This Year’s Top 100 Firms Expressed Serious Interest in Marketing

This Year’s Top 100 Firms Expressed Serious Interest in Marketing

Well, it finall

y came in today’s e-mail, and like Navin Johnson’s excitement about getting a new edition of the phone book, (Steve Martin in The Jerk), I’m excited to see that the new Top 100 List is here! The new Top 100 List is here!

Accounting Today recently released the list of 2013 Top 100 Accounting Firms, and many a Managing Partner (or at least 100 of them), furiously clicked away to see if they lost or gained in rankings, where their competitors’ ranked, and whether or not they got special mention above and beyond their ranking.

Congratulations to all of you that made the list, and to those of you that made the “Firms to Watch” list, here’s to more revenue growth this year so you can get that coveted Top 100 ranking this time next year.

What Managing Partners are Saying About Marketing

I was really happy to see that marketing took a very prominent role in the strategic thinking of the Top 100 firms. Here’s what 3 Managing Partners, representing about $150 in combined billings, had to say about marketing.

Andy Armanino, CEO and Managing Partner of Arminino: “We are planning to dedicate significant additional resources to marketing. It’s interesting because accountants take a while to accept the concept of marketing and business development, whereas consultants embrace these things quite naturally. Now, however, our accounting leadership has seen the power of marketing…..”

Jeffrey Capron, Managing Member, AronsonLLC: “In 2013 we will put a renewed focus on marketing and business development, particularly as it relates to search engine optimization, social media, and an improved proposal process.”

Lou Grassi, CEO and Managing Partner, Grassi & Co: “We are making a concerted effort to build our brand awareness…. Building our brand is essential to help drive profitable brand growth.”

Keeping Up With the Joneses

So, let’s read between the lines: Top 100 Firms are going to be investing more money than ever before into marketing. But, that doesn’t spell doom and gloom for smaller firms.

You’ve historically been outspent by your completion, and let’s be frank, in most markets; they’ve done a very credible job at building their brand by spending on brand building activities while you’ve spent next to nothing.  Now more than ever before, you’ve got to make your marketing dollars stretch even further and generate more results.

Spending money on trying to build your brand in traditional ways may be a luxury whose time has come and passed for your firm.

Instead, you’ve got to outthink, not outspend, you competition.

Think Niche

One way to out think the competition is with a niche marketing strategy. Essentially, it may be time to marshal your strategic and financial resources and concentrate on a niche market, rather than be a generalist. In one of my posts last year, “How CPA and Consulting Firm Niche Marketing Programs Get Found & Heard”, I wrote:

“…. it’s relatively easier to generate leads and build the top line by focusing on narrow markets, and building your brand and authority in those markets. But it takes a lot more work than just pounding a stake in the ground and declaring your intentions to serve a particular niche. It takes marketing, and an important part of that effort is how you use your website, social media, and thought leadership to become the “go to” accounting or consulting firm for a particular industry, or for a particular horizontal service.”

For more on niche marketing for your accounting, consulting or law firm, download our whitepaper, The Partner’s Guide to Niche Marketing, here.

Commit a Significant Part of Your Budget to Online and Inbound Marketing

Another way to out think and not outspend your competition is through inbound marketing for your accounting firm. This is a marketing approach that works for Top 100 firms as well as for smaller CPA firms. 

Inbound marketing is built upon the fact that prospects look for solutions to their issues by doing online search, and then contacting those firms that appear to offer the best solutions. That means that your website becomes the hub of your marketing program, and a place where you need to devote smart marketing budget dollars.

Inbound marketing requires a very different approach than traditional marketing, particularly in terms of the need for content, and the placement of various types of offers on the website (and promoted through social media and email) for lead generation. A word of caution though – just because digital marketing’s direct costs are low, there’s still a cost in terms of the human resources need for its execution and maintenance.

You can read and learn more about inbound marketing in The 2013 Partners Guide to Inbound Marketing that you can download here.

Pick Battles Big Enough to Matter, Small Enough to Win

This quote from Jonathon Kozel really sums up what this post is all about. Yes, firms in your market, especially the larger ones, will be putting more marketing dollars on the table. Yes, you will need to put more money into your marketing budget – if for nothing else than to defend your current market position and share. Yes, you will need to spend smarter and out think your competition.

The strategies, tools and tactics of inbound marketing may just be what you need to win those battles.