Believing that summer is the wrong time to proactively prospect could be detrimental to the growth of your agency. We hear it all the time, “everyone is on vacation; budgets are locked down; no-one picks up the phone.” Our experience is just the opposite. Brand marketers are “on” 12 months a year, and when summer approaches, many of them are either getting a head start on 2023 planning, or better yet, figuring out how to spend any remaining budget this year. Summer is their time to try that one tactic they’ve been putting off, double down on a program, or invest in a targeted campaign. Yet many agencies slow down or stop their prospecting entirely over the summer months.
In fact, summer is a prime opportunity for you to break away from your competitors. Growth driven agencies who continue a steady pace of proactive business development into Q2 find significant success in overall revenue goals by creating conversations and opportunities with their prospects.
Here are three reasons to continue prospecting through the summer:
1. Consistency drives results.
The Q1 emphasis on business development – emails, phone calls, events, blogs – burns everyone out, and agency after agency will put their new business efforts aside as Q2 approaches. We typically see 50% of agencies stop their proactive outreach for new business completely after the first quarter. There are two reasons this is alarming. As we’ve already mentioned, summer is still a rich time for prospecting, but being in front of your right to win clients over and over again is the key to getting and keeping their attention on you and the problems you can solve for them. The other reason to stay consistent is your competitor’s lack of momentum will leave a gap you can fill.
Of course, sometimes you just need a break. But don’t shut down all your proactive efforts. Here are two ways to keep the momentum going:
- Build content 2-3 months out. Work ahead to have as much content planned, created, and scheduled as possible so your prospects won’t forget about you in months where you are less proactive.
- Utilize technology as much as possible. Marketing Automation is key to ensuring that even when you aren’t proactively contacting prospects yourself, your new business efforts aren’t affected.
2. Brands still have money to spend in 2022.
We see a significant number of brands still planning Q3 and Q4 projects in June. This is a huge opportunity for your agency to take advantage of available funds in your prospect’s budget and impact your 2022 revenue goals. According to our sister company, Winmo, 3,065 brands are currently planning for Q3 and Q4.
We tell our clients not to leave money on the table – be there in front of your ideal prospects to help them spend it!
3. Brands are planning for 2023.
They say the early bird gets the worm, and the phrase couldn’t be truer in proactive prospecting. How can a brand marketer choose your agency as their partner in 2023 if you aren’t on their radar? As you approach the end of Q3, the focus of your outreach should be on creating relationships that ensure you are in consideration as brands plan for 2023. This approach will impact your own 2022 revenue early in the year.
