As a consultant, you need clients; it’s just a reality. However, it’s not quite clear how to acquire them. The answer varies from person to person, but in this digital era, I can confidently say that you need to leverage digital marketing strategies for your consulting firm.
The next question that might arise in your mind is, which one?
Should you start a blog? Should you leverage SEO or go to business mixers? Start sending out emails or join the podcasts?
These marketing strategies for consultants actually have merit, but finding out which one works best for your specific consultancy can be difficult.
This is where this list comes in.
We’ve put together 8 ways so you can market your consulting business.
This guide will give you a better understanding of the world of digital marketing, regardless of whether you are just getting started or have something established already.
Helping you figure out what aligns perfectly with your goals and target audience while developing a strategy that does so.
On this page
Niche down before you start marketing:
No doubt, it’s important to think of the best marketing strategy, but we can’t forget one tool that’s just as important. It’s like sharpening the saw.
Choose a perfect niche for your consulting firm.
It may seem counterintuitive, but let me explain my point. The broader your offering of help, the larger your target audience. However, this also means having more competitors compared to being very specific.
Secondly, according to a study by Edelman, 73% of B2B buyers prefer working with specialists. Therefore, when you narrow down, you have more room to excel and prove yourself to be the best specialist in your field.
Let me give an example using consulting careers.
Let’s say you’re a management consultant and specialize in managing strategy for businesses.
This is good and all, but you’ll be competing with every other management consultant that comes up on Google’s first page.
What would happen if your area of expertise was “management consultant for business-to-business (B2B) companies” instead? That would definitely restrict who you could assist, wouldn’t it? Well, yes and no.
Yes, since consultants who exclusively work with B2B companies are now your competitors. And no, because the number of competitors just dropped dramatically.
But you can always get more specific.
I worked with a company that only focused on branding information technology. That’s already a very specialized area, but it gets better. If someone does a search for an “information technology consultant” and this agency comes up, they’ll know right away that this is the type of person they’ve been looking for.
Fair warning, though; some people do recommend not doing this. For example, Greg Faxon makes a compelling argument that you shouldn’t choose one but instead grow into one.
Ultimately, it all comes down to knowing what you’re about and who your target audience is.
Place Google and social media ads:
Online ads on search engines like Google and social media platforms such as LinkedIn, X, and Reddit have a slight advantage compared to other digital marketing strategies for consultants: they are highly targeted, measurable, and yield instant results.
With things like blog posting, using social media, and attending in-person events, you can reach a lot of people, but you will always have a little bit of doubt about who exactly you are targeting.
Ads take that worry away.
You have multiple options to target your audience with demographics, interests, financial conditions, and terms they search.
It brings you right to the audiences that are pursuing your type of service, or those who might need it but aren’t aware yet.
If you focus on search engines like Google, Yahoo, and Bing, you are already targeting the search terms, ensuring that your business appears to the right audience with 100% certainty.
Even if they don’t click and visit your website, it helps you in brand awareness.
Research conducted by Google/Ipsos MediaCT states that Google Search Ads can increase brand awareness by up to 80%, even when people don’t click on your website; they simply remember your brand name.
If this inspired you, you have a lot of different ways to target specific groups of people on Google and other search engines. You can target worthwhile clients from potential companies, those that live in your city or state, or any number of different criteria for targeting.
Search engines guide you on how to do it and target your potential customers. But, ideally, you should not do it yourself, experts know how to save your money with the best practices.
Acquire leads through organic search traffic:
The next big digital marketing strategy to leverage for your consulting firm is search engine optimization (SEO).
In SEO, you can improve the search ranking of your website on Google and other search engines by optimizing it. In return, you get free traffic from search engines.
In this digital marketing strategy, you also have control to target the best audience to optimize your conversion rate (called CRO). I mean, you won’t target businesses that are less likely to convert, but you will optimize your website more for those with a huge potential for conversion.
It totally depends on the SEO expert optimizing your website.
For instance, if your SEO team doesn’t have the right content marketing strategy but keeps adding more and more articles to acquire more and more traffic, your conversions will be pretty low, but your SEO will be expensive.
So, it’s not something you can do yourself unless you have a strong grip on keyword research, technical SEO, on-page SEO, and off-page SEO.
SEO also has many additional benefits. It improves various aspects of your website, focusing on UI, design, speed, and many other factors that collectively contribute to a superior user experience.
Taking it one step further is local SEO with location targeting. If you want to draw in customers, you must be aware of their whereabouts and establish a strong online presence. For instance, you ought to concentrate on locals if you run a management consulting firm in Miami, Florida.
