Marketing for accountants

Posted 18 August 2021

Marketing is critical for successful accounting firms. Your accounting firm is up against a lot of competition. Cutting through the noise means having a strong message.

Good, optimised digital marketing strategies can help to grow your client base, attract new clients that fit your firm, increase the lifetime value of your existing client base and help you find more high-value work, such as business advisory services.

That can be easier said than done, though – primarily if you operate a small accounting firm and don't have in-house marketing professionals.

In this accounting marketing guide, we'll introduce you to everything you need to know. We'll cover the basics, why marketing is important for accounting firms and uncover why marketing strategies for accounting firms are your most significant opportunity for clients and prospects.

Marketing for accounting firms: where do I start?

1. Your Goals

What is it that you want to achieve through your marketing efforts? Cost-effective digital marketing for an accountant requires an end goal – the thing you want to happen to your accounting firm as a result of investing in marketing. Additionally, you should ensure you can tie this result to actual ROI.

Try to be specific with your goal, such as what your firm wishes to achieve, for example:

A 30% increase in your total client number,
A 3x increase in the average lifetime value of your clients,
Or add 200 new email subscribers.

Having a goal to guide everything you do can help your firm choose between the marketing channels we list below.

2. Understanding your target market

Good marketing is the right message in the right place and time. If you're pointed with your messaging, then everything else will follow.

Of course, your messaging depends on the potential clients you want to attract – and their needs.

So, before you go further with your marketing, make sure you can answer these questions about your desired accounting firm target audience:

What do they need or want?
What are their challenges or pain points that you can solve?
What is their budget?
What demographic are they?
How do they consume content?

You can get this information and discover your niche by talking to team members in your firm, hosting workshops with existing customers, or asking for feedback from current clients through surveys.

3. Mapping out a customer pipeline

Now that you know the potential customers you're hoping to talk to, you need to know precisely how they will interact with your accounting business – and when. This means mapping out your customer pipeline or journey from the initial contact point to converting and their ongoing loyalty.

Joining these dots will help you understand how high-level marketing ideas, for example, someone following your social media content or reading a blog – contribute to ROI later in the journey.

Questions you can ask yourself:

What is the first touchpoint between your firm and a potential client? When will they become aware of your firm?
What are all of the potential touchpoints that follow engaging for a prospect to continue their journey with you?
How do they get through each step? What actions should they need to take? And how long will each step take?
What happens after a prospect converts? What are the ongoing touchpoints for these new clients? Mapping this out enables better marketing in the post-sales stage, which you may want to do to increase client retention and total lifetime value.
Where are the most straightforward and the most challenging points in the timeline? At which points can a prospect breeze through with little effort and require more engagement, a longer time, and more action on the prospective clients?

Write this down and plot it into a timeline or flowchart. You might be unable to answer all these questions perfectly, and that's okay! You can add to it over time as you learn more.

4. Using data

When you have a high-functioning, cost-effective digital marketing system, data is vital to all critical decision-making. You can do much more with much less if you optimise your assets before investing in new ones.

So, you'll need a system for gathering, maintaining and utilising all your marketing data. It would be even better if these systems could share valuable information.

Accounting firm marketing platforms you could look into:

A client management system for accounting practices
A marketing analytics platform
A way to connect your sales process and accounting systems to marketing.

You may be unable to make some of these investments immediately, which is okay. It's something you can refine over time.

Why don't accountants like marketing accounting services?

That's a generalisation, obviously – yet the basic idea holds. Many accountants are wary of marketing in this digital age, believing they'll be bad at it.

Ultimately, this concerns the importance of marketing mentioned above and approaching proper marketing strategies with a test-and-learn mindset.

For many accounting firms, this kind of thinking takes time to swallow. Good accountancy requires following the rules – while smart marketing strategies can mean breaking them.

At the least, marketing principles are more guidelines than rules – being good at marketing is where accountants find themselves marketing their services. They need to get comfortable with this open-ended, test-and-learn approach.

Digital marketing strategies for your accounting firm

In this section, we'll detail ten popular digital marketing methods many firms use to market their accounting services.

1. Your website

Good website design is the first win in your marketing plan, especially on a budget. Your online presence is the who, what, where, when, why and how of your brand, where curious potential clients have a place to learn more about your services and realise that you're the accounting firm for them.

