How Acerta’s digital strategy attracts ambitious entrepreneurs

Jan 26, 2024

sales, marketing and service

Becoming self-employed is not something you have to do all by yourself. HR service providers like Acerta provide a range of essential services for starters, including payroll, HR, legal advice, and more. To persuade entrepreneurs, they set up an intricate strategy that includes online and offline channels. Acerta called in delaware’s expertise and support to strengthen and expand the digital aspects – with great success.

Client: Acerta, the largest HR service provider in Belgium, boasts a network of 25 offices and a customer base exceeding 400,000.
Challenge: Expanding Acerta's digital presence and further grow its market share.
Solution: strategic support in search engine marketing, UX optimization, and the 'digital translation' of new marketing campaigns.

Challenge: acquiring new, self-employed starters

In early 2022, Acerta asked delaware to help its organization grow in the field of performance and digital marketing, with a specific focus on acquiring new, self-employed starters. “Through several workshops and meetings, we first conducted a comprehensive analysis of Acerta’s existing marketing strategy and benchmarked it against the digital marketing landscape for HR and social insurance funds in Belgium.”

delaware differentiated itself by very clearly stating what they don’t offer. That clear-headed, no-nonsense approach fits perfectly with Acerta’s values of recognizability and reliability.

Rachel Ho, marketing manager at Acerta

“Next, we defined a number of hard and soft KPIs and set a target for each one,” adds Acerta’s marketing manager Rachel Ho. Armed with the necessary information, the team drew up a strategic plan.

To achieve the set targets, Acerta decided to focus on:

Google Ads (f.k.a. Google AdWords) (SEA): setting up a new Ads strategy, based on conversion value-based bidding and an adapted account structure.
Search engine optimization (SEO): prioritizing SEO optimizations according to urgency, effort, and results.
Automation: optimizing the current Acoustic automation flows.
Enhanced UX: updating Acerta’s website resulting in higher performance of this digital channel.

Acerta also engaged delaware to support its digital marketing campaigns. Serge Lemmens, marketing strategist at delaware: “Every 4 to 6 months, a new campaign is launched, often via radio. Our mission is to make the message of the campaigns ‘resonate digitally’, for example, through the use of social media. Acerta specifically asked us to introduce video as a different means of distributing Acerta’s messages online.”

“One campaign, supported by the government, was focused on preventing burnout and improving the mental well-being of entrepreneurs at work. Together with Acerta, we created a digital plan to spread the message and convince people to perform a scientifically substantiated self-scan on their mental well-being, set up with the help of psychologists. Depending on their score, Acerta suggested participants to follow webinars and training courses, for example, on stress management.

After working with numerous consultants, delaware was like a breath of fresh air. Yes, they set ambitious goals, but they always complement high-level strategic thinking with a realistic and incremental approach.

Rachel Ho, marketing manager at Acerta

The results: steady growth on all fronts

Today, Acerta is reaping the rewards of the project. In March 2023, the number of registered starters on the Acerta website was 25% higher compared to the year before. “We’ve set up a series of dashboards so that both parties can keep track of the results,” Serge says. “We hold weekly operational meetings with the delaware team on Friday,” Rachel adds. “And in the quarterly meetings, we evaluate how we’ve performed, and whether we need to adjust course.

“It’s been a pleasure working with the people at delaware so far,” she concludes. “They’ve done a fantastic job in bringing our digital marketing strategy to life and increasing our market share. I’m already looking forward to the upcoming campaigns. For now, let’s hope more and more new starters will find their way to Acerta.”