Mastering customer acquisition: 10 proven strategies

Businesses might be well-equipped with advanced digital tools and modern-day strategies to attract customers. However, the quest to find the “perfect solution” to customer acquisition remains timeless. 

Customer acquisition is the backbone of a business’s growth and sustainability. A lapse in acquiring customers can be alarming for businesses. 

Looking for a quick answer to what those 10 customer acquisition strategies are? Here's a quick rundown:

1. Enhance local SEO
2. Offer referrals
3. Start mass texting and email marketing
4. Get active on social media marketing
5. Get granular with PPC ads
6. Aim for more customer reviews
7. Capitalize influencer marketing
8. Focus on video marketing
9. Publish user-generated content (UGC)
10. Have gated content

For a deeper dive into these strategies, read through our detailed blog. 

What is customer acquisition?

Customer acquisition is persuading potential customers to become paying customers. Steering these leads through the sales funnel and turning them into new customers is the lifeblood of any business, as it fuels growth and revenue. 

Understanding the nuances of this process is crucial to your customer acquisition strategy success.

As a business leader, whether you run a large enterprise or a local business, learning customer acquisition strategies and retention methods to improve sales in the long term is very important. 

A mere 5% boost in customer retention can increase your profits by at least 25%. To remain profitable, you must convert leads with effective marketing strategies and tactics, as discussed below. 

Did you know you can reduce customer acquisition costs (CAC) with business text messaging? Read the blog to find out how. 

Why is customer acquisition important?

Customer acquisition is important because your business must increase its customer base and pool of repeat buyers for the following reasons:

• Easy word-of-mouth marketing to spread the word about your brand.  
• Repeat customers will improve sales and increase your revenue.
• More revenue means you’ll have additional funds to invest in other aspects. 
• Attract business partners, investors, a better workforce, social media personalities, and new customers with a growing brand. 
• Integrating your acquisition strategy with customer retention will ensure your brand’s long-term sustainability.
• A good online reputation will put you ahead of your competitors.

How do you optimize customer acquisition?

Optimizing customer acquisition involves these key actions to attract and retain a growing customer base for business growth: 

1. Define your audience to tailor your marketing efforts.
2. Use digital marketing for online visibility.
3. Improve website usability to boost conversions.
4. A/B test with different strategies to find what works best.
5. Encourage satisfied customers to refer others.
6. Collaborate with other businesses or influencers.
7. Take customer feedback.

Regularly evaluate and adapt your customer acquisition strategies. 

What is customer acquisition cycle?

The customer acquisition cycle is the business’s process to turn potential customers into actual buyers. It typically involves attracting, engaging, and converting leads into paying customers.

As your primary goal is to drive new customers and leads toward your business., you can guide them through the sales funnel with marketing strategies and a fine-tuned acquisition process. 

But you can’t treat the funnel as a singular entity since it consists of three distinct segments. This is because customer behavior changes across these segments.

To deeply understand the funnel, you need to grasp  the customer journey through each segment:

• ToFu (top of the funnel): This is the top-most section, the awareness phase. 

Here, leads have limited awareness of your brand and may consider your offerings but won’t make a purchase yet. These leads hear about your offerings and that of competitors based on marketing materials and outreach.

• MoFu (middle of the funnel): This is the middle section known as the consideration phase. 

At this stage, leads closely compare your offerings to your competitors. If you don’t convince them and earn their trust that your offerings are superior, they will exit the funnel without making a purchase.

• BoFu (bottom of the funnel): This is the bottom section known as the decision phase. 

Only qualified leads make it to this coveted section, and they need a gentle nudge to make a purchase. You may also have to offer an incentive such as after-sales services, a comprehensive warranty, or a custom solution.

Recommended read: Did you know now that there are 12 ways to use AI in sales in 2023? 

What is a customer acquisition strategy?

A customer acquisition strategy is a business’s well-planned and organized approach to attract and gain new customers. It involves a set of tactics, methods, and channels designed to identify, engage, and convert potential customers into paying clients. 

The ultimate goal of a customer acquisition strategy is to increase a company’s customer base, boost revenue, and ensure sustainable business growth. It encompasses both online users and offline prospects, examining how customer journeys connect with sales funnels. An exceptional customer acquisition strategy persuades them to trust the quality of your offerings and turns them into buyers. 

How to build a winning customer acquisition strategy?

Today’s dynamic and highly competitive environment demands strategies and techniques to excel in acquiring new customers. 

Every business will have its unique strategy, but here are a few building blocks: 

• Determine your target audience: Build your ideal customer profiles based on their demographics and preferences.
• Research the market: Ensure you’ve gathered enough information about your target market and audience before investing in marketing. 
• Define your value proposition: Understand what sets your business apart and distinguishes it from the competition.
• Improve your marketing funnel: Adopt a data management strategy to analyze data across all your marketing channels and funnels. 
• Optimize your landing pages: Use A/B testing to maximize your landing pages and lead generation. 
• Implement analytics: Use tools to help you figure out if you’re meeting your KPI targets.   