Many other digital marketing channels will return to this website, so you must get it right. It will feature on your customer pipeline map a few times.

Necessary user experience (UX) tips for your website:

Ensure the website functions correctly on both desktop and mobile.
Make it clear what your accounting services are and how they will benefit a potential client. Don't just list what you do or your features; focus on how your business can help someone.
Consider if you have the right web pages to offer the information your potential audience is after. For example, some people may want to avoid reading pages detailing services but are more inclined to read pages on how you help a particular industry or solve a business problem.
Test everything. Ask your team to play with the new website and note down any pain points they're experiencing, challenges or missing information they noticed in their experience.

2. SEO as a digital marketing strategy for accountants

SEO stands for search engine optimisation. Improving your website can help it score higher in search engines like Google. The higher you rank for relevant search terms, the more likely that prospective customers will be able to locate you.

Things you should know about SEO:

SEO is a type of long-term, passive marketing. It can take some time to get started, but when you're firing on all cylinders, you will deliver users to your website without needing paid ads, making any sales calls, or anything like that. This makes it highly cost-effective over a long period but a poorer short-term solution for quick results.
SEO can be both a technical- and content-related activity. Often, it will require technical tweaks at the back end of a website and specific use of content (such as web pages optimised for SEO, blog articles, and so forth) that can help Google find, read and rank your site for various search terms.
SEO involves keyword research to identify what search terms people use to find accounting services like yours. You may find, for example, that only a few people are searching directly for your services, but they are asking questions about your field that can be answered through blog articles and other resources.

Effective SEO-based marketing requires dedication plus expertise. Still, this is the most cost-effective form of marketing in the long term.

Local SEO for accountants

Local SEO is a form of optimisation that guarantees you are found in search engines where your physical location is important. This is also relevant for accountancy firms.

Relationships are so crucial to the accounting industry. Those looking for an accountant, bookkeeper or advisor may want someone to meet them face-to-face. Google knows that, so when searching for a term like "accountant", you'll notice a map displaying where you are, along with the profiles of accountancy firms nearby.

Setting up your local SEO will make your accounting firm findable to prospects close to you who turn to Google for help with their finances or search for terms like 'accounting firms near me'.

At a minimum, every accountancy firm should use their free Google My Business listing best and fill it out with the correct phone numbers and website, a compelling business description, some FAQs, and engaging photography.

An accurate Google listing is essential because most web traffic comes from search engines. You'll be found more quickly if you create a listing on Google My Business with the correct contact details. You can ask your current clients to provide reviews and ratings, which will have similar effects as word of mouth.

3. Content marketing

Content marketing uses different content types to attract prospects, draw them towards your accounting services, and turn them into clients.

Commonly applied content marketing types include:

Blogging
Downloadable guides, whitepapers and report
A newsletter
Case studies
Webinars
Podcasts
Video marketing
eBooks
Interactive media, like games or calculators

How should I know what content to produce?

This is where understanding your customers and customer pipeline is essential. Knowing what content your customers consume will help you decide where it fits your customer pipeline and how to nurture them to your ROI.

Some content marketing tips for beginners:

Regularly publishing blog articles and guides will be great for your firm's SEO.
Many firms will write case studies showcasing top clients that can be used for 'social proof' for potential new clients perusing their websites.
High-value content can be used to gather people's email addresses, which can be used for email marketing. People are usually willing to exchange their contact details for helpful downloadable guides and webinars. The operative word there is 'useful'.

4. Social media for accounting firms

Social media is a must-have for most modern accounting firms. Social media platforms present an opportunity where firms can connect with potential future clients, delight their existing clients, educate and provide thought leadership, build trust, grow awareness of their profile within the industry, entertain, and sometimes even sell products.

How do I choose the right social media channel for my firm?

Social media is all made differently. Social media channels have a particular demographic skew. For example, LinkedIn users are typically adult professionals aged 30 and over. Facebook users tend to be older and family-oriented; people use Twitter for updates and news; TikTok is aimed at a younger audience, and so on.

So, how do you know which one is right for your business? As an accounting firm dealing with other companies, it will likely be LinkedIn. The easy way to confirm that is by referring to your target audience profile that you generate from the tips offered earlier in this article. What is the most appropriate platform for social media marketing for your clients?

How do I know what I should post?

