As we enter the New Year, one common goal clients have been conveying to me, again
and again, is to increase their client acquisition.

These days, the many options available make the decision on which client acquisition
strategies are right for you more confusing. Of course, you are always welcome to
contact us to discuss your goals and plans or you can keep reading and follow this
simple three-step plan:

Step one: Evaluate.
One excellent way I’ve found to determine which are the best options is to use the
SWAT method.

The SWAT method takes into consideration your strengths, weaknesses, opportunities,
and threats by answering the following four questions:
1) What are your internal strengths?
2) What are your internal weaknesses?
3) What are your external opportunities?
4) What are your external threats?

For example, an agency we work with designs websites. They are terrific at what they
do and have built great relationships with their clients. They determined that their
internal weakness is that they don’t offer services beyond designing websites, which
poses both an opportunity and a threat. Other agencies which offer additional services
to attract customers to their client’s websites create a threat in stealing their clients. At
the same time, this creates an opportunity to expand their offerings to strengthen their
relationship further with their existing customers, generate new sources of income and
increase the lifetime value of their clients, and become more attractive to prospects. So,
they could continue to focus on their strengths, they partnered with us to provide white
label PPC management services to their clients.

Step two: Choose one or more strategies that match your SWAT results.
Keeping your strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats in mind, here are five
strategies for client acquisition:

1) Add more target verticals. In 2018, segmenting your audience is critical. One
way to separate yourself from the pack is to take your existing core offer and
tweak your messaging to target specific verticals. For example, if you target
lawyers, consider adding a new vertical that targets chiropractors or plumbers,
and so on. Creating a PPC strategy with target-specific language to attract these
new verticals can help you grow much more quickly.

2) Expand your offerings. By providing new services, you not only can increase
your earning potential with existing customers, but you have another way to draw new customers in. For example, let’s say you offer SEO services only. By
partnering with us as a white label service, you can offer PPC management as a
new service without risking losing potential prospects or existing customers to a
competitor.

Or if you already offer PPC management, look at going beyond AdWords and
provide advertising on other channels such as Facebook, Instagram, BingAds,
Pinterest, YouTube, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Oath. These can be tricky; however,
we have proven systems in place that will exceed your expectations.

3) Focus on your strengths while partnering with someone who specializes
and excels in your weak areas. Rather than spending energy on learning a new
specialty to expand your offerings, partner with a white label service to add
something new. This way you keep control and don’t risk messing up your
relationships with your existing clients. For instance, are you good at making
sales and customer care? Let us take care of the PPC side of your business for
you. Rated among the top 5% of Google Partners, our track record, high rating,
and over 20 years’ experience specializing in PPC will help you attract more
leads either through campaigns we create for you or by offering you another
attractive service to add to your company offerings, helping you land potential
new customers. And because we will take care of these PPC services including
AdWords, Facebook Advertising, etc., you’ll have more time to concentrate on
making sales.

4) Work on drawing more relevant traffic to your website. Using a Google
certified agency can help you attract more relevant clients. “Google Partners” are
designated by a blue or red badge. A BLUE badge designates that the minimum
requirements have been met to become a partner. An agency with a RED badge
indicates it is among the top 5%. (PPC for Small Biz has a RED badge.) While an
agency with a blue badge may be less expensive, it’s not unusual for a red
badge agency to decrease your acquisition costs by 60%.

5) Add an advertising strategy to your social media channels. You can run
extremely targeted ad campaigns for your business with social media ad
campaigns. In 2018, highly targeted campaigns will be critical to stand out,
making this even more essential to successful client acquisition. In addition to
selecting your audience based on age, gender, and location, you can get much
more targeted. For example, you can target users on Facebook based on their
interests and target Twitter users based on keywords and on LinkedIn you can
target users based on the industry they work in, their job title, and their job skills.
This more targeted approach helps you gain better, more qualified customers
which means you’ll stretch your advertising budget further.

Step three: Decide on a partner agency you feel will be most effective.

Reaching and converting new customers is important to your business and strategies
like the ones listed above can be what your company needs to grow your business in
2018.

In determining what agency to partner with, here are some things to consider:

1) Search for an agency that specializes in PPC in your category. (PPC for Small
Biz specializes in designing, implementing and managing PPC advertising
programs (AdWords, Facebook Ads, Bing Ads) for small business, Global 1000
companies, ad agencies, resellers and multi-location franchises.)

2) Ask for case studies so you can get a feel for their experience level.

3) Ask to see not just one-month results, but six or nine-month results to see if the
agency gets results for their clients over a longer period.

4) Speak to their clients. You’ll get a feel for how the company does business and
services their clients.

5) Find out how the agency communicates to ensure they are available when you
want to speak with them versus only speaking to you once a month on a pre-
booked appointment. Also, find out who you’ll be speaking with. (At PPC for
Small Biz, we won’t delegate your account to junior staff, SEO specialists, or
unqualified administrators like other agencies do.)

6) Before you sign anything, get 100% clear on what is expected. This includes your
campaign goal and timescales and who’s responsible for what.

7) Make sure you have an out clause if the objectives aren’t being met. There is no
need to be on the hook for 12 months, but to be fair to an agency, that period
should never be less than three months.

To get a Google certified agency, search for “Google Partner.” I recommend searching
for a RED Badge-designated provider (which signifies they are in the top 5%). Follow
these three steps will help you achieve your customer acquisition goals this year.