In our last episode of Online Confidential, we looked at being on the rollercoaster ride of being an ad freelancer where you could be fully booked one month in the next, you may lose a couple of clients, and then you were left wondering, where am I going to get two new clients from. So today we’re going to talk about inbound marketing and some inbound marketing strategies that you can use so that you will constantly have a stream of potential clients. 

So, first of all, what is inbound marketing? Now, I’ve got to admit, as someone who got started as an Ad Manager without a marketing background, I heard the term but didn’t know what it meant. So simply put, inbound marketing are strategies that involve attracting clients to you rather than you actively seeking them out. 

Think of it as a magnetic force. Drawing potential clients towards your services. It’s about creating valuable content, tailored solutions and experiences that are specifically designed for your ideal clients.

Inbound marketing strategy number one is paid traffic because we know the value of paid traffic, right? That’s what we do for our clients. I always, 100% recommend ad managers run their own ads. One, it gives you this experience and the feeling of spending your own money in your marketing. And number two is that it keeps getting you seen in the newsfeed on autopilot. 

In fact, just today. I had my weekly call with members of Mastermind, The Clique and one of them was talking about their own social media marketing, feeling a bit overwhelmed about the pressure of creating content so that they are visible and not the best-kept secret, even though their books are already pretty full with premium clients.

So I reminded her to use the Client Attraction Code, my ad strategy, where you can promote your content pieces for just a dollar a day and cover a 90-day window – because we all know you need to nurture your audiences.  This ad strategy is evergreen. Your audiences roll through audience cohorts, keeping the content fresh and keeping you visible. I always have a client attraction code running for myself and people are always saying to me, I see your ads all the time. And while these ads are designed to nurture your audiences they do also attract sales so they are perfect for any client accounts.

Additionally, you can also use some top-of-funnel strategies where you have an engagement campaign and a video view campaign which is targeting your ideal audience to create a warm audience for a dollars a day, one dollar for each ad set. Then you’ll add these audiences into the 90-day nurturing sequence. So having that inbound strategy is not going to break the bank for you. You can do that for a cup of coffee a day. Right? Your Starbucks order… maybe just get one coffee a day instead of two or get a small pumpkin spice latte instead of the venti. 

So for just $5 a day, you can just be getting started with audience building and nurturing campaigns, doing your own inbound marketing with Facebook ads. 

Then as well with your Facebook ads, since we’re talking about ad spend, create a lead magnet of some sort. What is it that people ask you about when it comes to running Facebook ads? What’s your zone of genius? Create a guide or write a checklist so that you can use to attract people to you. So they’re opting into your email list which leads us to… 

Strategy number 3, Email marketing. They’ve opted in and now you continue to nurture them. Now, I know a lot of ad managers may find the thought of creating emails overwhelming. “What the heck am I going to write?” Well hello ChatGPT

This is where you can get that inspiration. Just go in and enter a prompt like: You are a Facebook marketing expert. Give me a list of 12 topics about Facebook ads that would be highly valuable to… and name your niche. Start there. See what those 12 topics are. If you don’t like them, regenerate new results. Select 12 and then go deeper on each one of those.

Enter a prompt: Explain more about topic one….. Write an email about this topic. Key points to cover are X, Y, Z. Things to consider are X, Y, Z. Then edit it yourself. Then, you can have a three-month email series written in an afternoon. 

So, while we’re still on the topic of paid inbound strategies – Google ads. Because that’s where people go and search “find a Facebook Ad Agency near me”. 

You could also set up a Google my business if you have a valid business address, which will help with getting discovered in Google searches, as another inbound strategy.

You can also do search engine optimization (SEO) which is a bit more technical, but there are places that you can outsource that to for just a few hundred dollars a month for local area SEO.

You could also hold some webinars or workshops. Does the local government in your area have an education program where you could approach them and offer to do Facebook ad training for business owners. Are there associations in your area? Like chiropractic or small business associations. What about even business networking groups who have members who want to know how to use Facebook ads? So starting those connections and offering to do some workshops free or paid. 

So inbound strategy number 8 let’s talk referrals.  Do you ask your current clients for referrals? And if so, at what point do you ask them for referrals? A great place to ask for a referral is when you’ve just got some amazing results or when you’ve just onboarded the client and you’ve provided them with some Stella gold class onboarding services. And they’re loving the attention to detail that you’ve given them.   This is when they would happily and confidently refer you to a colleague.

What about referral partners?  Do you know someone who is a VA who may have clients who would benefit from Facebook ads? 

And our 9th and final inbound marketing strategy for this episode is Content marketing. I know that can make many of us go, oh my gosh, I don’t have time for that. And organic marketing is so hard. That’s why we do paid traffic, right? In my Successful Ad Manager program, we teach you a simplified marketing system where you just create 20 pieces of content which will cover you for 12 weeks that you can get done in an afternoon. Getting content on your website can help your SEO as well.

The benefits of inbound marketing are what you are turning up. You’re being seen by potential clients. You are establishing your authority and your expertise. They’re seeing you as the one who knows about Facebook ads, they’re building up trust and rapport with you. So that when you get on a call with them to discuss your services, they already trust you. You don’t need to be convincing them that you know what you’re talking about. They’ve been seeing you in their newsfeed. They’ve been seeing you in their inbox. They’ve been reading your emails. They’ve been listening to you, watching you. They know, you know what you’re talking about and that’s why they have called and messaged and reached out to you. 

Next week, we’re going to be talking about outbound strategies you can use to keep your potential client pipeline full so that you can get off the client hustle roller coaster.

So until then keep dreaming, keep doing, keep believing. Stay tuned. I’ll catch you in the next episode. And until then, Keep dreaming. Keep doing, keep believing. You’ve got this.