Accounting firms have a ripe opportunity to post thought leadership and education content relevant to the accounting industry, and their employees can use their profiles as a platform for providing commentary on what's currently happening in the industry.

Knowing what to post involves looking at your competitors to check out what they're doing. What is working and what isn't? Analysing how people engage with their posts gives you a framework to follow.

If you're a CPA firm, CPA Australia offers in-depth guidance and even sample posts that can help you to start.

You can learn more about social media marketing for accounting firms in our article: Establishing a social media presence for accountants.

5. Paid digital advertising for accounting firms

Paid digital advertising covers any content you must pay for to improve your online presence. Sometimes, you will pay for these with a sponsorship fee; sometimes, this will be paid by the number of clicks (such as the search ads, known as PPC or pay-per-click ads), and sometimes another payment option.

Commonly used channels for digital advertising

Search ads: Here, you purchase your search rankings. Your ad would appear in a regular search result, usually before the organic results, and will lead straight to a particular landing page or resource on your firm's website. Google is the most popular search platform you can use for advertising.
Display ads: the images, GIFs and videos that are used in articles, on websites, in apps, or before or during videos.
Native ads: an ad mimicking the style of content found on the platform. Native ads blend into their surroundings, looking less like advertising and more like helpful content.
Social media ads: Platforms like LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter all have in-platform advertising. Often provided through pay-per-click, these networks enable you to get the word out to users scrolling through their regular feeds. LinkedIn will allow you to send ads directly to your clients' inboxes, which is usually quite expensive compared to other social media formats. However, this is very effective as it allows you to target particular industries and even people with specific job titles within those industries. This will enable you to focus on your ideal accounting clients.
Influencer sponsorships: Paying influencers and content creators so your firm can be mentioned or for your ad to appear within their content. You may need to create content for the influencer's audience; other times, they will note you in their regular content.

The pros and cons of paid ads for accountants

Paid digital advertising for accounting firms is a straightforward, fast approach to marketing. However, it does have its downsides.

Many digital advertising strategies work on auctions, which means the more people who advertise against specific keywords, the increased cost of the keywords. The most valuable commercial terms will be identified and attract multiple bidders.

These costs will accumulate very quickly. It's also important to note that as soon as you switch off your spending, the leads switch off, making this a dangerous lead source to rely on entirely.

Quality of leads, ROI and messaging

Suppose you describe your firm accurately upfront – perhaps with a "business tax specialists" message – your conversion rate will be higher. Converting 2% of your 100 visitors, your acquisition costs will be $558/2 = $279. You'll have much more room to play with:

The spend you need to recoup and what you need to charge. Lower prices can help you convert more clients in a competitive space when you keep your fees the same, but dropping your acquisition cost leads to higher profits).
The amount you are investing in your digital advertising.

This rule can also apply to your website messaging as much as to your ad messaging. An attractive, compelling website convincing visitors to become your clients will ensure you get the best ROI from your ad spend. And if you're attracting leads with expensive digital ads, a dated, unprofessional website will convert less traffic – and cost you dearly.

It is vital that your ad messaging and website messaging align. Sometimes, when you're targeting a specific audience with a particular ad, creating a dedicated landing page with matching messaging will make more sense than sending that traffic to your home page.

6. Email marketing for accountants

Email marketing efforts can feel like a dying medium to many beginners – nobody likes spam. But it's alive and well and a handy tool for connecting with an audience over a longer time.

But you would only drop emails into everybody's inbox with them consenting. These days, there are two common ways email can be used for marketing, and both require users to give their email to you first freely:

Email nurtures

A series of emails, known as email nurtures, is sent to someone over time to persuade them towards a conversion point.

Usually, there is a 'trigger' that the nurture can send, such as when a user downloads a particular guide or signs up for a webinar.

Essential example nurture (each email sent a week apart):

"Thank you for downloading our guide".
Education on the same topic.
More education on the same subject, with contact details for your firm if they need more help.
Direct sales information that is related to your service.

Email nurtures can be just a few emails or potentially dozens and are combined with other marketing activities, such as paid advertising that reinforces messages across your platforms.

They are usually at least semi-automated. After the trigger point, the emails are sent automatically. Additionally, you'll be personalising each message with the recipient's name and adjusting the content they see based on specific details. Finally, if people don't engage with the nurture, they may be automatically dropped from future email correspondence. This prevents uninterested users from being 'spammed' by your content.

