How an Account Manager Can Increase Your Profits This Year
Running and growing a digital marketing agency is a delicate dance. Ask any owner, and they’ll tell you how much deliberation goes into deciding when and how to invest in their team and their company. Sure, a remote Client Account Manager (CAM) would be great — but can you afford one?
Even with any associated costs, the right Client Account Manager can help to increase profits for a digital marketing agency. Assuming you follow best practices when hiring, a CAM can more than make up for their added expense.
We’ve already explored how a CAM can help reduce your stress levels, and even save your business. Now let’s explore specifically how professional account management can help increase your profits this year.
4 Ways An Account Manager Can Increase Agency Profits
Trust us: the right Account Manager can be a profit center for your agency. If you’re currently drowning in emails and client management, then you’re probably not doing what you can and should to grow the business. So the more you can free up your time to do sales calls and outreach, and/or to focus on strategy, the more your agency is going to transform into that powerhouse you’ve always envisioned.
Ultimately, an Account Manager can help increase your revenue by freeing you, the owner, up to do what you do best.
“Client management is a hard problem,” says Bryan Starck, Dot & Company client and owner of 100 Celsius. “Find the people who love it and are really good at it - I think that’s really key.”
Beyond freeing up their own calendars, agency owners like Bryan typically use Account Managers to increase revenue in the following four ways:
1. Client Retention
Like Bryan quickly learned when starting his own agency, whether or not clients stay or go usually comes down to communication. Mistakes get made, and sometimes external factors mean that campaigns don’t go as planned. That’s life, and most clients will understand this—-as long as they understand the work you’re still doing and what you bring to the table.
Having a good Client Account Manager means you have someone on board who is communicating with clients on a regular, pro-active basis. They’ll answer (and anticipate) questions, put out fires, and, critically, also talk up your accomplishments, too.
The result is that your clients will fully appreciate your value and be much more likely to stick around.
2. More Referrals
Getting new clients is no joke. So what if we told you there was a way to get new clients without lifting a finger?
By keeping your clients super happy, your Client Account Manager can also help you naturally drum up new business. Happy clients tell their friends, becoming some of your best ambassadors and lead generators (which is why Forbes says referrals are the most valuable form of marketing out there).
3. Upsells
If your Account Manager is good at their job, they’ll know how to upsell your clients. They’ll also simply be a walking billboard for your company. If your client loves them, they’re going to love your agency. And so they’re going to trust you with future projects as they arise.
4. Team Retention
Last but certainly not least, Client Account Managers aren’t just there to keep your clients happy. They can also keep your team happy, too. That’s because, unless you have a dedicated Project Manager, CAMs can be the ones to coordinate tasks, deliverables, and timelines, both internally and with your client.
In other words, your Account Manager can help keep projects from descending into chaos! And no one wants to work in chaos.
We all see the headlines. It’s an employee’s job market out there. If you’ve got great people on your team (and you only hire the best, right?), then they have other options. Keeping workflows manageable and sane is one of the best things you can do to keep your team engaged and happy to work with you. And keeping your team intact means you won’t have to spend time and cut into your profits by having to find and train new hires.
Case Study: How One Agency Did This
The only thing we like more than when our clients succeed? When we get to share their success stories! Take our long-term client Kerry, CEO of SystemEnvy. We started helping Kerry with client management three (!) years ago, and her agency has been on a steady path up ever since.
Kerry says she’s saved a lot of time thanks to her Dot & Company Client Account Manager—10 hours or more a week, to be exact. Besides more freedom, that’s also time she’s been able to spend growing the business.
Getting down to brass tax, Kerry says she’s been able to scale her business by 30% now that she’s got a Client Account Manager on her team. “I've been able to grow the non-service-based side of my business, which has been a dream come true,” she says.
Specifically, Kerry says her CAM has helped her the most in following areas:
Giving her time freedom
Allowing her to bring on new clients
Helping her to keep her clients longer
Helping to make her clients even happier.
A More Affordable Option For Account Management
Obviously, we’re pretty passionate about client account management. . But we’ll also be the first to tell you that bringing on a CAM might not be the right move for everyone all the time.
Even though an owner may be gung ho and excited to hire a CAM, that doesn’t mean their agency is ready for one yet. If you’re still in the startup phase and only have a handful of clients (or less), then you might not have enough work for a full-time CAM.
When many of our new clients come to us, it’s because they’ve got about 10-15 clients, along with a steady pipeline. But of course, when the time is right for a CAM is always agency-specific (reach out if you’ve got any questions!)
That said, in our experience, most agencies can and should bring on a dedicated CAM when account management starts to become a pain point. Of course, that often brings them to the chicken and egg phase. A CAM could bring in more money in the long-term, but how can you afford one in the short-term, especially if you’re a young agency?
Introducing fractional Client Account Management. When you work with one of our superstar CAMs, we white label account management. Your client will get a dedicated manager who acts like a full-time member of your team. But you’ll only pay for the hours you need (see how to calculate how many hours you need for account management here).
Ready to boost your team and your profits? Reach out to see how a Client Account Manager can help boost your profits asap!