10 proven customer acquisition strategies

Growing your customer base will depend on how well you apply the customer acquisition strategies listed below:

1. Enhance local SEO 

Search engine optimization (SEO) is essential for boosting your website traffic. With effective SEO, your website will rank higher than competitor sites when users search specific keywords or phrases. 

Use the following steps to boost your site’s SEO:

• Focus on enhancing your local SEO.
• Do keyword research for topics that your potential customers use. 
• Write eye-catching titles and useful, top-quality blogs.  
• Publish quality content regularly. 
• Keep the end user in mind when you create any content 

2. Offer referrals

Referrals are a quick way to increase your customer base. 

Run “refer a friend” campaigns using email, text, and social media. Offer discounts and gifts. You can use platforms like Birdeye Referrals to track and scale your campaigns.

3. Start mass texting and email marketing

You probably use email daily to message customers, vendors, and stakeholders. Email marketing is a top tool for communicating directly with customers and driving them to your offers. 

Enhance your efficiency with Birdeye Messaging. This ensures you stay in touch at every step of the customer engagement process. 

4. Get active on social media marketing

There’s no better place to share content than your social channels. Engrossing, funny, and quality content often goes viral on social media. 

But don’t forget to engage with users when they respond to your social media posts. Maintain consistent engagement with Birdeye social media software. 

5. Get granular with PPC ads

Google Ads are effective for advertising your offerings. But you’ll want to quickly obtain your Google Seller Ratings (GSR) to build trust. Once you add your GSR to your Google Ads, it’s easier to convince leads to purchase. 

Birdeye Google Seller Ratings will help you rapidly gain 100+ qualified reviews to unlock the power of Google Ads. 

6. Aim for more customer reviews

Part of your customer retention acquisition strategy is managing the reputation of your business. The better your reputation, the easier it is to convert leads into paying and repeat customers. 

You can boost your organization’s reputation by collecting oodles of positive reviews. AI-powered tools like Birdeye Reviews can make this process easier. 

7. Capitalize influencer marketing

Collaborating with influencers like social media personalities with massive followings is one of the best ways to build your brand and generate leads. 

The key benefit is reaching out to an audience you might not have reached otherwise. 

8. Focus on video marketing

Platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube all have massive audiences who love consuming video content. Create entertaining videos to reach these audiences. 

Like social media posts, engaging videos can go viral and increase your customer base.

9. Publish user-generated content (UGC)

Your existing customers might share UGC content online, like blog posts, images, GIFs, memes, and videos. This is beneficial because such UGC acts as social proof and reflects how customers perceive your brand. 

Birdeye’s solutions help track UGC and let you engage with customers, inviting them to leave reviews or create additional UGC. 

10. Have gated content

While you should create content to give away for free, you should also consider producing gated content. This content is more exclusive and premium than your audiences can only access via a paywall or by providing their emails.

Use the latter strategy if your goal is to grow your mailing list rapidly.  

What is customer acquisition cost?

The cost incurred to attract new customers is the customer acquisition cost (CAC).

Knowing your CAC is one of the most important marketing KPIs in any business.

This determines the marketing ROI–Your marketing efforts succeed if they attract enough customers to generate sales above your CAC. 

How do you calculate customer acquisition cost?

The customer acquisition cost is calculated by dividing the total marketing expenses by the number of customers acquired.

What are the elements of customer acquisition?

Customer acquisition involves various elements to attract and convert potential customers. Here are the key elements:

1. Know your customers

Build profiles of your ideal target audience. Delve into their interests, likes, dislikes, lifestyles, and demographics.

As you delve deeper into understanding this audience, learn which social media channels they prefer and determine the most effective ways to connect with them. 

2. Set your goals

Set several goals as part of your customer acquisition strategy. Diversifying goals and strategies work best. For example, you may choose content to attract leads on your social media channels. But then opt to pay for ads to drive new users to your landing pages and special offers. 

3. Choose the customer acquisition channels

Several channels constitute your acquisition funnel, including your target audience, market research, goals, and budget. But don’t forget to look beyond immediate results. Continue to engage with customers even after they’ve purchased from you.  

4. Determine budgets

Use the CAC formula to figure out budgets for email marketing, direct mail, and more. Reduce your CAC by optimizing your website, landing pages, and copywriting. Not only that, investigate more cost-effective methods if your current marketing channels are causing you to overshoot your budget.  

5. Iterate your strategy

There’s always room to improve, even if your customer acquisition strategy proves successful. Examine your customers’ journeys and determine which marketing channels and methods drive results. Repeat battle-tested and successful acquisition strategies, but always be open to making necessary changes. 

