Marketing – if you’re doing everything you can but you’re not getting the results you hoped for, it’s time to review what you’re doing. Poor marketing typically stems from one or more of the following assumptions, so we’ve given you some tips on how to improve matters:

1. “Our team is up to speed with the different services you offer and regularly discuss these with your clients, prospective clients or business introducers”.

Find out how often they actually have conversations with clients and others about your services. If they say they are doing this regularly, do they make a note of conversations they’ve had and can they link this to additional fees? If they’re not having these conversations find out why and how this can be overcome.

2. “We tried advertising, it didn’t work”.

Step back from the adverts you have placed. Were you advertising in the right publication to get in front of your target audience? Was the design of advert and the message used appropriate to engage their interest? Was there a strong call to action, i.e. Contact us:  for a free IHT review; to show you how to use Xero; to guide you through the making tax digital process, etc.?

3. “All our clients know what we do – we send them newsletters and emails and use social media etc”.

Do they actually read them? If you’re sending out emails, are you using email software such as MailChimp which lets you see who’s opened the newsletters and what articles they have clicked on? Are your clients actively engaging with you on social media? How often to do you remind them about specific services which they could benefit from? Don’t rely on telling your clients something once and assume they’ll remember what you’ve said, you have to keep reminding them.

4. “We’re proactive in asking for referrals”.

You may be, but is everyone else in the practice as good as you? Again, ask them how often they are doing this and ideally get people to track conversations they’ve had, so you can see where the enquiries and new sales are generated from.

5. “We sent a mailing to target prospects but got nothing back”.

What was the purpose of the mailing and the message you used? Did you offer something such as a free consultation or something that would appeal to them? Did you follow up with a phone call?

The bottom line is, if you’re marketing isn’t working it’s usually because you aren’t doing enough to remind people of who you are and what you do, or you need to do what you’re currently doing, only better.

Take a long hard look at what you do – what changes can you make to give them more impact?