Post-sales engagement and content distribution

Another way you can use email marketing is as a platform to engage and distribute content to your clients and prospects who may still need to convert but might still be interested in your content.

Monthly newsletters are the most common example, but it's not all you can do. Sometimes, businesses send helpful notifications at certain times. For instance, if new legislation is coming up or a tax change has been announced, you can educate your audience on how this impacts them, show your expertise, and demonstrate your value while keeping your name and brand in mind.

To know what to send your clients, consider the value you're offering them and what you hope to achieve through email marketing.

Learn more here: HubSpot's Ultimate Guide to Email Marketing

7. How accountants should approach thought leadership

Thought leadership demonstrates you or your accounting team are experts in their field. The concept is that by exemplifying your expertise and being helpful and captivating inside your sector, you have opportunities to build trust with potential clients. This is essential for accounting firms, given there are levels of trust involved in a successful client relationship.

Common types of thought leadership content are:

eBooks and Whitepapers
In-depth blog articles
Podcasts
Research papers
Webinars

Writing your book is the ultimate thought leadership!

The ultimate form of thought leadership is writing a book. This will seem daunting, but if you or your staff have an area of genuine expertise, writing an industry guide to your topic area can help stamp your authority in the accounting space.

Books can be self-published using a platform like Amazon's Kindle or a conventional local publisher.

Learn more: SEMrush's We've Ultimate 2022 Guide to Thought Leadership

8. Collaboration and guesting

Both content types are where your content, or people, are hosted on another person's platform.

Unlike a paid sponsorship, these may not require any cost on your part. Brands often focus on building collaborative relationships with other brands who see a common goal in working together. For example, a software vendor that creates accounting practice management software for small businesses could work with business advisory and accounting firms as these two products are mutually beneficial.

What is content collaboration?

The two businesses work hand in hand to produce content or a more comprehensive marketing campaign where both parties contribute. For example, one may write content while the other promotes it.

What is guesting?

Guesting is where your people seek to become guests on popular content platforms like podcasts. In this case, your people contribute expertise to the content creator's platform while promoting your brand simply by being there.

Guest posting in the accounting community

Guest posting is a mix of collaboration and native advertising. This is where your firm creates content designed for another's platform, usually a blog or magazine, indicating that your brand wrote the content.

Your typical content reach may extend if your words are put in front of someone else's audience.

This is its own thing rather than a type of collaboration because blogs and magazines often charge you for that privilege. On the other hand, a "guest post" may not be noted as 'Sponsored Content' on the host platform, which some may find off-putting.

9. Word of mouth

Word of mouth (WOM) marketing is where your clients and prospective clients advertise your business simply by talking about it with one another.

WOM is one of those proven marketing ideas that can significantly impact your brand by being free advertising. No matter how much money you are funnelling into typical digital marketing channels, a subset of people inherently don't 'trust' it; no matter what you do or say, you're your own form of brand advertising.

The word will spread through WOM, bringing with it a sense of authenticity. Authenticity is something that a much more comprehensive range of users can trust.

How you can generate word-of-mouth marketing for your accounting services:

Deliver an excellent service: WOM often will usually come from clients who have been satisfied with the service they have received and are enthusiastic to recommend it to others.
Ask for reviews where relevant: Is your business on any review websites? Ask your customers to review you if they've had a positive experience. Anyone researching your firm may come upon these reviews and read through them to get a sense of what you're like to work with.
Getting testimonials and case studies to host on your website: Testimonials and case studies have a similar type of authenticity to WOM, especially if you've got video content of real clients talking about their experience (as opposed to clients reading from a script).

10. Using a specialist marketing firm for accountants

If your firm needs hands-on experience marketing in-house, even utilising the suggested tools may not be very cost-effective in generating results. Who can assist you with your marketing?

The answer is marketing firms, specifically those specialising in the accounting sector.

You seek support from a generalist marketing firm, but it is doubtful they will be able to meet the needs of your industry. When dealing with your client's personal and financial data, you need assurance that you're working with a firm that can get all the wording right and profoundly understands your audience's needs.

There may be an association you could join to help your in-house marketing staff grow together and network. It's called the Association for Accounting Marketing. In Australia/New Zealand, there's also Bizink and Practice + Pixels.