The Essential Guide to Customer Acquisition

Customers are the lifeblood of immoderate business.

Without caller customers, businesses cannot survive, fto alone grow.

In this guide, you’ll larn however to get much caller customers for your business.

Here’s what we’ll cover:

• What is lawsuit acquisition?
• Create a lawsuit acquisition strategy
• Customer acquisition channels
• Customer acquisition examples
• FAQs

Customer acquisition is the process of gaining caller customers for a business.

Customer acquisition is not a “one-step” process. Most prospects don’t crook into customers instantly. Instead, they travel a journey:

• Awareness – The purchaser realizes they person a problem. They privation to recognize much about it.
• Consideration – The purchaser is looking for and comparing imaginable solutions to their problem.
• Decision – The purchaser purchases a solution.

So, successful bid to get caller customers, you request to align your selling with these 3 stages.

1. Awareness – You request to look successful the consciousness oregon consciousness of your imaginable customers. You’ll besides request to amusement them your merchandise oregon work tin assistance to lick their problem.
2. Consideration – You request to person these prospects that they should take your merchandise oregon service.
3. Decision – You request to “tip” these prospects implicit the finishing line. Common tactics see discounts and escaped trials.

Customer acquisition isn’t astir executing a assortment of tactics and hoping 1 sticks. You request a strategy, i.e., your conflict plan. This is however you’re going to pull caller customers and take the close acquisition tactics.

Here’s however to make a lawsuit acquisition strategy.

1. Identify your customers and wherever they hang out

If you don’t cognize who your customers are, you can’t pull much of them to your business.

That’s wherefore the archetypal measurement of your lawsuit acquisition strategy is to fig retired who your perfect customers are.

If you’ve done your market research and created lawsuit personas, past this should beryllium easy. You’ll already cognize who you’re trying to reach.

For example, here’s a simplified mentation of our perfect lawsuit astatine Ahrefs:

SEO professionals and website owners who privation to thrust much postulation to their websites.

If you’re inactive successful the aboriginal stages and don’t person a lawsuit connection similar this yet, don’t worry. You tin usage this guide to make 1 for your business.

Knowing who your perfect customers are volition besides assistance you fig retired which marketing channels you should use. For example, we cognize website owners who tendency much postulation are often searching connected Google and looking for adjuvant guides.

This is 1 of the main reasons wherefore SEO-driven contented marketing is our main selling tactic.

Experienced SEOs thin to bent retired a batch connected Twitter too, and that’s wherefore we person a dense beingness there.

2. Set your goals

For your strategy to work, you request to cognize your destination. That is your goal.

Ideally, you should person goals for each signifier of the buyer’s journey. But successful reality, astir companies person constricted manpower, time, budget, and resources. So attempting to execute goals for each signifier whitethorn beryllium to beryllium difficult.

In that case, you’ll person to prioritize. I suggest focusing connected the country wherever you’re lacking the astir currently.

For example, possibly you whitethorn person a batch of postulation coming to your website (awareness). Yet you aren’t seeing immoderate important summation successful your income (purchase). As such, you whitethorn privation to acceptable a extremity and tackle the “problem area.”

Once you’ve identified what you privation to enactment on, you should acceptable a SMART objective to marque it wide what it is you privation to achieve.

• ​​Specific – It should intelligibly authorities the desired outcome.
• Measurable – It should beryllium thing you tin way the occurrence of.
• Achievable – It should beryllium realistic.
• Relevant – It should align with your wide concern objectives.
• Timely – It should person a clip framework attached to it.

For example, this is simply a bully nonsubjective aligned with the SMART criteria:

Increase the conversion complaint of your escaped proceedings to a paid subscription from 1% to 3% successful the adjacent 12 months.

3. Choose your lawsuit acquisition channels

Based connected what you’ve designed truthful acold successful your strategy, you should person an thought of which channels whitethorn enactment champion to get caller customers.

Pick 1 to 2 of the astir suitable ones and statesman experimenting with them. (More astir the antithetic channels successful the adjacent section.)

Here are immoderate of the astir fashionable lawsuit acquisition channels you tin experimentation with for your business.

1. Search motor optimization (SEO)

SEO is the signifier of optimizing a website oregon webpage to summation the quantity and prime of its postulation from a hunt engine’s integrated results.

Pros

• Passive, integrated (almost free) traffic
• Evergreen and compounding effects; nonfiction written a fewer years agone tin inactive make postulation if it ranks precocious connected the hunt engines
• Potential customers are automatically qualified by their search intents, e.g., idiosyncratic searching “ahrefs vs moz” is person to buying than idiosyncratic searching “how to summation website traffic”
• SEO contented tin power full selling funnel

Cons

• Ranking precocious connected hunt engines takes time
• Popular presumption tin get competitory (i.e., tons of clip and resources required)
• Return connected concern (ROI) tin beryllium hard to measure
• Slower effects for newcomers; website with smaller fig of high-quality backlinks and debased topical authority may find it tougher to fertile higher successful the opening stages

2. Content marketing

Content selling is the process of creating and distributing contented to pull and clasp customers.

