Running your own marketing agency can be exciting, but it can also be challenging at times. After all, the US alone has around 40,000 marketing agencies, so it can sometimes feel like a struggle to grow and capture a significant slice of the market.
But 2022 is a great year to push your digital marketing business forwards. COVID-19 accelerated digital transformation and drove even the laggards online, which translates into more potential clients for you.
Recent research from Databox shows the outlook is bright for marketing agencies. According to the study, 75% of marketing agencies founded six or more years ago are seeing year-over-year revenue growth of at least 16%. Among agencies established more recently, 70% are currently experiencing year-over-year revenue growth of at least 16%, with more than half growing to the tune of 45% or more.
If you’ve hit a slump and feel like business has plateaued, don’t despair – the demand and potential are there. Here are five tips for growing your marketing agency in 2022.
Diversifying also helps you punch above your weight. For example, many small to medium agencies encounter clients who want full marketing services with all the bells and whistles, but you might not have the expertise and/or manpower to meet their needs. Instead of outsourcing or losing them to a competitor, consider adding reselling to your business model. When you resell platforms designed and refined by others, you can offer clients more services.
Consider the vcita xperts reseller program, for example, which enables you to guide clients to manage some of their own marketing tasks, like email marketing, customer relationship management and payments, freeing you up to focus on more complex ones. Simply offer a co-branded version of the platform to your clients at special rates, or use its meta-dashboard to log in as your clients and collaborate with them on their nurture funnels.
Agencies can use reselling to add marketing coaching plans and software access alongside your done-for-you marketing packages, so you can attract SMB clients who need support, but don’t have the budget for full marketing consultancy. Using vcita xperts and similar programs means you can diversify without overstretching yourself or moving beyond your core competencies.
Rejig how you onboard new clients to give you more time to hear the parts that go unspoken. Often people ask for one thing when they need something else entirely, and sometimes even they don’t know what they really need.
“No project exists without a backing problem,” notes Brennan Dunn. “Your competitors likely won’t care enough to investigate what that problem is. If we know the problem, we can better tailor the project and what we end up doing toward that end.”
For example, a new client may get in touch to ask for a new website build. Instead of taking that at face value, ask why they want a new website, what drove them to turn to you, and what problem they expect a new website to solve. You might find that whether or not the prospect actually needs a new website, what they’re really after is help with lead generation.
As obvious as it might sound, it still needs to be said: take the time to audit your own website, social media channels, and digital assets, and check they are all optimized for the post-COVID market.
Revamp your own marketing by upgrading your lead magnet. You could use SEOptimer’s embedded audit tool to give new leads a free website audit. The user enters their website and an email address to receive a free, personalized audit report, while you get their details for nurturing.
That’s an offer that really gives value to the audited lead, while also providing you with key insights into what their biggest pain points are.
Start a regular podcast for the verticals you serve, such as real estate, restaurants, or high fashion retail, or the type of marketing you specialize in, like social media, PPC, or content. Share valuable insights, invite guests, present case studies, and discuss major marketing themes to your eager audience. Many podcast hosts will also be happy to be your guest, so by exchanging interview appearances, you can both reach new audiences.
Podcasting has worked well for Sebastian Schaeffer, founder of the backlink building tool Dofollow.io. “We have seen most of our growth over the last year come on the back of our podcast appearances,” he says. “Both my business partner and I dedicated much more time over the past 12 months to appearing on industry podcasts.”
A recent survey found that only 54% of marketers successfully track RoI, only 23% are confident that they’re tracking the right KPIs, and 40% agreed that more accurate data would improve their marketing outputs, demonstrating that the need for data is strong and awareness is real.
Use a self-serve analytics platform like Dundas BI to give your clients customized, powerful, yet accessible dashboards and visualizations that help them understand the value of your efforts. Dundas is designed on an open API to make it flexible and versatile.
With better data reporting, you and your clients can stay aligned on the performance of your marketing activities, thereby boosting retention.
But 2022 is a great year to push your digital marketing business forwards. COVID-19 accelerated digital transformation and drove even the laggards online, which translates into more potential clients for you.
Recent research from Databox shows the outlook is bright for marketing agencies. According to the study, 75% of marketing agencies founded six or more years ago are seeing year-over-year revenue growth of at least 16%. Among agencies established more recently, 70% are currently experiencing year-over-year revenue growth of at least 16%, with more than half growing to the tune of 45% or more.
