Stop Using Your CPA Firm Marketing Budget to Interrupt Prospects

Get More Love from Search Engines with an Investment in Content Marketing

What’s that tippity-tippity-clack sound I hear? Ahhh!! It’s the sound of marketers crunching numbers on an Excel spreadsheet, trying to figure out how much money they can squeeze out of their partners for the 2014 marketing budget.

I understand. Been there. Done that. Not a lot of fun.

There’s a pretty big difference, however, on the types of strategies and tactics that today’s marketers need to budget for than what they were spending on five years ago or so. The hard truth is that your marketing budget needs to reflect that we’re now operating in an environment where your prospects (and clients) don’t want to be interrupted by your marketing.

Today, before they commit to talking to you, they’re online searching for information on how to solve a problem or issue. Our marketing efforts now need to be focused on getting found first, and trying to be the firm that delivers that information though a high search engine ranking. That search, and a click on to your website, is the catalyst for a inbound marketing process where prospects give us permission to market our services or products to them.

That’s the truth that inbound marketing is built upon, and at the very center of inbound marketing is content – using things like websites pages, blogs, whitepapers, eBooks, videos, seminars and so on to attract, convert, nurture and delight. (If you’re not familiar with content marketing, then check out our whitepaper “The Partner’s Guide to Content Marketing”  here, or read what we’ve had to say about it in this blog by clicking here)

So as more and more CPA and other professional services firms are moving into the marketing budget season, the questions of why should we invest and how much to invest in content marketing should be at the forefront of discussions.

Did You Know that Search Engines Love Fresh Content?

There are a lot of reasons why a strategic investment in content marketing makes sense, but I’d like to focus on one of them in particular: content has become one the fundamental ways that firms can achieve high search engine rankings. We know that a high search engine ranking is pretty important for driving eyeballs to our website, right?

Jim Yu, in a blog post titled, The Content Catalyst: How Content Drives Search & Social Synergy on the Search Engine Land blog, summarizes the importance of content as follows,

“As Google shifts its focus to quality and relevancy, content marketing adoption has soared. It is no coincidence that the increasing focus on content marketing closely follows the significant Google algorithmic changes aiming to give users a better search experience.

 … If you look further into the way the SERPs have changed recently, video, social, mobile and local rankings all require good creative and different types of content to fuel them. Technical SEO is important, but will only get you so far — your SEO efforts need the catalyst that is content marketing.”

But it’s not just any ol’ content that will get you love from search engines … they’re looking for high quality. Today, we need to worry less about Google's ranking algorithms and to pay more attention to  delivering the best possible experience for the visitor to your website by creating content that serves purposes ranging from showcasing your thought leadership to generating leads.

How Much Should Your Firm Invest in Content Marketing?

Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but there’s a number of costs associated with content marketing, from content acquisition (i.e. paying for writers), to having the right technology in place to have a platform and infrastructure for content publication (i.e., HubSpot), to resources ranging from newsletters (i.e.,  BizActions), email platforms, and social media mavens necessary for promoting your content.

I can’t give you a specific answer on what your firm should be spending, but I can give you some very preliminary data from our 2013 Survey of CPA Firm Best Lead Generation Practices that shows almost a third of firms have no budget for content marketing!!!

Hmmm…  that should be pretty good news for those of you sitting on the other side of the fence who have made a decision – and a budget commitment – to content marketing. My advice: carpe diem!

PS – Our survey is open until September 30^th. Click on the image to become a respondent and we’ll send you a full copy of the results. Not a bad deal for about five minutes (or less) of your time!