mountain climbing
Editor's Note: Davis Snedeker is presenting two sessions at the "Scaling New Heights®" conference in Orlando, Fla., this June. The Yeti (practice challenge) he addresses in his sessions is "Finding the Right Clients."
Branding and marketing are consistently among the top obstacles accountants face when growing their practice. It’s a common “Yeti” all businesses have to face at some point in their development. The trick is to tackle the Yeti and put it to rest; don’t let this one get away.
It All Starts With Branding
Hands down, the biggest, most common mistake I see is a business trying to market its services before having defined a brand. How can anyone be interested in your product or service when it’s not clearly defined? In order to begin marketing yourself, it’s imperative to understand who you are and what value you provide to others. What makes you unique and why should people be interested? Moreover, who specifically should be attracted to engage with your brand/business?
These are the types of questions your business needs to answer before even considering a marketing strategy. Don’t dip into your marketing budget if you haven’t established a cohesive and recognizable professional identity. Much like dating, you have to know yourself before you can find your soul mate. Likewise, your business needs to know its brand before you can target your ideal clients.
Then Comes the Marketing
Once you have clearly established your brand and identity, it’s time to share it with the world and attract those quality clients. By now you’re clear on who your target audience is, so now it’s just a matter of how to reach them. The overall marketing strategy should be scaled for comfortable growth while being continually optimized according to which tactics are working and which aren’t. Tactics change based on technology, social trends, and as your position in the marketplace evolves.
Join My Sessions
This year will be my third year attending Scaling New Heights and I’m excited to be presenting for the first time! As Lead Designer for INT, I have had the opportunity to work with numerous small and mid-size business owners to improve their branding, guide their marketing strategy, and experience the pride of presenting the authentic public image that their business deserves.
I’m excited to share my passion with the "Scaling New Heights®" conference attendees through two sessions: "Personal & Professional Branding," Tuesday, June 6, 8 a.m., and "Leveraging the Next Generation of Social Media," Tuesday, June 6, 5:20 p.m. Each session aims to provide a wide breadth of information along with specific, actionable steps for igniting your business’s branding and/or marketing strategy.
My goal as a presenter is to help you tackle your branding and marketing “Yeti” and put it to rest once and for all.
You can find more details about each of the sessions in a downloadable document located here: Download Course Descriptions.
Reminder: As your ever-faithful Sherpas, we stand ready to guide and encourage you along your chosen path. If you would like to consult with us about your path, please email me at coliver@woodard.com or Liz at ecolley@woodard.com.
Be sure to tell us your goals and what you hope to learn so we can recommend appropriate paths for your upcoming learning experience at the 2017 Scaling New Heights® conference.
Davis Snedeker
Davis Snedeker is the Lead Designer for INT’s Creative Services. A Millennial and digital native, Davis was brought up in the age of digital technology and social media. He has cultivated a passion for strong creative strategies supported by simple, elegant design. His experience with graphic design, digital marketing and web development coupled with his love of small- to mid-sized business management has drawn him to clients in the accounting profession, and he is excited to share his marketing expertise with the forward-thinking attendees of the SNH conference.