If you’ve hit a slump and feel like business has plateaued, don’t despair – the demand and potential are there. Here are five tips for growing your marketing agency in 2022.
1. Diversify your services
The benefits of diversifying are clear: the more services you offer, the more revenue streams you have flowing, which means you can bring in more income and also be more resilient to ups and downs in any one sub-service.Diversifying also helps you punch above your weight. For example, many small to medium agencies encounter clients who want full marketing services with all the bells and whistles, but you might not have the expertise and/or manpower to meet their needs. Instead of outsourcing or losing them to a competitor, consider adding reselling to your business model. When you resell platforms designed and refined by others, you can offer clients more services.
Consider the vcita xperts reseller program, for example, which enables you to guide clients to manage some of their own marketing tasks, like email marketing, customer relationship management and payments, freeing you up to focus on more complex ones. Simply offer a co-branded version of the platform to your clients at special rates, or use its meta-dashboard to log in as your clients and collaborate with them on their nurture funnels.
Agencies can use reselling to add marketing coaching plans and software access alongside your done-for-you marketing packages, so you can attract SMB clients who need support, but don’t have the budget for full marketing consultancy. Using vcita xperts and similar programs means you can diversify without overstretching yourself or moving beyond your core competencies.
2. Dig deeper into client needs
If you’ve recently been experiencing frustration that your clients seem to be churning or you aren’t getting the referrals you once were, perhaps you’ve lost your ear for clients’ needs. It can hurt to admit it, but acknowledging the issue is the first step towards boosting business back where it belongs.Rejig how you onboard new clients to give you more time to hear the parts that go unspoken. Often people ask for one thing when they need something else entirely, and sometimes even they don’t know what they really need.
“No project exists without a backing problem,” notes Brennan Dunn. “Your competitors likely won’t care enough to investigate what that problem is. If we know the problem, we can better tailor the project and what we end up doing toward that end.”
For example, a new client may get in touch to ask for a new website build. Instead of taking that at face value, ask why they want a new website, what drove them to turn to you, and what problem they expect a new website to solve. You might find that whether or not the prospect actually needs a new website, what they’re really after is help with lead generation.
3. Revisit your magnets
While you’ve been immersed in the daily grind, working with your clients and worrying about the plateau you hit, your website, lead generation forms, and other parts of your funnel might have fallen out of date. After all, times and trends are changing ridiculously fast.As obvious as it might sound, it still needs to be said: take the time to audit your own website, social media channels, and digital assets, and check they are all optimized for the post-COVID market.
Revamp your own marketing by upgrading your lead magnet. You could use SEOptimer’s embedded audit tool to give new leads a free website audit. The user enters their website and an email address to receive a free, personalized audit report, while you get their details for nurturing.
That’s an offer that really gives value to the audited lead, while also providing you with key insights into what their biggest pain points are.
4. Use podcasts for networking
Podcasting isn’t new anymore, but it is massively popular, and there are no signs that the public’s appetite for new podcasts is slowing down. Podcasting creates an intimate connection that builds relationships, and agency marketers should be doing more of it.Start a regular podcast for the verticals you serve, such as real estate, restaurants, or high fashion retail, or the type of marketing you specialize in, like social media, PPC, or content. Share valuable insights, invite guests, present case studies, and discuss major marketing themes to your eager audience. Many podcast hosts will also be happy to be your guest, so by exchanging interview appearances, you can both reach new audiences.
Podcasting has worked well for Sebastian Schaeffer, founder of the backlink building tool Dofollow.io. “We have seen most of our growth over the last year come on the back of our podcast appearances,” he says. “Both my business partner and I dedicated much more time over the past 12 months to appearing on industry podcasts.”
5. Deliver on data demands
Everybody wants data-based insights, but nobody wants to have to work at it, so if you can give your marketing clients a shortcut to beautiful data visualizations and easy-to-use dashboards that deliver a stream of real time, actionable ,marketing insights, you’ll be riding high.A recent survey found that only 54% of marketers successfully track RoI, only 23% are confident that they’re tracking the right KPIs, and 40% agreed that more accurate data would improve their marketing outputs, demonstrating that the need for data is strong and awareness is real.
Use a self-serve analytics platform like Dundas BI to give your clients customized, powerful, yet accessible dashboards and visualizations that help them understand the value of your efforts. Dundas is designed on an open API to make it flexible and versatile.
With better data reporting, you and your clients can stay aligned on the performance of your marketing activities, thereby boosting retention.