15 Unique Ways Agencies Are Landing Clients in 2023
Traffic turns into leads and leads turn into clients and at the end of the day, your agency needs to reach the right people at the right time to thrive.
With agencies being a dime a dozen, there is a lot of competition. Worried about your agency staying competitive? With the 15 strategies for agencies to land more clients that I’m about to dive into, trust me, your agency will come out as the shiny place brands want to go to in order to power their own digital footprints.
Yay For Lead Magnets
Lead magnets are the number one way I grow agencies. You can read in-depth information about lead magnets here.
Create something valuable enough that your target audience will be willing to share their email address to access it. Use your lead magnet as your hub for all your promotion efforts.
Once a lead is generated from your lead magnet, be sure to nurture them with a strategic email sequence.
Go After Brand New Businesses
New businesses need marketing and PR and are likely on the hunt for an agency to help them grow. Don’t you want them to choose your agency?
One way to access new businesses with funding (because you want them to have funding to afford your services) is to purchase a monthly list of new businesses with funding. I use Get Prospects as it’s super affordable.
Gather and Promote Social Proof
Your potential clients care about how brands like them had success by partnering with your agency. This third-party endorsement is called social proof.
Identify your happiest clients and ask them for testimonials, leave you reviews, participate in case studies, and nudge them to post on social media about your agency.
Gather this social proof and feature it on your website, on your social media channels, in your email marketing, and more.
Join Freelance Networks
I have personally had a lot of success landing clients on UpWork. Often, brands post about a service they need that your agency can accomplish.
Set up an account, buy credits (they’re cheap), and craft pitches for the brands that post that they need the services you provide.
I like UpWork because it shows the brand’s budget so if you bid on a gig, you don’t have to reduce your fees drastically.
Referral Campaigns
There is nothing better than word-of-mouth marketing. Sometimes it just takes a simple ask and a little incentive to get your happy clients to refer new business to your agency.
Start by identifying your happiest clients and segment them in your marketing automation platform. Create a campaign by emailing them and telling them for each referral they send your way, they’ll get a $25 gift card. For each referral that turns into a client for your agency, they’ll get a $100 gift card. Feel free to drip a few emails for more success with this tactic.
Thought Leadership Strategies
Being a thought leader is the best way to build credibility for your agency. Define the strongest niches your agency falls under, find a unique way to say the strategies you believe in the most and get your voice out there. Here are a few strategies to do just that:
Blog about marketing and PR on your company blog
Publish guest posts on high-profile publications
Have an active social media presence
Start a newsletter full of insights
Speak at conferences
Host webinars
Offering Something For Free
As you know, brands don’t immediately want to come on board to your agency so finding ways to just start the conversation is so important. This can be accomplished by offering something for free.
This usually looks like a free consultation, a free social media audit, free SEO advice, free brainstorming sessions, etc.
Let Awards Speak For You
One of the first things brands look at when choosing an agency is their awards. Being an award-winning agency isn’t as hard as you may think.
Here is a list of awards you can consider. You’ll nominate yourself and share work that you are most proud of and it will be judged and hopefully earns an award. I will tell you that a lot of them charge a fee to be considered but it’s worth it.
When you earn awards, be sure to put the badge on your website and run a campaign announcing that you are an award-winning agency.
Treat Your Agency Like You Treat Your Clients
You do amazing work for your clients so do the same for your agency. Treating your agency like one of your clients ensures that you are getting a steady stream of leads.
Implement email marketing, social media marketing, thought leadership, lead magnets, ads, and more.
Go Local
Your agency may work with clients on a national level but you should consider also focusing locally. Brands often like accessibility to their agency and face time is always a bonus.
Join local communities, network and promote your agency on a localized level.
Hit Some Directories
There are a ton of directories to get your agency listed in and you can check out the ultimate list of agency directories here.
Once your agency is listed in a directory, in order for it to generate more business, clients need to leave reviews and write about their experience with your agency. You can incentivize them to do so with a $10 gift card for each directory they leave a review for you in.
Polish Your Portfolio
Since the agency world is so competitive, you need to demonstrate your biggest successes to get the attention of the brands you want to work with.
Keep your portfolio up to date with the work you’re most proud of and include case studies and testimonials.
Put your portfolio items on your website so that potential clients can easily access examples of your work. You should also use your portfolio when you’re doing initial talks with brands.
Leverage LinkedIn Strategically
LinkedIn is a gold mine for landing new business. Here are a few ways you can leverage it strategically:
Join LinkedIn groups that have to do with marketing and PR for your agency’s niche
Post all of your thought leadership content
Have an active page for your agency and an active profile for your personal brand
Connect with decision-makers at brands you want to work with
Leverage InMail
Publish articles on the platform
Partner With Influential People
You already know who the thought leaders are in the niche your agency falls in. Engage with them on social media to warm them up and ask them if they can write a blog post or social media post about your agency.
Assets with lead capture forms are the best items to equip your influential partners with.
Host Virtual Events
Whether it’s a webinar or an all-day conference, hosting virtual events generates leads and provides thought leadership.
Choose a topic or series of topics that resonate with your target audience so that when they sign up for your event, they’re self-identifying as a qualified lead.
Be sure to create a strong landing page and promote your virtual event heavily to maximize leads generated.
Wrapping It Up
As you can see, there are so many innovative ways to land more business for your agency.
If you’re like a lot of agencies, you spend a ton of time doing amazing work for your clients and promoting your agency sometimes becomes an afterthought. That exact scenario is why The Campfire Circle was born and we can help you land more business by implementing all the strategies listed above and you can contact us for a free consultation here.
If you have the bandwidth to implement some of these strategies in-house, that’s great! My recommendation is that you start with 2 of your favorite strategies in this post and gradually experiment with other strategies so you can learn what resonates with your target audience.
Have you used any of these strategies to land clients for your agency? I’d love to read your insights in the comments below!
