Create a Consistent Process
Without a consistent process, tasks can easily fall through the cracks, time can go unaccounted for, and the quality of your work may suffer as well. One way to create more consistency is to figure out the exact steps in your process, from the beginning to the end, and then research apps and tools that can help make your process more efficient. For example, using standard templates or a time management app can help you save and keep track of time. Also, collaboration tools like Slack or project management tools like Basecamp, make sure everyone on the project is communicating and completing their tasks on schedule.
Become More Selective
As great as it is to sign on new clients, not every prospect who reaches out to your company is going to be a fit. If you say yes to every company who calls in looking for help, you’re either going to be working projects out of your scope or stretching your team too thin with work. Instead, create a profile of your ideal client, one that provides you with both revenue and profit. Don’t be afraid to tell the prospect they’re not a fit with your company if you think they’re going to cost you too much time and resources in the end. It’s better to be upfront with the prospect and possibly refer them to another agency than not be able to produce quality work for them.
Promote Selling
Project managers plan, budget, and oversee all aspects of specific projects. In addition to these duties, you should also have them proactively trying to grow their existing accounts. Since project managers work so closely with the client, they should be able to anticipate a client’s needs and come up with solutions to their problems. Whether this involves increasing the client’s budget or putting them on retainer, the project manager is an excellent position to negotiate these options with the client.
Market Your Company
When you’re spending every day working on solving problems for your clients, it can be difficult to see the problems within your own agency or to look at your agency and see the big picture. While it’s important to prioritize large clients over marketing your own agency, if this happens too often, then it will be impossible to see any growth. One way to make sure your company’s marketing efforts are consistent is to hire an outside agency or consultant to help. While it may seem counterintuitive to hire another company to do the marketing for your marketing agency, having fresh eyes and perspective might see things and come up with ideas that you hadn’t thought of.
Grow Your Team
As technology advances and the range of marketing increases, companies will be looking for a wide range of services from marketing agencies. From SEO and marketing automation, to web development and graphic design, marketing agencies are expected to have it all. While it can be difficult to hire a new web developer for a specific project just to let them go when the project is completed, there are other alternatives. Hiring marketers with specialized skills on a contract or temp-to-perm basis allows you to reduce churn and become much more flexible in your hiring decisions. With freelancers, you can hire them for a 3 month contract to complete a project and either terminate or renew their contract depending on what your client needs. If you’re not able to provide this technical talent, you might lose out on business to agencies who do provide it.
Follow these steps to help grow your marketing agency and get the right talent in place to help you take on more projects.