6. Analyze results

Your customer acquisition strategy may fall short if you don’t keep track of your KPIs. Fortunately, you can track results easily with analytics tools and a data management strategy. Tracking your metrics in real-time allows you to make adjustments quickly.

Customer acquisition metrics

Customer acquisition metrics are a set of data points that businesses use to evaluate their effectiveness in acquiring new customers. These metrics provide insights into the entire customer acquisition process, from the initial touchpoint to conversion. 

By analyzing these metrics, businesses can fine-tune their strategies for optimal results. Here are four key customer acquisition metrics

1. Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC): It includes marketing expenses, advertising costs, and sales team salaries.  

2. Customer Lifetime Value (CLV): CLV calculates the total revenue a business can expect from a customer throughout their relationship. A higher CLV indicates better customer retention and can justify higher CAC.

3. Conversion Rate: It measures the percentage of potential customers who take a desired action, such as purchasing or signing up for a newsletter.  

4. Churn Rate: Often associated with subscription-based businesses, this measures the rate customers stop using a service or product. 

7 popular customer acquisition channels for businesses

Every business has its customer acquisition strategy. Here are our seven recommendations for customer acquisition channels. 

Note: Not everything may fit your needs, so don’t try to invest your time, money, and resources in all options. Test which ones work best for your business and focus on them: 

1. Organic search

Include a visually appealing website with up-to-date SEO content in your customer acquisition process. When users search the web for answers to their problems, your site should have a first-page ranking in your local business market. 

What to do: Create informative blog posts and engaging videos to transform these users into paying customers. 

2. Paid search

You can drive traffic via pay-per-click (PPC) ads. These advertisements appear on top of searches. Examples that work well include Google Shopping for product listings and Text Ads primarily for customer marketing. 

What to do: 

• Attract more customers with higher Google Seller Ratings. 
• Run targeted ad campaigns.

3. Events

Try attending events to meet people face-to-face and build relationships. You can attend conventions, exhibitions, festivals, and trade shows, to name a few. 

What to do: 

• Get granular when doing sales prospecting. 
• Create an ideal customer profile. 
• Target only those with a problem that only your business solves. 

4. Traditional advertising

Don’t forget about traditional advertising. Television, radio, and print media still have their place. You can also advertise in your local newspaper or radio station to reach local consumers.

5. Social media

Social media offers you a gazillion avenues for lead generation. Not all these avenues are free. But they do let you reach users based on your customer profiles. 

What to do: 

• Create engaging social media content. 
• Use AI in social media management.

6. Emails

Improve your customer acquisition strategy by using email. 

What to do: 

• Send personalized emails to nurture leads.
• Share promotions without appearing salesy. 
• Maintain relationships with your existing customer base and reply to them. 

7. Loyalty programs

Boost your customer retention acquisition process with loyalty programs. Well-planned loyalty programs not only help with customer retention but also entice prospects. 

What to do: 

• Use email, social media, and your website to inform customers.
• Implement a user-friendly referral system on your website or app to share referral links with just a few clicks.

Recommended read: Grow your business with Birdeye Referrals

Case study: Customer acquisition strategy example of Complete Care

The healthcare industry is highly competitive, and customer acquisition is tricky, as today, patients have more choices than ever. The success of healthcare organizations depends on their ability to attract new patients while providing high-quality care to existing ones.

Here is a customer acquisition strategy example of how Birdeye helped Complete Care to attract, retain, and satisfy patient care: 

About the brand: Complete Care is a multi-specialty healthcare facility helping patients recover (fully) after an auto accident. 

Challenge: 

• Although patients were usually very happy with their visits, few left reviews online. 
• This made it difficult for Complete Care to know what needed improvement.
• It became harder for prospective patients to find Complete Care in search results. 

Complete Care’s customer acquisition strategy

Complete Care’s customer acquisition strategy aligned with its patient-centric culture philosophy. They made sure all customers/patients left reviews, and their team responded to all. Even when receiving negative feedback, they contacted the patient to determine if any internal processes needed improvement. 

Confidently using the satisfied patients’ feedback helped them build trust with potential patients.

Implementing these quality controls improved their reputation as they could offer a better brand experience. Doing these helped many locations appear on the 1st page of Google organically.

Solution that Birdeye offered: 

• Automating the review process
• Mass texting to easily communicate
• Generate actionable insights from patient reviews
• Monitor all of their reviews from each review site in one place
• Streamline review collection for all locations in one central dashboard

Results: 

• 3,653% increase in the number of reviews per location
• 4.8 average star rating across every location
• 29,650 reviews generated across all sites
• 50% open rate on review requests

FAQs about customer acquisition

Boost customer acquisition rates with Birdeye

Building up your customer base is a top goal of your organization. There are several strategies you can use to find customers. Still, your acquisition rates may leave much to be desired. Don’t worry. You can improve customer acquisition with Birdeye’s software solutions. 

Try a free demo now and contact us to learn more.