5 ways To advertising Your company And gain more certified Leads

Source No. 1 of Qualified Leads (and leading generation as a whole) for agencies is a referral.

The referrals are amazing. They convert at higher rates. They are backed by social evidence.

But relying on them sinks your business. Leaving your agency susceptible to ups and downs, unpredictable revenue, making hiring and increasing your team a nightmare.

Being dependent on referrals and expecting agency growth is an oxymoron.

Agencies are just as incredibly difficult to reach. Without a predictable funnel of qualified leads, it’s almost impossible.

In this post, I will share your agency ‘s unique ways of marketing (depending on how I marketed my own agency) so that you can stop relying on referrals and start adjusting.

1. Cold email marketing works (if you have that one thing ..)

The biggest misconception is that cold email marketing doesn’t work for service-based businesses.

“It doesn’t work if you’re selling high tickets.”

“Only SaaS companies can gain customers with cool emails.”

“No one buys from spam.”

You’ve probably heard a version of these statements before. And they just aren’t real.

My proof? We’ve done extensive business from cold emails with some of the world’s largest software companies and sent them directly to our link-building agency site.

Here is just one example of dozens of customers in the last 12 months I gained from a cold email:

This is the response of a senior content marketing director at a software company with 1001-5000 employees and nearly $ 1 billion in assets. That’s right, a billion.

A year later, they are still our client and are thrilled with the results we are providing to turn SEO into their engine of organic growth.

Cold email works if done correctly. The reason why most people say “cold email doesn’t work” is three times:

1. They don’t send enough emails.

Expecting 50 emails and gaining qualified leads should be expected, not an indicator of a failed channel.

50 target accounts? You need 5000.

Fight against: budgets, timelines, delivery / spam, competitors and more.

You should expect a low conversion rate. The beauty is that you only need a few interested people to maximize your return on investment.

Professional advice: research accounts using Semrush’s Market Explorer tool. You can analyze specific niches:

It quickly gives you key details such as the main players in the space, the Common Addressable Market (TAM), and much more to compile a list of target accounts:

2. Cold email does not shorten your sales cycle.

Cold emails are not a magic cure for a dried sales pipeline.

Email accounts and domains take 30 days to heat up. It takes a few days, if not weeks, to compile a ready-to-send targeted email list ready to send.

It then takes weeks to send all your initial emails. Possible months to send the entire sequence.

And that doesn’t count the lengths of your own sales cycles.

Email does not shorten your sales cycle. You’ll rarely send an email, take a call, and shut someone down right away.

Cold email is a long-term game, so they should be treated as such.

3. You don’t have a brand

Sending cold emails to a billion-dollar company requires one thing:

A brand that people trust. If you are completely new to the space, your cool emails will almost always fall off.

The first thing someone does when they receive your cold email? Look at you. Your name. Your company. Your social networks. Who are you, why are you emailing me and why should I trust you?

If not much comes along, you can expect convincing response rates.

And that brings us to the gist of the article: marketing your own marketing agency to make any potential generation activity 10x easier.

2. Build your personal brand

Although it sounds like “become a leader of thought,” building your personal brand is extremely important as an agency working to increase volume.

People want to work and connect with people. And they are much more likely to connect you with expertise if you build a personal brand first.

Unlike software companies, direct consumers (D2C) or consumer packaged goods (CPG), there is much less brand loyalty and loyalty in the agency space.

People love their favorite software. I understand. Clickup. Semrush.

But how many agencies can you remember by name where you don’t connect one founder or CEO right away?

Probably very little. There are a godless amount of agencies and almost none of them get immediate brand recognition like other industries.

In contrast, personal brands are one of the main reasons why good agencies bring new business: people want to work with someone they know is an expert in space, not an agency that only has cool graphics and logos and claims to be »# 1.”

Building a personal brand can attract millions of impressions per year, which would otherwise cost a fortune for advertising. And if you become recognizable for your work, this leads to many new businesses.

Platforms like Twitter, LinkedIn, and Tik Tok are ripe for brand building and virality. Their algorithms increase the reach of valuable, popular content.

And I’m not just talking about conversation. I walk after the walk. My Twitter the following is active and generates millions of impressions per week:

Posting on Twitter and sharing your SEO expertise has led to:

• Podcasts
• Speeches
• Partnerships
• Reference networks

And most importantly, as far as this topic of the article is concerned, a new business!

