How To Grow Your Inbound Marketing Agency

November 21, 2016

Four Main Areas of Inbound Marketing Agency

  1. Market

  2. Sell

  3. Deliver

  4. Grow

Define Your Agency’s Positioning

Why is positioning important?

You need to articulate the people and the markets you serve.

You are not “all things to all people.”

Heart surgeons make more money than general practitioners. Focus is crucial to your success.

Great agencies understand the motto “choose who to lose.”

It provides direction for you and your customers.

It creates a borderless market for your agency.

Positioning helps you create a clear target audience with a strong DIS-qualification process.

It also helps you create premium pricing.

It takes time and effort…but it necessary and will pay off.

How do you define your agency’s positioning?

Tim Williams has a lot of great advice in this area in his book, “Positioning for Professionals: How Professional Knowledge Firms Can Differentiate Their Way To Success.”

72% of customers are more likely to buy from you if they see you as an expert in your niche.

As you begin, get your team on board and supporting your vision for the agency.

Document your positioning strategy then pick a position. From that point onward, remain consistent in your marketing so it ties back and reinforces your positioning.

The 6 steps to define your positioning strategy

  1. Assess your current positioning

    1. What is your USP (Unique Selling Proposition)? 

    2. This is not a “mission statement” and goes beyond your

      1. Full-service capabilities

      2. Integrated approach

      3. Superior service

      4. Ability to produce results

      5. Devotion to big ideas

      6. Reputation &/or years in business

      7. Nimbleness and flexibility

      8. Promise to assign the best people

      9. Diversity of clients

      10. Fresh approach and thinking when it comes to problem solving 

    3. You must avoide the “sea of sameness“

    4. What do you stand for?

    5. What differentiates you?

    6. This requires time and attention to create.

  2. Define your agency’s purpose

    1. This is your “definitive statement about the difference you are trying to make in the world.” ~Roy J. Spencer, Jr.

    2. Why do you exist?

    3. Why do you go to work every day?

    4. Why do your employees continue to come to work?

    5. Why do your clients choose you?

    6. Making money is not a “why”.

    7. Purpose sets everyone on the same path.

    8. What would people miss if you closed your doors tomorrow?

    9. What problems do you solve?

    10. If you had an all-volunteer staff, what would they be volunteering for?

    11. Commit to your purpose once you find it.

  3. Identify your agency’s best client

    1. This helps you become an expert since you understand the attitudes, habits, values, needs, wants, behaviors, and motivations of your best clients.

    2. Specialize around a particular

      1. Industry

      2. Audience

    3. Questions to ask yourself:

      1. What type of clients have you been most successful with in the past?

      2. What do they all have in common?

      3. Which industries, business categories, or market segments do you know best and thrive in?

      4. What types of companies do you enjoy working with?

      5. What type of clients do you NOT enjoy working with?

  4. Identify your agency’s core competencies

    1. Becoming an expert in a discipline is another way to focus your agency.

    2. What do you do particularly well, better, or more efficiently than other agencies?

    3. Which of your capabilities and services provide the most value to your clients?

    4. If you could only provide one service, what would that be? What services would you give up to have that focus?

    5. What are the things that your clients can’t do on their own if they chose to invest internally?

  5. Define your agency’s culture

    1. This is your agency’s way of life

    2. It can be the key differentiator that positions you ahead of your competition

    3. What are the philosophies and methods you follow to service clients?

    4. Do you have a unique way of thinking or working processes?

    5. What is the one thing that you would never change about your agency?

    6. Will you say “no” to a prospect because of your values and culture? If so, what are some of the reasons that would cause you to say “no”?

    7. What does it take for someone to succeed at your agency?

    8. Create your Culture Code (it’s similar, yet different, than Culture Club)

  6. Create your positioning statement

    1. We do WHAT for WHOM by HOW becuase WHY.

    2. We (provide this service / value / outcome) for (this type of company / industry / market) by (using this kind of approach) because (why).

How positioning impacts your marketing

  • Strategy is nothing without execution

  • This must be applied to all of your major business practices

  • This is done in three key areas

    • Website

      • Is it clear?

      • Audit your site

      • Publish case studies so prospects know you can help their types of business and answers “How can you help me grow my business?”

      • Add testimonials, preferably video testimonials

    • Content Creation Strategy

      • Complete a content audit

      • Align them to the proper buyer journey stage and persona

      • Ensure future content aligns with your positioning

      • Turn general content offers into specific offers that will resonate with your ideal customers

      • Review your blog as it is a focal point of your content

    • Lead Qualification

      • When your content is relevant and your offers are relevant you will develop better leads

Packaging and Pricing Inbound Retainers

This is your ongoing services agreement with your clients to help them achieve their business growth goals.

Why are inbound retainers important?

It’s vital to your growth because it provides stability that project-based work does not.

They create consistent work for your agency and makes revenue forecasting simpler.

Retainers are the bricks in building your agency and help you say “no”.

Retainers help you have a clearly defined set of services you will provide and can help prevent scope creep. It keeps you from over-promising soemthing you can’t deliver.