The main goal here is to optimize the website and Google Business Profile for the specific location. If done correctly, the business will be more likely to attract locals. When that happens, there’s an increased chance they’ll find the services they need at that location rather than somewhere else.
If you want to concentrate on other essential aspects such as ensuring client satisfaction, efficient delivery, and personal growth, it’s much better to outsource your digital marketing. We provide SEO services that encompass everything needed to generate leads and enhance your brand.
Reach out to prospects, leads, and clients through emails:
Different kinds of communication are needed for leads, clients, and prospects. This is especially true for consulting firms that need to nurture leads and keep potential clients thinking about them. A way to accomplish this is through a targeted email list.
Creating this list consists of finding industry professionals and potential clients to periodically reach out to.
Doing this can help drive leads and effectively communicate with their audience. For best results, it’s important to keep track of how effective these emails are.
It’s a time-consuming process and you can hire any freelancer on platforms like Upwork, or Freelancer to do it for you.
Content marketing strategy:
In SEO, we integrate content marketing into our approach, but if you are working on your own, you might not know its significance, that’s why I thought to make a separate marketing strategy for your consulting agency.
In content marketing, you produce highly relevant, engaging, and goal-oriented content for your potential clients.
With content marketing, you can target the right audience on various platforms. These platforms may include social media, platforms like Medium, forums relevant to your industry, and ideally, your own website.
You might already know about content marketing on social media, you must be following some experts and read them often. It’s because they create content for you.
But when it comes to writing on your website, it’s called blogging.
In blogging, you create purposeful content. You optimize it for search engines to rank your articles on Google’s first page, ideally within the top 3 results of SERPs.
This way, you attract traffic interested in reading the article where you address potential client problems, and subsequently, you can offer them your services or encourage them to subscribe to your list.
If you don’t understand that here is a simple way to do the right blogging for your consulting business website:
- Your potential client has a problem, so they type it into Google for a solution
- Your blog article appears as one of the results (as it was helpful to solve that problem)
- They end up reading your post and are satisfied with the information given
- Eventually, they sign up for your email list and even hire you
Make sure the questions that get answered cover topics that people typically search for in your industry. Also, make sure that the content is:
- Engaging
- Easy to read
- Search engine friendly
- Helpful
Winning a content strategy means you can put your brand and expertise in front of a stream of people who are perfect prospects for your services. This also gives you the opportunity to share something useful in e-mails and on social media.
Here is a misconception about content marketing. The majority of people believe that content marketing is all about making sales.
It’s not.
In fact, according to the Content Marketing Institute, 87% of B2B companies consider their audience’s desire for information over their urge to sell products or build promotional messages.
So, make sure to be helpful to your audience and it will pay off.
Build a presence on Social media:
Building a presence on social media is a difficult undertaking. But it’s very valuable for consultants, as it gives them access to a large number of potential clients.
Using social media effectively involves a few steps. You would need to start by building a following by posting newsworthy content and interacting with people who could use your expertise or recommend you.
It all entails hard work but some are able to establish thousands of followers within days, while others take years to develop their audience.
Nevertheless, success will depend on the industry you’re in, the people you already know, and the quality of your posts.
The pro tip is that your potential customers aren’t going to follow if they don’t see value in what you post tutorials, tips, behind-the-scenes looks, and algorithm updates—they want content that is helpful to them.
If you only focus on promoting yourself, you probably won’t see much engagement.
Also, pay attention to trends on all of the platforms.
For example, on LinkedIn, it’s videos where people speak to a camera about their industry and expertise. And with Instagram, it’s the stories. These are things that will help reach more people if taken advantage of.
Create videos:
You need to make more videos. Studies show that 86% of marketing professionals already use video as a tool. And 78% say it helps them increase sales, while the other 86% say it drives traffic through the roof.
Videos have some additional benefits, they’re more engaging, and personable and rank higher on social media. Plus, you can upload them to YouTube and repurpose them as podcast episodes for extra longevity.
It all depends on how you strategize your video marketing strategy.
Get yourself a professional website to build trust:
Consulting firms can’t survive without a good website. It’s a key part of credibility and brand positioning. Plus, it’ll attract clients to you rather than the other way around.
It doesn’t cost much to get yourself a business website. It can be somewhere between $600 to $1200 depending on your requirements.
But the benefits are endless.
Podcasting:
Smart consulting firms are increasingly using podcasting to establish a relationship with their target market and integrate it into their overall marketing plan.