Pros

• Educates imaginable customers
• Builds loyalty and retention
• Can spell viral successful the abbreviated word and make a batch of attraction and consciousness at once
• Builds credibility
• Can beryllium the ground of different selling channels (e.g., integer advertising)

Cons

• ROI tin beryllium hard to measure
• Requires clip to work
• Content needs to beryllium promoted and distributed; otherwise, attraction whitethorn beryllium scarce
• Content indispensable beryllium precocious quality; otherwise, it can’t basal retired from the tons of different published content

3. Digital advertising

Digital advertizing is the process of paying a website oregon level to scope its assemblage via ad space.

Pros

• Fast mode to get traffic; conscionable acceptable up an advertisement and get it moving successful a substance of minutes
• Highly circumstantial targeting (geography, age, gender, interests, etc)
• Easy to measurement and scale

Cons

• Can beryllium costly (especially erstwhile scaling up)
• Learning curve exists; costs clip and wealth to fig retired what works for your nonstop business
• Suffers from symptoms similar advertisement fatigue and banner blindness
• Increasing usage of advertisement blockers and third-party cookies blocking by web browsers whitethorn impact measurement and effectiveness

4. Influencer marketing

Influencer selling is the signifier of moving with influencers—people who person an active, sizable audience—to beforehand your brand’s message, products, oregon services.

Pros

• Good mode to amended marque awareness
• Popular influencers tin “bestow” a halo effect on your brand
• Can make nonstop sales, e.g., via influencer-specific discount codes

Cons

• ROI tin beryllium hard to measure
• No guaranteed returns erstwhile moving with influencers
• Risk of unwanted marque associations if you enactment with the incorrect person
• Limited power implicit originative oregon messaging

5. Email marketing

Email selling lets you scope your prospects’ mailboxes with messages that either punctual nonstop enactment oregon purpose to promote prospects to make a semipermanent narration with the brand.

Pros

• Easily scope your prospects oregon customers straight (and astatine any time)
• Emails sent tin beryllium highly personalized and segmented
• Easy to measure

Cons

• Takes clip to organically physique a prime email list
• Overdoing it tin origin you to interruption email selling authorities (GDPR, CAN-SPAM, etc)
• Can beryllium competitory (people’s inboxes are flooded with emails!)

6. Video marketing

Video selling is the process of creating and distributing video contented to pull and clasp customers.

Pros

• Great for demonstrating however a merchandise works
• Can beryllium aboriginal repurposed into different contented formats (e.g., your publication tin beryllium turned into a blog post; main video tin beryllium turned into multiple, bite-sized versions)
• Engaging videos tin seizure and clasp attraction overmuch much efficaciously than different formats

Cons

• Very resource-intensive to nutrient 1 high-quality video, fto alone many

7. Social media

Social media drives postulation to your webpages and creates engagement with your marque by means of societal media platforms.

Pros

• Organic, astir escaped traffic
• Massive audiences tin beryllium recovered connected antithetic societal media platforms
• Can interact straight with your audience

Cons

• Not casual to physique a pursuing connected societal media
• Social media platforms whitethorn alteration your integrated scope (to get much radical to wage for ads)
• May beryllium astatine “mercy” of these platforms; you tin get banned oregon removed anytime, which means losing each your following
• May acquisition galore antagonistic comments and trolls

8. Referral programs

A referral programme incentivizes existing customers to beforehand your marque to their household and friends.

Pros

• Can beryllium a low-cost mode to get caller customers
• Builds lawsuit loyalty

Cons

• No guarantees that a referral programme will work
• Can’t “force” your customers to notation their friends

Here are immoderate examples of however antithetic businesses person acquired their customers.

1. Ahrefs – Content marketing

Ahrefs is an all-in-one SEO toolset that allows you to bash keyword research, rival analysis, website audits, contented research, fertile tracking, and more.

The main lawsuit acquisition strategy we usage astatine Ahrefs is SEO-driven contented marketing. Here’s however we do it:

First, we find topics that our people customers are searching for connected Google.

As mentioned earlier, our customers are often searching connected Google for solutions to their problems. This makes SEO an perfect acquisition channel. Ranking precocious connected Google also ensures that we get passive, integrated traffic, arsenic agelong arsenic our contented stays on top.

How bash we find these topics?

1. Go to Ahrefs’ Keywords Explorer
2. Enter 1 oregon a fewer applicable keywords
3. Go to the Matching presumption report
4. Switch to Questions

As you tin see, determination are implicit 180,000 topics to take from. We’ll eyeball the database and enactment down those that are applicable to our customers.

Once we person a database of topics, we determine which topics to people archetypal utilizing business potential.

We commencement with topics that person a people of “3,” past “2,” and so on.

With a database of topics to enactment on, we make contented based connected this framework:

2. Circles.Life – Referral program

Circles.Life is simply a integer telco based successful Singapore. Despite entrenched contention from the 3 existing major telcos successful Singapore, Circles.Life has managed to succeed. (I, too, americium 1 of its customers.)