While there can be exceptions to the rule, you won’t make those exceptions at the expense of delivering on your foundational services. You’re looking for not just the authority and the right to say “no” to your clients, you’re looking for the transparency and the trust with your client to say “that’s not a great idea now, and here’s why.”

Retainers also help you balance your own ROI for your workforce.

How do you package and price inbound retainers?

  1. Identify and package services

  2. Determine services, i.e., content creation baseline services could include

    1. Develop buyer personas

    2. Research keywords

    3. Blog

    4. Build lead conversion paths

    5. Social media posting

    6. Email marketing

  3. Divide services into three separate packages into something like…

    1. Build

      1. On-page SEO

      2. Buyer persona developmen

      3. Keyword research

      4. Blogging

    2. Grow

      1. Social media publishing to increase traffic

      2. Content offers

      3. Conversion path building

    3. Accelerate: all of the above plus…

      1. Social ads at the top of funnel

      2. Database management and segmentation for closing clients

      3. CRM implementation

  4. Set the retainer’s service offering schedule

    1. Determine which are regular, like weekly blogging, vs larger time blocks like content offer campaigns done quarterly, perhaps

    2. Start with your one-time services such as

      1. Buyer persona development and

      2. Keyword research

    3. Proceed to your ongoing quarterly-services such as

      1. Building conversion paths

      2. Content offers

      3. Launching campaigns

  5. Calculate cost to execute your services

    1. Determine time for each task to maximize ROI for both your own agency and for the client

    2. You don’t want to over-extend on services your agency can’t deliver

    3. You don’t want your client to pay for extraneous features

What does an inbound retainer look like?

What do you know about your prospective client?

Use lead intelligence gathered on the prospect to recognize their specific needs. See what questions and services have piqued their interests.

Ask the prospect:

  • What do you consider an ideal prospect or customer?

  • What is your average deal size?

  • What is the average sales cycle from the time a prospect is identified to the time they order?

  • How many times does your average customer order from you each year?

  • What is the lifetime value of a customer?

With this information you can recommend the proper tier to the prospect and include in your proposal:

  • Why your month one actions include the creation of:

    • A 12-month marketing plan

    • Buyer personas

    • Any website redesign plans

  • The shape of your potential marketing offers

  • Your editorial calendar

  • Your weekly consulting

  • The types of platform management, training, and support you’ll provide

Marketing Your Agency With HubSpot

Why is marketing your agency important?

 You must be a product of the product. Leverage inbound marketing to develop and grow your own leads.

This helps you become your own best case study for the services and software you offer.

You will have the opportunity to practice and perfect your skills and prove your expertise and become a thought leader in your space.

Finally, this will help you attract top talent when you are marketing your own agency.

 

How do you sell successfully?

  • Stop pitching and aim to help. The best salespeople help their prospects like they help their friends.

  • Differentiate and target. 

    • Differentiating is finding what sets your agency apart from the field.

    • Targeting is using that differentiation to pursue the right set of prospects.

    • Do you have a thought-out agency story that includes your differentiation?

    • Do you have a list of what makes a good fit client for your agency (and what does not)?

    • Do you have a well-defined targeting approach, whether by geography, specialty, vertical, or something else?

  • Emphasize the Inbound Methodology. To determine how well you do so, ask yourself these questions:

    • Have your conversations centered mainly around tactics such as SEO, social media marketing, email creation, etc…or results such as an increase in visitors, leads, and income?

    • Can you explain why your higher pricing is justified because you are paid for producing results vs. just executing tactics?

    • After going through the sales process, can your prospects articulate the value of converting strangers to visitors, visitors to leads, and leads to customers—and doing them together?

Identifying quality leads for your agency

Why is identifying leads important?

How do you identify quality leads?

  • Define your ideal buyer profile

    • Persona describes the type of person you’re targeting

    • Ideal buyer profile describes the type of company you’re targeting

  • Primary criteria of a good retainer prospect

    • Concept of a conversion on their website

    • Large enough to support a retainer (Usually $3 million+ in revenue)

    • Sells something that involves a considered purchase process (A bathroom remodeling company vs an emergency plumber

  • Secondary fit criteria include

    • Business model

    • Sales model

    • Average sales price

    • Etc

    • Reference the Prospect Fit Matrix

  • The goal is to find prospects worth pursuing vs. perfect prospects

What does identifying leads look like?

  • Start with yourself

  • Strategies for building a lead list

    • Look to existing relationships: The easiest and most effective way to grow

    • Target by vertical: a great way to differentiate

    • Target locally or geographically

    • Focus on target accounts

Connecting to Open the Inbound Conversation

Why is connecting important?

Getting into more quality conversations is the classic challenge of the salesperson.

A “connect call” is done to

  • Establish an initial relationship with the prospect

  • Understand if you might be able to help

  • Schedule a first meeting

A “connect call” is not

  • An elevator pitch

  • A chance to explain inbound to the prospect

  • An in-depth assessmetn of whether you can help 

How do you run a “connect call”?

