Now that the crush of the tax deadlines are behind you, it’s time to once again think about marketing. But not just any marketing – I want you to think about marketing to your top clients.
Over the past several months you have been “heads down” focused on getting the work out the door and on time. You had little time to think strategically about your top client relationships and what you needed to do to serve them proactively. At any other time of the year, you would be able to stop and think about clues and triggers occurring with the client that mean you need to talk to them.
For example, maybe a client bought a vacation home – indicating perhaps that retirement was closer than they originally thought? Perhaps a business client of yours merged with a competitor indicating the need for some accounting integration assistance? Or maybe your client’s business grew significantly which means you need to talk to them about internal controls. Obviously these are just some basic examples, but they show you that little things can mean big opportunities for you to have additional discussions with your client about changes and additional considerations.
With a little more time on your hands now, it’s a perfect time to plan some meetings with your top ten clients over the course of the next several months. Maybe you leverage a clue or trigger that has occurred in the past few months or maybe you simply want to catch up and discuss top priorities for the coming year. Create a brief agenda and/or outline for your meeting if appropriate and get it on the calendar.
Your meeting can also be social in nature. Building deeper and stronger client relationships pays dividends in retention and profitability, so don’t overlook the opportunity just to check in and see how things are going in your client’s personal life.
Finally, remember that your top clients are your competitor’s top prospects! If you are not calling on your clients, I can guarantee that your competitors are calling on them. If this isn’t motivation enough to go out and see your top clients, I don’t know what is!