One of the main ways it acquired its customers (at slightest successful the aboriginal days) was via its referral program. In fact, according to HireDigital, implicit 40% of Circles.Life transactions travel from referrals.

The occurrence of a referral programme depends connected a fewer factors, but the main 1 is the incentive. An charismatic inducement motivates customers to share; a atrocious 1 drives nary action.

In this case, Circles.Life’s referral programme succeeded due to the fact that the prize was precisely what telco customers wanted: much information for debased prices.

This is reminiscent of Dropbox’s referral program, which was besides 1 of the main ways the unreality retention institution acquired its archetypal customers.

Recommended reading: How to Choose the Right Referral Incentives for Your Referral Program (With 20+ Examples!) 

3. Luxy Hair – Video marketing

Luxy Hair is an online store that sells hairsbreadth extensions and hair-related accessories. With implicit 3 cardinal subscribers connected YouTube, it’s sidesplitting it.

Luxy Hair makes videos that get thousands, if not millions, of views.

Each video features antithetic ways of styling hair, taking attraction of it, and more. And each video—ding ding ding, you guessed it—features Luxy Hair’s ain products.

The institution past makes it casual for immoderate spectator oregon subscriber to bargain by including the applicable links successful the video description.

Recommended reading: The Four-Part Formula That Got Luxy Hair 2.8 Million Subscribers connected YouTube

Here are immoderate often asked questions related to lawsuit acquisition.

How bash you cipher lawsuit acquisition cost?

Customer acquisition outgo (CAC) is the mean magnitude of wealth you walk to get a azygous customer.

This is calculated by dividing your lawsuit acquisition expenses by the fig of acquired customers.

CAC = Total magnitude spent connected marketing/Number of caller customers acquired

For example, if you acquired 10 caller customers aft spending $1,000 connected your marketing, your CAC would beryllium $1000/10 = $100.

What is the mean lawsuit acquisition cost?

According to Shopify’s research, present are the mean CACs by industry:

• Arts and entertainment: $21
• Business and industrial: $533
• Clothing, shoes, and/or accessories: $129
• Electronics and/or electronics accessories: $377
• Food, beverages, and baccy products: $462
• Health and beauty: $127
• Home and garden: $129

Don’t instrumentality these benchmarks arsenic gospel. These numbers are averages and tin disagree depending connected your brand, nonstop market, mean bid value, and more. You should ever subordinate your CAC to your ain business.

Why is lawsuit acquisition outgo important?

Many businesses cipher the CAC due to the fact that they privation to lower it.

However, trying to trim your CAC successful isolation is not a bully idea. Most of the time, reducing your CAC and being much effectual successful selling don’t needfully spell manus in hand.

If your CAC is excessively low, you whitethorn really beryllium limiting your vulnerability and under-spending connected your selling activities. Your equilibrium expanse whitethorn look bully successful the abbreviated term, but you whitethorn beryllium missing retired connected important maturation opportunities successful the long term.

So, alternatively than strive to wage arsenic small arsenic possible, purpose for selling effectiveness.

To bash this, you should usage CAC successful narration to your lawsuit beingness worth (CLV). This is simply a metric that estimates however overmuch wealth an idiosyncratic lawsuit volition walk connected your products oregon services.

Here’s however CLV is calculated:

Avg. bid worth x Avg. yearly acquisition frequence x Avg. lawsuit lifespan

Take this into account, alongside your lawsuit basal maturation and wide selling effectiveness, erstwhile deciding if you should set your CAC.

Recommended reading: How to Use & Reduce Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC)

What is lawsuit retention?

Customer retention happens aft a lawsuit is acquired. The extremity of lawsuit retention is to support your customers with your marque for a long time.

This is due to the fact that a loyal lawsuit is much invaluable to a business. Not lone volition they bargain much (and bargain much frequently), but caller customers are besides often much costly to acquire.

Customer acquisition and lawsuit retention are not mutually exclusive. Both are important to a business’s maturation and endurance and should beryllium astatine the same time.

Some marketers adjacent reason that lawsuit retention should really instrumentality precedence implicit lawsuit acquisition—after all, there’s nary constituent filling a leaky bucket.

— Aazar Shad (@Aazarshad) July 12, 2021

Recommended reading: What Is Customer Retention? 11 Examples and Strategies to Retain Customers

How bash you measurement lawsuit acquisition?

Besides CAC and CLV, which metrics should you measure?

This depends connected the nonstop maneuver you’re using. I urge speechmaking the usher beneath for a illustration of the astir important lawsuit acquisition metrics you should beryllium tracking.

Recommended reading: 25 Marketing Metrics You Should Consider Tracking

Final thoughts

If you privation to get caller customers connected a accordant basis, you request a strategy. Create 1 and past execute only the tactics that determination your concern ahead.

Did I miss retired connected thing important astir lawsuit acquisition? Let maine cognize on Twitter.