How to use free audits as a lead generation tool for your marketing agency

Along with keeping your Agency’s income flowing, we’ll hazard a guess that holding joint place with recurring revenue as your top priority, is generating new revenue.

There’s an abundance of methods of getting new business, from online ads to content marketing, exhibitions to print ads and everything in between. But have you thought about how free digital presence audits could be the oil in your marketing agency’s cogs?

When selling digital products, such as:

Conducting audits on your prospect’s online presence is an insanely powerful hook and arms your sales team with a plethora of information to angle their sales pitches on!

Leading a pitch with a ‘why’ rather than a ‘what’ is going to get your digital marketing agency that initial buy-in much faster than if you’re pitching empty-handed.

Today we’re diving into what these free audits are and why your prospects will absolutely love them – so read on to get the tea!

They’re comprehensive checks of a business’s online and digital presence. Audits look at a multitude of metrics, such as:

This list is by no means exhaustive and audits will go into much further detail than that. But they will collate all of this data and turn it into a report and score it (usually) by an industry standard.

It gives customers and prospects alike an in-depth look at how the online world sees them, which elements they’re excelling at in addition to the bits that need work.

These audits enable you or your sales team to approach prospects with something tangible – a comprehensive report that can point out the shortcomings in their digital presence, which your agency can dive into, to show them how your agency’s products will solve those problems!

There are many reasons why free audits are a good idea, however, we think that its lead-generating capabilities come in at the top.

Offering free audits will undoubtedly attract the attention of potential clients who want to improve their digital presence and swapping a free audit for an email address is a brilliant way to build up your mailing lists and build your CRM!

Offering these thorough audits shows that your Digital Marketing Agency knows its stuff and being experts in the field is a surefire way to earn trust. By being able to identify the cracks in a business’s online presence and then detail a strategy to help it repair it, your digital marketing agency will be able to demonstrate its ability to help your prospects and customers hit their business goals.

Providing valuable insights and actionable steps for free will help your agency make its mark in the digital marketing industry, thus building credibility and the added trust factor needed to be considered an industry expert.

By using audits you can highlight areas that require improvement, making it clear to the prospect that there are elements of their digital presence that could use your agency’s help. Leveraging the detail in the audit will help you create a sense of urgency to get these issues fixed and being as your agency was the one to identify it initially, there’s a higher inclination that the prospect will hire you for the job.

There are a number of ways in which you can create audits, using a variety of tools and there’s an abundance of detailed apps or websites exist to assist your agency in creating the perfect audit.

What is a perfect audit you ask? A perfect audit is one that reflects your agency’s service offerings to a ‘T’. For example, if your agency focuses on social media advertising, an audit that includes local presence, website build and security wouldn’t be the best fit.

So rather than covering the generic ‘online presence’ elements, it will pay to hone in on the aspects of digital presence that are your agency’s bread and butter.

The most commonly audited digital presence elements are:-

There are a million different tools out there for you to choose from that will facilitate your audits for prospecting, but finding the right tool for what your agency does is crucial.

You can use websites like:-

All of these tools will help you to collate a comprehensive digital audit that will wow prospects and clients alike.

Auditing can be quite lengthy and time-consuming though, so to go one step further with optimising your agency’s sales process, you can use tools like Insites to get a fully customisable and comprehensive audit, just by searching for the business. Taking all the leg work out of auditing and leaving time for the stuff that really matters.

So you’ve done that hard part, now comes the fun – Pitching your free audit!

How do you do that? We’d suggest following these steps:-

It’s always the best idea to make your opening about your prospect rather than your agency and its services, otherwise, it’s an instant sales pitch and the guards will go up and the ears will close!

Example Opening

You could say something along the lines of “I just wanted to pop over and tell you how much I enjoyed reading your blog/that post you wrote/other thing you achieved” – (give a compliment about said thing).

”I ended up having a look at your website and noticed a couple of things I thought could help you. I was wondering if you’d mind me running an audit (it’s totally free!) and going through it with you?”

Start with the basics, it’s the polite thing to do! Introduce yourself, and your agency and let the prospect know a little bit about you to start building that rapport. Keep it short and sweet though, just enough to form a little familiarity.

