who is your customer?

woman yawing on sofayou can’t create content until you determine your audience.

by becky livingston
the accountant’s social media handbook

there are a lot of moving parts to a content strategy, but when you’re working alone or with a small staff, it’s hard to keep the roles and responsibilities clear as to who is doing what.

more on social media: how to craft a social media profile | which social media should you use? | determine your target audience | what is social media? | how social media works with accountants’ top 5 marketing goals

i recommend creating a content calendar to help keep the machine running and moving like a well-oiled machine. here is a short list of reasons why most brands develop a content marketing strategy, to:
read more →

how to schedule and manage social media activity

illustration, how to leverage contentwrite it once, use it again… and again, and again…

by becky livingston
the accountant’s social media handbook

creating a daily posting schedule is not only smart, but for some industries such as the legal, accounting and medical fields required.

more on social media: determine your target audience | what is social media? | how social media works with accountants’ top 5 marketing goals

it’s important to keep a schedule so you can monitor activity, determine the post’s effectiveness and align website increases with marketing efforts via social media. lastly, keeping a schedule also helps prevent you from posting the same content too close together.
read more →

how to track who’s clicking your links

example of google's url builder formget the most out of those urls.

by becky livingston
the accountant’s social media handbook

you may want to track urls by posting location.

more on social media: determine your target audience | what is social media? | how social media works with accountants’ top 5 marketing goals

for example, you have a tax blog story you want to share on facebook, linkedin and googleplus, but you want to know which platform generates more traffic to the website. you would need to add a url tracking token to the urls that identified the referral source – often called url builders.

tools like burlybuilder.com, google’s url builder, e-nor.com and piwik.org create long urls with tracking code in them. in this example, google’s url builder was used.

activity

complete the fields as described. the campaign medium is the place you are sharing the content, such as facebook, linkedin or twitter, etc. campaign term and name may be the same, and should include a keyword about the content, such as “tax-tips.”

now that you have a really long url, you will need to shorten it for use in the social media platforms, especially twitter, or it will look awkward to have a 250-character link floating behind the content post.

to shorten a url, consider using tools like hootsuite, bitly, google’s url shortener, bit.do and tinyurl.com. by shortening longer links with these tools, you can create a record for the url that may be tracked through your preferred scheduling tool.

what to say on social media

young businesswoman using a tablet outdoorslet your audience tell you what they want.

by becky livingston
the accountant’s social media handbook

providing valuable content and engaging in the conversation are the most basic social media tasks. if you are unwilling to do that, or cannot provide it, then either

  • work with a consultant to do it or
  • wait until you can provide these elements yourself to clients.

more on social media: what is social media? | how social media works with accountants’ top 5 marketing goals

be sure to look past just the big platforms, such as facebook, twitter and linkedin. do your homework to know the platforms of choice. also consider the search engine optimization, or seo, impact for your content and social posts. keywords  terms that drive search results are important to factor in and associate with content and social posts.
read more →

how to craft a social media profile

hanging sign that reads "your culture is your brand"“social” includes “likable” and “interactive.” bonus: advice on images.

by becky livingston
the accountant’s social media handbook

after you’ve

  • defined the social media platform you plan to use,
  • determined the goals for the business and how social media plays its part in those goals, and
  • begun thinking about your brand and how you can begin to define its personal value proposition or the value-add it provides to your target audience,

more on social media: what is social media? | how social media works with accountants’ top 5 marketing goals

it’s time to begin developing the firm page for your profile. you’ll begin defining your brand’s company page description, plus images you can use to supplement your social media presence.
read more →

which social media should you use?

social media words on cubesdon’t pick a platform at random. make an informed choice.

by becky livingston
the accountant’s social media handbook

according to quicksprout research, 75 percent of people are somewhat likely to share content they like online with friends, co-workers and/or family members. forty-nine percent do it at least weekly.

more on social media: what is social media? | how social media works with accountants’ top 5 marketing goals

in the same study, 86 percent of marketers stated that social media is important for their business, while 89 percent stated that increased exposure was the number one benefit of social media marketing.
read more →

determine your target audience

hand circling one of multiple outlines of different person typesyour ideal client directs what platform you use.

by becky livingston
the accountant’s social media handbook

choosing your social media platform based solely on trends will get you to spend more time and money than you may need. it’s important to know where your target audience is and who they are before jumping into any social media efforts.

more on social media: what is social media? | how social media works with accountants’ top 5 marketing goals

any good social media or marketing person will ask you who your target audience is before doing any work for you. if he/she does not, that’s a red flag.
read more →

are you flunking social media?

every platform is different.

by becky livingston
the accountant’s social media handbook

successful social media marketing requires a deep understanding in how consumers and businesses use each of the major social networking platforms.

more on social media: social media marketing for cpas [video] | how to engage with social media influencers | marketing for mobile | how social media affects seo | social media campaign 101 | why use social media for marketing?
goprocpa.comexclusively for pro members. log in here or 2022世界杯足球排名 today.

each platform provides different functionality and limitations. understanding effective tactics to maximize the potential each platform holds is essential in the effective implementation of your social media marketing strategy. the current, most important social media platforms are facebook, twitter, linkedin, youtube, google plus and pinterest.
read more →

how social media works with accountants’ top 5 marketing goals

this is how clients find you now.

by becky livingston

in today’s world of cpa firms, marketing has taken a leap from the back seat to a seat at the strategic table.

more on social media: social media marketing for cpas [video] | how to engage with social media influencers | marketing for mobile | how social media affects seo | social media campaign 101 | why use social media for marketing? | 12 seo myths | quick tip: accelerated mobile pageswhy you need an ssl certificate now | why tracking urls are so important | what goes into a buyer persona? | what is seo and why is it important?
goprocpa.comexclusively for pro members. log in here or 2022世界杯足球排名 today.

with more and more firms focusing on marketing efforts, it makes a cpa wonder, “how does my firm continue to stay ahead of the curve to attract clients and to move the firm higher on its journey to increasing lead generation?”

social media marketing is one solution.

read more →

when clients prefer social media

screen shot 2015-09-25 at 6.10.24 am
source: hinge marketing

how to use every new channel to create a new touchpoint to serve a client or attract a prospect, hire the best people, find new markets.

by becky livingston
social media for accountants

in today’s world of cpa firms, marketing has taken a leap from the back seat to a seat at the strategy table. with more and more firms focusing on marketing efforts, it makes a cpa wonder, “how does my firm continue to stay ahead of the curve to attract clients and move the firm higher on its journey to increasing lead generation?”

marketing is one solution.

read more →

10 key questions to ask before you try crm

choosing a crm system can be tricky. here are some pointers.

by becky livingston

when do you need crm? you know you need crm when your list of contacts has outgrown your rolodex. you remember what a rolodex is right? another indication is when you begin to forget important information about your clients, or you notice your communication with them has dwindled.

also consider crm when you are looking to increase sales as well as relationships with clients, in the end positively affecting the bottom line.

lastly, if you find yourself personalizing emails manually and/or do not have a clear idea of where you customer or lead is in the pipeline, you may need crm.

read more →