Attract New Accounting Clients Using These Social Media Tips

Marketing an accounting firm on social media can help you attract new CPA clients organically, many of whom may not have had any intention of switching to a new accounting firm. When many consumers and businesses are looking to hire an accountant for the first time or exploring alternative options they turn to Google.

This doesn’t mean that search engine optimization is the only online marketing strategy that your business should focus on. If your accounting firm has a strong social media presence it will contribute to solid branding as well as attracting new clients that find your content interesting and insightful.

Some businesses assume that social media marketing will not work effectively for them because they associate it with viral videos and memes. It’s so much more than that from an opportunity standpoint. With so much participation across social media, your CPA firm is missing out on a lot of opportunities if you have a thin to nonexistent presence.

The key to a successful social media campaign for an accounting firm is the type of content created and how it’s presented. Hiring an accountant isn’t an impulse decision – it typically involves a lot of research and due diligence. Let’s jump into some tips to consider that can help your firm leverage its social media profiles to attract new CPA clients.

Create Content That Drives Prospective Accounting Clients to Your Firm’s Website

The type of engagement an accounting firm is going to generate on social media is drastically different than the engagement direct-to-consumer apparel or supplement brands receive, therefore the approach to push that user towards a conversion goal requires a more thorough approach.

If a social media account is promoting a product or service that is in the $40 to $60 range and it can be classified as an impulse purchase, that business can direct its social audience directly to the purchase – and convert at a significantly high rate.

Onboarding a new accounting client requires many more steps:

Initial discovery
Client due diligence
Client shopping between multiple firms and accountants
Advanced due diligence and qualifying questions
In-person meeting
Final decision

The content that you post across social media should be designed to drive interest and then push that individual to your firm’s website. It’s impossible to deliver the amount of information that is required to educate and nurture an accounting lead on social media.

No logical human is going to hire his or her next accountant based solely on a social media post. Share your blog posts on social with strong calls-to-action to attract clicks. You can also create video content that begins to answer commonly asked questions that direct the individual to an in-depth blog post that dives deep into the specific topic.

One social media platform that will perform better than any other option is the complete opposite for most businesses – LinkedIn. Restaurants, retail stores, online businesses, service businesses, etc., allocate zero percent of their social media effort towards LinkedIn.

While their customers are likely using LinkedIn, it’s not the correct ecosystem to engage in for their specific business. For an accounting firm, it’s the complete opposite. From business owners to professionals, the vast majority of active members have an accountant.

Since not every new accounting client takes control and initiates a new search on their own, it presents you with an opportunity to draw attention to yourself and your expertise, as well as your firm.

LinkedIn is a very community-driven social media platform. Insightful and helpful content is rewarded with likes, shares, and comments – all of which help push it up, exposing it to more organic views. Take a minute to look at the trending content on LinkedIn and you will notice a pattern.

The best performing content is always related to something trending, provides insight, but also has an open-ended question element that drives the discussion.

If cryptocurrency regulations were a trending news topic at the moment a long-form post on LinkedIn discussing crypto tax strategies would be well received. For the best results don’t link back to your website. Instead, make sure your firm’s contact details as well as your own is visible and public-facing on your LinkedIn profile.

If you share helpful information and someone is interested in learning more about what you do and your firm, they will seek that information out on their own. This is the highest quality accounting lead you can generate – organic and inbound.

When you receive an inquiry from an inbound lead that is coming to you on his or her own, and not via an ad they clicked on or any other piece of marketing material they have peak interest. These leads will close at the highest rate with the least amount of resistance.

Even though content posted on LinkedIn is technically promotional – it’s done to draw in new clients – it’s a non-invasive way to draw attention to your accounting firm. Anyone engaging with the post is doing so because they are genuinely interested, and not because a popup prevented them from leaving a website or it was placed in their Facebook social media feed without their consent.

An accounting firm’s social media marketing strategy needs to build trust quickly, and this will only happen if the prospective client feels comfortable with the CPA firm. Many businesses will post on social media using a business page that features the firm’s name and its logo as the profile picture.

This is not personal at all and feels very distant and there is an immediate disconnect between the potential accounting client and the firm’s social media profile. Include a picture of yourself with the post, and this is something that you can create your own even if you don’t want to hire a professional photographer.

Mobile phone cameras are very high quality these days and you can use free image editing programs like Canva to add text and your firm’s logo to pictures to make them even more custom. A simple strategy like this enables the prospect to see who is providing the information, and if they deem it to be interesting, they will reach out because they know there is a real person there to answer questions and provide the assistance they require.

Implement Paid Retargeting Campaigns to Convert More Accounting Clients

What happens to all of those website visitors that your LinkedIn effort drives? While some may reach out for more information while on the site and some might pick up the phone, the majority of traffic will leave, never to return.

That is unless you pull them back in, and that is what you can do through a retargeting campaign. By including tracking pixels on your website you can then target your previous visitors with highly targeted ads on all of the social media channels.

While an ad that says, “Need a New Accounting Firm?” on Facebook that is shown to a targeted by cold audience might not perform well, one that says, “Are You Ready to Come Back to Our Website and Learn How We Can Reduce Your Tax Liability?” that is shown to someone who was just on your website and familiar with your accounting firm is a different story.

Using this approach you can show ads according to the last page they visited, allowing you to deliver laser-focused messaging to give you the best opportunity to pull them back to your website and present them with an enticing offer to convert them into a CPA lead.

Final Thoughts

When you create content that is helpful and informative, while also combining that with a “face” and showing the individuals behind the firm is removes the typical barriers that many accounting firms face when marketing on social media.

The biggest mistake is sharing generic and boring content and expecting it to result in new client acquisition. Most people use social media as a way to escape and unplug – the last thing they want to engage with is boring accounting and finance content. By making it fun, yet still informative, you build that trust and command attention.

While not every follower is going to have an immediate need for a new accountant, your social media presence can help you convert them down the line so treat every follower like a possible future client. Your following can also turn into a lucrative referral source when you focus on providing value with a dash of creativity and fun thrown in.

If you have any questions about social media marketing for accounting firms and CPAs please contact us so we can answer them for you. Our accounting marketing team will also be more than happy to provide you with an audit of your current social media effort as well as any additional online marketing campaigns your firm is running.

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