the success of your business.
Here are six strategies that can help you better understand and solidify your marketing approach, along with a discussion on how delegating accounting tasks may facilitate this process.
Objective #1 – Establish Your Key Milestones
The initial step is to clarify precisely what you wish to accomplish through your marketing efforts. Some potential objectives might include:
Attracting a greater number of new clients. (By outsourcing accounting work, you can increase your revenue without compromising on quality as you grow.)
Acquiring more A-list clients (those ideal clients compared to less desirable ones).
Securing new clients at an elevated percentage paid for each return.
Expanding into additional niches (for instance, while your primary focus is on small business work, you may also want to venture into personal tax returns).
Without clear objectives, it will be challenging to determine if you’re getting value from your marketing investment—whether in terms of money or time.
Additionally, having defined goals will help sharpen your focus so that you’re allocating resources specifically towards what you aim to achieve rather than employing a scattergun approach and wishing for favourable outcomes.
Objective #2 – Establish Your Voice
Your “voice” reflects the culture or ambiance of your business. It’s not merely about what you offer but rather how you present it, giving prospective clients insight into the kind of experience they can expect when collaborating with you.
By outsourcing your accounting jobs, you gain more time to focus on nurturing relationships with your clients, embodying your voice, and fostering trust.
Through your marketing efforts, you can communicate whether you’re a highly serious financial institution or offer a more relaxed atmosphere. Perhaps you’re a firm dedicated to serving everyday individuals who may feel intimidated in traditional settings.
Objective #3 – Establish Smaller Milestones
You’ve identified your primary objectives; now it’s essential to break them down into smaller targets that will assist you in achieving them. These milestones represent specific actions you can take and check off as completed. For instance, if your aim is to acquire a particular number of SMSF clients by the end of the year, some of your smaller milestones could be (all of which allow time savings through outsourcing accounting work):
Join and actively participate in SMSF-focused groups on LinkedIn.
Do the same on Facebook and Twitter.
Launch a blog on your website with one SMSF-related post each week.
Distribute a monthly email newsletter to existing clients featuring tips and advice pertinent to SMSFs.
Without defined actions for you to mark as complete, you’ll likely find yourself wasting valuable time contemplating what you should do next instead of taking action. Additionally, without having these tasks recorded clearly, it becomes all too easy to postpone marketing efforts under the pretext of “getting back to it later.”
Objective #4 – Expand Upon Your Existing Achievements
You don’t need to incur substantial financial strain during expansion to ensure you’re prepared for the increased workload from future clients. By outsourcing your accounting work, you can grow without having to hire and train new in-house personnel, bringing in additional support only when necessary. This way, you won’t have idle employees wasting time while still receiving a paycheck.
Additionally, starting anew is not essential. Examine your loyal returning customers – do they often fall into a specific niche? This niche could involve a certain income level or perhaps be predominantly blue-collar versus white-collar workers. They might also share commonalities like being located in the same city or belonging to similar industries.
Regardless of what trends arise or which projects come your way, you’re already equipped to manage this niche effectively. There’s no need for you to adopt any unfamiliar processes; if more assignments arrive, simply begin delegating accounting work as word spreads about the exceptional quality of your firm.
You’ve established an entry point here. If your trend involves blue-collar workers and your primary objective is to engage with small business start-ups, simply communicating with your current clientele may encourage some of them to take the leap they’ve been contemplating (to launch their own venture), or they could potentially refer someone who needs your services.
Objective #5 – Create a Budget
Similar to your primary objectives and the list of tasks, it’s essential to clearly define how much time and money you plan to allocate for your marketing efforts. Delegating accounting tasks can significantly save both resources.
Firstly, having a budget makes your marketing initiatives more tangible; the more tangible they are, the less likely you will push them aside for other priorities.
Secondly, you’ll possess a benchmark that allows you to evaluate whether the time or money you’re investing is yielding results. If the return rate on new small-business clients (or whichever goal you’ve set) falls short, you’ll have specific figures indicating that it’s time to consider an alternative strategy.
Objective #6 – Don’t Put it on the Backburner
As we’ve emphasised repeatedly in this article, we want to stress once more that marketing is integral to your business. It should not be considered an auxiliary task or a mere side venture. Stay committed to your list of smaller objectives, and if they don’t yield results, modify your strategy and give it another shot.