You may also want to reiterate that this audit is complementary.

Current Performance

Using the audit you compiled, identify the technical issues you found such as broken links, slow loading times, responsiveness problems and overall UX flaws. In addition to pinpointing on and off-page SEO elements.

This is the perfect time to book a call to go through the findings and explain what they mean and how they can be improved. Be sure to explain how they can hurt search engine rankings and how they can impact negative user experience, deterring visitors from returning.

Competitor Analysis

Use audits that you’ve created for key competitor sites as well to drum up some healthy competition. Every business wants to know that they’re outperforming its competitors so this is great leverage in getting the prospect interested in what you have to say. Offering ways that your prospect can better position themselves in the market is a surefire way to pique their interests.

Actionable Insights

Once your prospect’s ears are open, give them specific, actionable recommendations that are based on their business goals and their industry. This could include technical fixes, optimisation and/or strategies. You want to tell them how you’re going to solve those problems for them and if possible, give them an indication of how long these changes will take to yield results.

Be sure to pinpoint quick wins as well – if there are any areas where improvements can be made immediately to achieve a quick win, that’ll win your prospect’s favour too!

Proof Of Value

Finish off your sales pitch with a call to action that is clear and concise, detailing what it is your agency is offering and what the next steps are to sign up for the offer. Reiterate and summarise the benefits you previously covered and outline any immediate value you’re able to provide as another layer to the hook.

Try to include a limited-time offer if you can to create a bit of urgency and if it’s a pitch by email then be sure to use phrases like ‘Act now’, ‘Don’t miss out’ etc, to encourage the prospect to sign on the dotted line.

We’ve included an example of a pitch email below that you can use and tweak to your liking and the structure of an in-person or phone pitch if that’s your chosen method of pitching!

Hi [Prospect’s Name],

I hope this email finds you well! I recently came across your [blog/post/article] on [specific topic], and I just had to reach out. Your insights were super engaging and thought-provoking.

Whilst browsing your website, I noticed a few areas where some improvements could really make a difference. I’d love to offer you a free audit to dive deeper into these aspects and discuss how we can enhance your site’s performance.

A bit about me – I’m [Your Name] from [Your Agency]. We specialise in helping businesses like yours optimise their online presence to attract and retain more customers. This audit is completely complimentary, and my goal is simply to help you identify opportunities for growth.

Here’s what you can expect from the audit:

Current Performance: We’ll identify technical issues like broken links, slow loading times, and UX flaws that could be hurting your search engine rankings and user experience.

Competitor Analysis: I’ll also compare your site with key competitors, showing you how you can better position yourself in the market.

Actionable Insights: You’ll receive specific recommendations tailored to your business goals, including quick fixes and long-term strategies to improve your site’s performance.

To give you an idea of the value we bring, I’m happy to share some case studies and reviews from clients who’ve seen great results with our help.

Let’s set up a time for a call to go through the audit findings and discuss how we can implement these improvements together. I promise it will be worth your time!

Looking forward to hearing from you.

Best regards,

[Your Name]

[Your Position]

[Your Agency]

[Your Contact Information]

P.S. This offer is available for a limited time, so don’t miss out on this opportunity to give your website the boost it deserves! Act now to secure your free audit.

By focusing on the value and ensuring the process is clear and straightforward, you can effectively pitch a free audit to potential clients and increase your chances of converting them into paying customers.

To recap we covered:

When presenting free audits, you’re demonstrating that you’re willing to provide a great deal of value to the prospect for free, so imagine the kind of value they would get if they eventually became a paying customer?

That’s the main priority for any business looking to work with an agency on their digital presence, so for you to able to demonstrate that right off the bat will create trust between you and our prospect instantly.

Audits are a fantastic value-add asset for agencies of all sizes and Insites is the one-stop shop for all the tools you need to effectively audit websites and digital presence, give you all the information and talking points around these audits and even generate the leads and prospects which you would pitch the free audits to.

Hopefully we’ve now shown you the value that free audits can bring your agency, so why not give them a go?

If you’re stuck with where to start then we have a no obligation free forever subscription, that you can sign up to and try out using digital audits risk-free!

Book a discovery call today. We’d be happy to welcome you on board!