To begin with, podcasts give a chance to consulting companies to exhibit their knowledge and become thought leaders in their zone.
They can build credibility by providing valuable insights, knowledge, and advice to audiences. On the other hand, they can strengthen their own reputation and brand recognition, which leads to more customers and new linkages with other organizations.
Thus, if someone keeps on regularly posting valuable content through their podcasts, it is likely they will create a community of loyal listeners who will be interested in it. This would result in more leads, conversions, and eventually revenue for the company.
Being guests on other people’s podcasts is a way for consultants to position themselves as authorities in their industry. Besides, they may also want to share what they know with more people, leading to increased leads from potential clients who may want their services.
However, when consultants interview industry experts, there is always an advantage because they might get access to such experts’ networks that can help them use social media platforms for advertising purposes.
Webinars/virtual events:
Meeting potential customers in person is priceless. You can really show your human side and respond to their questions right away. In addition, it is a wonderful marketing strategy if you offer something that they like.
One way consultants can make this happen is through live events where the kinds of people they want to work with come together.
Some consultants hold webinars so that participants can be from anywhere in the country or all over the world, while others host meetups where they live.
This can be done by bringing people together to share useful information, demonstrate their expertise, and establish relationships with potential clients.
Don’t know what topic your event should be centered on? Maybe it could focus on your field of specialization?
For instance, if you are an information technology consultant, organize a meetup for individuals desiring to find out more about fresh trends in technology.
You could present something (or ask someone else) that will prove how much information you have before opening the floor for questions, which will help people see what value such a presentation could add to their organizations’ operations.
Webinars are similar; simply get a group of people who are likely to have the same type of inquiries or interests, give out some knowledge and let them talk at the end.
As soon as you start your event, it is not possible to have a lot of people attend it. That’s fine. It will gain traction and more people will share it after they begin seeing the value in it.
Influencer marketing:
Influencer marketing is a must for consulting firms nowadays. When you collaborate with influencers, it creates online buzz about your firm. It can also offer reputational reinforcement for your business, enhance audience participation, and increase the conversion rate.
It is so clear that influencer marketing is among the best tools for customer acquisition. This helps you generate more leads for your business and eventually earn higher revenue. Indeed, influencer marketing’s ROI can be as high as 650%.
Simply getting numerous comments and likes on your social media platform posts is hard enough! Without good engagement levels, it won’t matter if you have millions of followers. Influencer marketing comes at this point.
Firstly, partnering with influencers in making content helps improve its standard and makes it more user-friendly. You should note that such content has a higher chance of appealing to your target audience.
Secondly, sharing content by an influencer on their social media profiles will make their audience react as well. They may like the content, tag the photo with friends or even share it on their own profile pages, thereby opening it up further.
It’s like having a friend recommend something to you. People follow and trust the thoughts of influencers who are their acquaintances. This way, companies reach a larger audience, establish credibility, and increase sales.
It is high time that the importance of influencer marketing be recognized by marketers and business owners and should be used to their advantage.
Customer Reviews and portfolio:
For a company to prosper, customer feedback is key. To decide which consulting firm to hire, people will always look at the customer review, which acts as a necessary tool for those willing to consider other customers’ previous experiences in order to make an affirmative decision.
Positive reviews and testimonials serve as endorsements because they indicate that your company has helped others. This only goes to show how reliable and trustworthy your service is.
In this digital era, many people rely on customer reviews and testimonials before they can buy something.
It was reported by Statista that almost 70% of the buyers read no less than six reviews before purchasing anything.
As a result, customer reviews are valuable assets for your business since people trust internet reviews from strangers more than their friends or relatives’ opinions.
Encourage clients to share their experiences with your company so that you can benefit from customer reviews and testimonials.
Another good idea is to display these reviews on the homepage of your website and other online platforms.
This way, potential customers can easily see them and get a feel for the value they will get.
Video testimonials are very effective because they allow prospective customers to hear directly from satisfied customers. It gives it a human feel and makes the testimonials more authentic.
Remember to engage with your clients by replying to their feedback. Thank them for taking time out of their busy lives for this great favor and addressing any issues or questions that they might have asked about.
It only shows that you cherish their views and are dedicated to offering quality services.
Conclusion:
In a nutshell, effective client acquisition for consulting firms in the digital era requires targeted advertising, SEO optimization, personalized email campaigns, engaging content marketing, a strong social media presence, impactful video content, and a professional website.
By navigating these strategies, consultants can not only attract potential clients but also establish credibility, trust, and long-term success in the competitive digital landscape.