  1. Open the call.

    1. The sooner you make the call to inbound leads the better.

    2. Target accounts can be tough because

      1. They may not know who you are

      2. Competitors are going after them, too

      3. Timing can be a real challenge

    3. The flow

      1. Intro

      2. Ask for permission

      3. State your purpose and let them know you’ve done your homework

      4. Open a dialogue

  2. Address resistance

  3. Gather business information

  4. Close the call

Exploring to Excite and Assess Fit

The exploratory call is arguably the most important component of the sales process. This is a chance for the prospect to pick up some marketing tips and talk through their growth goals. It’s also a chance for you to excite the prospect about your services while learning more about their goals and challenges.

How do you run the exploratory call?

  1. Begin the call with an agenda (Get “The Sales Agenda“)

  2. Review the company and organization

  3. Understand if you can help

    1. Excite

    2. Assess fit

  4. Cover why you and why inbound

    1. Be careful to not talk about yourself too much

    2. Use a power statement: it references your agency’s story, but does so concisely and incorporates the goals of your prospects

      1. Recap their pains and challenges

      2. Explain your offerings and the main benefit

      3. Share your differentiation

      4. Reference Mike Weinberg’s “New Sales Simplified” for more on the power statement

  5. Close the call

    1. Rather than offering to do a proposal, recommend a goal setting and planning call

    2. Summarize important findings

    3. Use a tie-down to ensure you’re in alignment such as “How did you feel this call went?”

    4. Test for budget

    5. Recommend the next best step

    6. Assign homework

      1. A survey or questionnaire

      2. Share their funnel metrics

      3. Share their Google Analytics information

    7. Send a summary / recap email

      1. Main takeaways

      2. The next steps

      3. A few relevant links to case studies, etc.

How to excite and assess fit with your prospects

To excite try the “give and get”. Give a helpful tip, then get feedback from the prospect. 

There’s no faster way to fail at sales than to spend time with bad fit prospects.

To assess, try the process IBM created years ago called B.A.N.T.

  • Budget

  • Authority

  • Need

  • Timing

When you can pair plans, goals, and challenges with an understanding of the prospect’s cost of inaction, you’re onto something.

Advising to Close the Sale

How do you run a goal setting and planning call?

  • Take what you’ve learned in the Exploratory Call and create a plan to help.

  • Begin the call

  • Translate goals to inbound targets

    • Be conservative on close rates

    • Use targets that make the most sense

    • Be careful with expectations

  • Develop a plan with the prospect

    • Start with the inbound target

    • Share how inbound can help

    • Offer data to illustrate a point

    • Make a recommendation

  • Close the call

    • “How are we doing, Ms. Prospect?”

    • If they lack trust or confidence, slow down or back up.

    • Process

      • Summarize

      • Recommend a next call

      • Talk price range

      • Check-in

      • Understand their needs and next steps

      • Set a time

How do you conduct an effective demo?

  • Focus on the prospect and if you can help.

  • Once that happens, it may be time to demo the software.

  • A demo can tie together your services, solutions, and the technology all in one call.

  • But a demo is not always required or needed.

  • Don’t jump into a demo too soon. You must complete the goal selling and planning call first. You need goals, challenges, and a plan defined first.

    • Remember that less is more

    • Present the demo in a simple and relevant way to convey value

    • Customize the demo based on the prospect

    • Highlight 3-4 tools in the software to prevent overwhelm

    • Set expectations for the demo call

How do you present and close?

  • It can feel tough to ask a prospect for their business but it should come naturally.

  • Make sure you are ready to ask for the business

    • Does the prospect have a solid BANT rating?

    • Do they really need help? 

    • Do they have meaningtul Goals, Plans, and Challenges?

    • Is there a cost of inaction?

    • If the answer is “Yes” to all of these questions, then it’s time to ask for the sale.

  • Steps to a final presentation

    • Open your presentation with the most compelling reason

    • Recap the prospect’s business goals and targets

    • Show the business impact of hitting the inbound targets

    • Present a plan and options

    • Confirm timing: Start with a backwards timeline

    • Recommend the right plan. Highlight a case study but if you do not have a great case study yet, ask yourself:

      • Why should the prospect hire you?

      • Do I have industry or other relevant experience?

      • Do you have a good track record in other efforts?

      • Have you demonstrated you simply care more about their success than anyone else?

    • Inspire confidence in your ability to deliver

  • Be prepared for objections

    • Listen, acknowledge, explore what you might have missed, then get things back on track

  • Remember next steps

    • Set a specific date and time for the next meeting

    • Set expectations that paperwork and signatures will be finalized then

    • Send a Statement of Work summarizing what has been discussed

    • Answer any questions

    • Conduct that meeting and finalize the paperwork

    • Welcome your new client

Fundamentals of Delivering Client Success

Open communication and transparency cannot be over-valued.

Happy clients are more likely to refer you.

Happy clients give you more work.

Onboarding New Clients

Have a kickoff call

Reporting ROI to Clients