All you have to do is get started. Get a new Google Docs and start explaining information on a variety of topics and topics you know well.

Then find people in your space on Twitter, LinkedIn, etc. who are active. Network with people, comment on their posts, build your loyal followers.

Reminder: this is not a quick win. You will need months of constant posting to see any results. But when you make a single deal worth $ 100,000 +, you’ll be glad you did.

3. Do 1 podcast a week

One of the simplest but effective ways I have marketed my own agency is podcasting.

I don’t host my own, but I post popular, existing podcasts, for example:

Not only does watching the podcast expose you to the host audience, but it builds a real relationship with the host, thus exponentially expanding your referral network.

They now see you as an expert in the field, which means you’ll always be on top whenever someone you know is looking for the service you offer.

Define a list of the most popular podcasts in your niche. Be as relevant and specific as possible. And don’t limit yourself to the direct fit of a 1-1 niche.

These can actually be the worst when it comes to potential client generation, and is one of the biggest mistakes agency owners make.

If you offer PPC services, stop marketing directly to other PPCs. They are not your target audience. They are available for advice that they can use, not to make up for their work.

If you offer PPC services for healthcare companies, visit healthcare-related business podcasts.

Prepare 1 podcast a week for the next 6 months and it is almost guaranteed to gain potential customers.

I visit podcasts often, and my business development manager stated that “I heard you on the podcast” is one of the most common sources of potential customers.

1 podcast per week should last only 1-2 hours, including preparation time, depending on length and style.

And podcast hosts are always looking for new perspectives, guests, and ideas.

4. Obtain or build a Tripwire

Tripwires are smaller ticket offers that rotate in your target market without devaluing your agency’s position.

Things like $ 50 SEO audits greatly devalue your position as a top agency. Try to provide $ 10,000 holders after the offer to make this a tough battle, as you’ve devalued your time in exchange for extremely price-sensitive leads.

Meanwhile, a $ 1,000 course or a $ 100 a month software tool does just the opposite.

I will give you a real-life example: my business partner and I bought a software company for a low six-figure value. Wordable – a tool that exports Google Docs to your CMS in just a few clicks, with perfect formatting, clean HTML and saved settings.

This is directly in our niche: people who publish content on a large scale also need SEO experts outside the site to distribute that content and earn links. This is where my agency, uSERP, comes to the rescue.

Wordable works as a first step: SaaS worth $ 50,000 to $ 1,000 a month, bringing directly charged leads to our front door. We build real relationships. We offer flawless service.

And then at the right time we respond with a great attitude and fulfill them in our agency services.

This resulted in several contractual transactions that actually paid the full cost of the purchase.

If you can’t get the wires, build them.

Courses. Small tools. Guides. Video series. Everything you can imagine is valuable in your niche and leads to your service as the next step.

5. Run the least effective ads

CPC-based ads can be expensive.

For example: reaching senior decision makers on LinkedIn will cost you $ 6.40 per click.

LinkedIn requires a hefty budget to run on conversion-focused ads. Instead, I prefer something called minimum executable ads:

Show ads that you are:

1. Comfortable with a price where you never have to turn them off
2. Don’t worry that attribution and tracking are in vain
3. You are investing in the long-term awareness of your brand

The key is in # 1: your ads are so cheap that you don’t have to worry about their price or the time it takes to try to attribute your ads for brand awareness.

In plain English: Show cheap ads that you won’t turn off, even if you can never prove a one-dollar return on investment.

As you can see, this campaign has spent $ 393.32 in the last few months, receiving 50,000 impressions and 145 clicks in my target market (although the target is only impressions, not clicks).

My goal is not clicks, but that means $ 2.71 per click for VP marketing compared to LinkedIn’s global average of $ 6.40.

These are ads that I will run for years without worrying about their consumption, even if I can’t prove that not a single new potential customer came from them.

Final thoughts

Marketing your own agency is key to advancing through the ups and downs of referrals.

Acquiring a steady stream of qualified leads requires diversification and active marketing.

Take advantage of cold emails to connect with decision makers and start conversations with value.

Take time each week to create your personal brand and earn speeches, podcasts, and direct leads.

Do 1 podcast a week for 6 months. Show minimum-performing ads.

And if you can, build or buy connecting wires that can help you build a huge funnel of qualified leads.

Article Morality: Spend more time working on your business rather than your business.